MEDITATION W_LK

First off, I do not want to come of as overly cynical, I am grateful that a place as beautiful as Audubon Park exists for us to enjoy, but I stumbled upon something on my walk that was simply too ironic to ignore.
This archway reading "Meditation Walk" (the A is now missing), marks the entrance to the Heymann Memorial Conservatory, which was a botanical display initiated in 1884 along with Horticulture Hall. In 1898, a golf course portioned off a great expanse of the free space in which the display existed. Upon meeting this archway, I laughed at what I saw through what was supposed to be the portal to a peaceful world of tranquil outdoors reflection. The scene I witnessed: a group of hard-boiled-egg-bellied men on the aforementioned golf course, waddling to and from their golf carts, adjusting their khakis, groaning about some new lawsuit as they lined up to tap their little white balls; all this framed with the iron-working of the arch. The mood was anything but meditative; nature only existed as a putting green. This could very well be these men's only contact with nature, "getting out for 9 holes"; the thought crossed my mind that if there had been electrical outlets in the tree trunks, these men surely would have plugged their laptops into them.

I sound rather biting, but at that moment, I felt angry and I wanted to criticize these men straight to their face. Alas, I was on a meditative walk in "nature," I was not there to talk to people, so I continued on my way wondering how that archway had become so inane, about "What man has made of man." The park today is a far cry from the same area which would have been experienced by the romantics. It was difficult to see those oaks, the same oaks that they saw, in the context of joggers who only had thirty minutes to get in their workout, in the context of casual utility. These trees no longer stand as focal points or entryways into worlds of imaginative bliss, but as the backdrop to the daily grind, simply something nice to glance at as you come round your third lap. We have filled our lives with the unnecessary and the transient, to the point that we do not even have time to be with ourselves, in our own minds. The romantics took the time to get out of this world and into the world of nature which does not care whether or not you have only written four pages of that eight page paper. In nature, everything comes into focus, the frivolities of man made reality peel away like layers of cheap paint. All our stresses, our commitments, the schedules upon which we base our everyday are constructs, things that could be dropped in a split second and the world would continue. Something I briefly jotted down while I paused on my walk:

Men hold fast to sentiments
that will not save them.
The shaggy tree that leans just so,
the grass that nips at its roots,
the duck that guides
the green blades to water's edge,
they will all eventually die.
Never to come back,
never to be mourned,
never aware they were there at all.
Men hold fast to sentiments
that will never save them.

Not a good poem, but definitely a reflection of my immediate sentiments during the walk.

Meditation

Adding to the long list of contradictions attributed to the ideologies of William Blake we recently touched upon the differences of sight and vision as an extension of the body functioning as the prison of the soul. Picture your face, your outward signifier of social difference. Corporeal sight functions as a way of internalizing the physical world around us. I see you, that tree, and those telephone poles and I understand that I am seeing such objects. The instant my eyes set upon an object, my brain automatically interprets, reasons what that object is. It becomes real to me, exists in my immediate reality. When I close my eyes, however, that reality does not go away. Just because I can not see your face does not mean that your face no longer exists in my perceived reality. It remains in my memory, in my imagination, which exists beyond the tangible world. Blake argues that man is blinded in a sense by corporeal sight; that the world can be experienced more fully through imaginative vision. Imagination pushes us beyond the bounds of reason and exposes that reason itself is bounded.

I think that the most immediate way in which to explore outside the bounds of reason is through meditation. The Romantics may not have called their walks through nature meditation, but that is definitely what they were doing. Contemporary life does not always lend to the physical exploration of natural settings, so meditation offers a sort of out of body experience that can happen in your own home. I always thought of meditating just as a way for the body to relax, a calming experience rather than an internal exploration. My sister-in-law encouraged me to start meditating for a half hour or so every day to help with anxieties and stress, etc. But then she came over with a guided meditation of past life regressions and asked if I was interested (she was doing a paper for one of her graduate classes). I thought that it would be fun to try, but I didn't think that anything could actually happen because I have never really been able to relax enough to be hypnotized. But it turned out to be an amazing exercise in allowing the imaginative mind to overtake your corporeal body, and all rationality or reason aside, explore parts of the mind that I didn't think accessible.

It began as all guided meditations do, dark room, very quiet and relaxed setting, breathing exercises to bring about the most relaxing state. Her voice soothed and quieted my thoughts, focused only on a bright light. As the regression continued, she eventually led me to a door, and as the door opened the threshold of reason and imagination was crossed. Asking descriptive questions about my surroundings, she encouraged me to describe all that I was seeing (silently of course). Where was I? What environment surrounded me? What was I wearing? Was I male or female? Going into this regression, of course I thought about what kind of individual it would be cool to think that I was in a past life. Of course I thought of great women throughout history, in the style of Elizabeth or Marie Antoinette. I can with absolute honesty say that the vision I had during this meditation was the furthest thing from my mind possible. I was standing on the bank of a river, surrounded by green, an ancient temple in the distance. I could feel the cool wind on my naked body. I looked down at my hands, large, dark working hands. I knew that I was male. I didn't see my body, I just understood that I was male and I was naked. I was jerked awake from the vision and I sat up, my sister-in-law curiously asking if I had seen anything. Had the regression worked? And I was silent. My mind was trying to reason what I had just experienced. But I couldn't.

