Experiences which repeat...until by some chance or
change we are able to recognize ourselves in a pattern:
only then, dreaming but lucidly, may we escape it...
and this is the truth that has been obscured by the
dogma of Reincarnation. It seemed such a secret--
to remember through whatever might come (even to
ego-death)--they took extraordinary precautions to
preserve this knowledge; what remains is but an
elaborate sarcophagus, & not even the dust of that
secret remains, in any living theology you can name,
among the very ones that discovered it. For an insight
really cannot be transmitted. Its idea can, but it has
to live in you by the fire of its spontaneous ignition. The
words alone won't do it. Worse, they put you to sleep more--
because you feel you're safe: the war has been won...
   Ah, but to keep a journal! You record
all your forgettings indelibly: you can never forget that you
forget, constantly & only relieved by intervals of clarity:
& not always those in which you write. Keeping a journal
is to realize the truth of reincarnation, & if you are of a
thoughtful disposition, it makes you more a philosopher
than any learned Ph.D. in its history, simply because you
interrogate yourself for the meaning of existence, not
on exceptional occasions, but habitually. I think i value this
more than the making of art, even if it is less perfect &
useless to others. That other is what i make of the flies
i catch; this is the very web of my spiderhood.