Monday, February 4, 2019

Arlene Corwin writes


I Don’t Think I Want Fame

I don’t think I want fame;
It takes so damned much time.
I glance at Instagram.
It’s so demanding, damned demanding,

If it doesn’t come to me
Completely freely,
Then I’ll offer up pursuit. It doesn’t
Suit my person;
Talents, aptitudes – not one.

Photos those –
Keeping up and putting on
Day after day each movement’s fuss –
Ridiculous!
What’s vanity but narcissism!
Pointless,
Infantile tourism
Of the global kind.
Left behind a schism
Between means and end.

Transient, short-lived, fame’s a trend:
Here today and gone the way it came.

Synonyms you ought to to learn:
Fleeting, fading, fugitive;
Momentary, temporary:
Life that has no real live.
One could go on, on, on and on.

I do not want to spend my time
On something that is here and gone:
Never really here: illusion.
Maya, the Mirror of Illusions -- Arthur Bowen Davies

1 comment:

  1. In ancient Vedic literature, maya (probably derived from the Sanscrit "mā," to measure) implied extraordinary power and wisdom but later connoted an illusion by which things appear to exist but are not what they seem. In other contexts it is that which exists but is constantly changing and thus is spiritually unreal" or the principle that conceals the true character of spiritual reality. However, it may also have been derived from the prefix"may-", meaning mystify, confuse, intoxicate, delude, or disappear, be lost." If it is derived from "man-" (to think), it implies the role of imagination in the creation of the world.

    In the 6th or 7th century, Gaudapada wrote the "Maṇḍukya Karika," a concise explanation in verse form of the doctrines in "Mandukya Upanishad," which consisted of just 12 sentences. In Gaudapada's explication,

    The Soul is imagined first, then the particularity of objects,
    External and internal, as one knows so one remembers.
    As a rope, not perceived distinctly in dark, is erroneously imagined,
    As snake, as a streak of water, so is the Soul (Atman) erroneously imagined.
    As when the rope is distinctly perceived, and the erroneous imagination withdrawn,
    Only the rope remains, without a second, so when distinctly perceived, the Atman.
    When he as Pranas (living beings), as all the diverse objects appears to us,
    Then it is all mere Maya, with which the Brahman (Supreme Soul) deceives himself.

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