The Tale Of One-Eye, Two-Eyes, Three-Eyes, And Argus-Eyed

I.

She lived in a cave—
Cyclops bedded a daughter of Hades and Persephone,
Thence the Spelunkers
Who have shunned the sun as if the devil
And marked their timings
By the differentiation of shadows
Verniered to exactitude
By equinox and solstice
And the movements of the moon.
Candled or phosphorescence
She and her offspring have shunned the day,
The battles and bickering of men,
Gossiping all the while and caring less,
Feasting on carcasses and wine
Avoiding all scenes especially when dramatic.
Protected from invasion, pestilence and drought,
The race persists
(Brooding (their delight) in semi-darkness,
In indeterminable discussions,
To rhythms of bongo-drums,
Tapping of fossil-bones and beating of soft feet.
Suspended between sleep and wakefulness,
Instinct persisted along with animal-wisdom,
So often seeming fortunes could be read,
Thought the positive was beyond ‘prehension
Half-truths accepted,
And liars ostracized.
One-Eye and her brood die to avoid living,
But though the individual goes
The race runs on and one,
Half-beings in a world of endless potentiality
One-Eye, parodied and mocked,
You still retain the essence in sparkling gems,
In luminescent crystals and in waves of transmutation,
In the art of percussion and cavern paintings,
End the gloomy atmosphere of ancient cathedrals—
Never dying, never-living, neither transient nor eternal
Always about to be born, nature naturans.

II.

Two Eyes lives on surfaces
In a world of facts (which often have no meanings)
And meanings (which often have no facts),
Where victories cap struggles
With the abasement of the half-crowd
For the enjoyment of the others,
Where art is by line and form and shadow
And the camera the prince of instruments,
Exactituding the illusory moment,
Disdaining perfectionists
Who must be accused of witchcraft.
Gaze at this teeming world of pleasure
(Pleasure the genus—pain and masochims among the species)
Where to find satisfaction is treachery
And not to find it a crime—
Here Two-Eyes rules
Progenied from a legitimate line of practicality
(Meaning war and murder and perpetual disturbance)
(Meaning parks and gardens and endless possibility)
Too well know, too much described,
Damning, enchanting, noble, scurrilous,
Good-bad, bad-good, white versus black;
You-me, we-they, luminous cum opaque,
Opposites being unthinkable,
Which is to say, contrary to legislation
New words are substituted for new truths,
New meanings for new words,
Meanings are never repeated,
Palimpsesting to unconditioned ennui
Aging Heaven and Hell,
Praying for their manifestation,
But even more,
Praying that they never appear.

III.

Three-Eyes lives in heaven,
Here, there, everywhere—
Fairy, Apsara or Deva, I know not which,
For the immediate is of no determination
Save as it reflects a greater realm
Light shines in the light and the light comprehends it,
Attributing as colors, blends and tones.
Hers is the Eddington-world
(Anyone not a philosopher may know that)
Not imprisoned in time-seconds, or aeons
Nor buttered in procrustean chambers
She functions in perpetual harmonizations
Where moral qualities asymptote a stupendous symphony
Of forms, ideas and configurations,
Fundamental to all creativity,
Despised as Cassandra,
Doubly despised as Blavatsky,
She muses men, though she also may a-muse,
Instilling vision and procreativity,
Enhancing evolution,
Maneuvering against all retrogression,
Guarding the portals of ingenuity
That heaven may be reflected upon the earth
Or anywhere,
Even upon the heavens themselves.

IV

Argus-Eyed lives—
The daughter of the great Hercules it is said,
Or of his line;
And life and death and heaven and hell within here,
To be produced retracted or displayed
As she herself proclaims.
She portrays in Euclid or in Lobechevsky or Riemann,
Showing no preferences to her forms,
Direct immediate, and no waste
Of energy in anything she does.
She sings her melodies and symphonies
Cybernatizing their echoes and effects
And superintendence the weaving of dharmic patterns
Uncontrolled by Maya’s constant efforts
To deceive or guile or charm and circumscribe
The immediate is the all-sufficient,
The encompassing, the omnipresent—
No distance in infinitude,
No darkness—
She speaks—and it is done, no hiatus here;
She thinks—and it is finished—and to perfection
Yet she is with and not outside of law,
No anarchy but unsurpassable formatting,
The elements the same as those we know,
The patterns are not different
Yet start and finish are one—
A single stroke or mantric-word or mental-movement,
Await only for her signature
To be displayed in gallery or concert stage
Or laboratory.

What is Zen?
What is Zen—(remove the “what” and you have Zen.)