Throughout reading Blake in this class I have been thinking about this experience. I don't necessarily believe that I was actually a man in some ancient civilization (I latched on to Mayan civilization for some reason), but I think that it makes me feel what Blake is trying to express when he says that reason is bounded and that imagination allows us to bridge that boundary.

SUVs Aren't All That Bad

Of all of the mind boggling interpretations of our Romantic readings and complex discussions, this statement from the first day made a particular impact on my way of thinking about this course: Romantics experienced their world by walking. So simple. I know. Nonetheless, it posed a particularly obvious question: How do I experience my world? Digesting the question, I got into my car to go home when the answer suddenly dawned upon me. I’ll leave walking to the Romantics; I prefer driving.

A few years ago, driving represented the necessary evil to getting anywhere. It was a nuisance, and I avoided it at all costs. Recently, though, I’ve come to appreciate my car as a place where I can collect and organize thoughts, the portal to peace of mind. Since the semester began, I find myself overwhelmed with all of the information thrown at me in class, particularly Romanticism and Apocalypse: Literature and Critical Theory. And while I cannot sit here and recite all of the complicated particulars of class, I can assure you that this constant state of confusion has been more than beneficial to the way that I evaluate the world while driving. Even though I don’t come to any concise conclusions, I nonetheless find solace in my attempts. Reflecting while driving becomes a strange experience in itself though. My best thinking is done in a state of complete thoughtlessness, windows down, music up, hand swimming smoothly through the air.

Through the polarities of thought and thoughtlessness, I’m able to escape to a place unattainable by anyone else. Who knew that a car could provide such an escape? These thoughts particularly came to mind when reading Blake’s “The Marriage of Heaven and Hell,” namely this line: Importance makes strait roads, but the crooked roads without improvement are roads of Genius. Always driving around New Orleans, I know all too well of these “crooked roads,” though they take more of the form of potholes and protuberances in the roads. Created from the tension between the potentially smooth ride my car can provide and the streets that prevent this from happening, the perfect ride occurs, perfect because of its contradiction-driven energy. The ride may not be stereotypically smooth, and passengers can expect at least one gut-wrenching jolt to avoid a flat tire. However, these jolts remind of us that we are constantly in flux with the roads on which we drive, in flux with the world around us. The world’s roads come in a variety of lengths, types, and conditions and help serve as a reminder that not everything is laid out before us; we sometimes have to take a different route that may not be as smooth and provides a challenge. The rational car brings us along the network of imaginative roads, destination unknown

Reflections...

...on Coleridge and returning to College.

I was reintroduced to University this week, after a nearly four year hiatus; it's a bit of an anomaly. My hiatus included living in three different states (now four including Louisiana), working as a barista, a nanny, and tutor while attending classes at the local community college. I worked as an administrative assistant at a folk music organization and spent time traveling to Ireland for a a singing workshop, merriment, and blarney of course. Various other 9-5 jobs line my resume, but they all still left me scrambling for rent and food money. It's interesting what desperation does to your sensibilities and spirit. I feel like I developed a fairly "practical" approach to things, and matured my "idealism", sometimes to the chagrin of my creative faculties.

I had forgotten that as an English major, returning to school meant having the exquisite pleasure and luxury of explicating poetry, and delving deeply into the meaning of existence through literature. I can ponder identity and self, creation and truth, beauty and destruction. This right now is actually my job! It's almost perplexing.

Perhaps a few years ago, I was much more apt to get swept up and completely enveloped in these thoughts and exercises, loose myself an idealism of Romantic rhetoric. "What does it all mean?" or "is there any meaning?" become mantras; an insatiable metaphysical hunger for knowledge to quell these questions ensues. I still have that hunger for knowledge, but its different now; that deep quest isn't so demanding. Coming back affords me a different perspective, a critical distance where I am not so easily persuaded away from the terrestrial world. Still I am torn between practicality and poetry; idealism and pragmatism; discovery and experience.

Reading "Kubla Khan" jolted me back into that space of dreams, seeking, and uncertainty. Reminiscent of my underground poetry society at Wittenberg University, Coleridge very aptly elucidates this paradox between two worlds; our imperfect earthly domain, and a world beyond this one, an "imagination rendered through the voice of the poet." Perfect, except a little addiction to opium. This dream world is not tainted by our pain and destruction; it is spiritual, and creative. His distress comes from being interrupted in this memory by obligation, falling away from his feelings of ecstasy, possibility and beauty.

I too feel his distress, as I also feel interrupted in my quest, the quest for the higher self . An illness in my sophomore year of college left a schism in my development of personal philosophy and discovery of self, and I had to return home to get well. Deep depression followed, and my journey of discovery took a different route. I error. Innocence and wonder is a bit more aged now. Its like Coleridge's vision, in trying to remember it, you can never quite fully reclaim it.

Coleridge, I empathize with your bewilderment.

But I am also critical.

For Coleridge and many poets like him, there is that deep and aching desire to live outside of this "practical" world that interrupts our creative and poetic "genius". The ability to even hint in fractions at this ever evading place of beauty and freedom beyond ourselves is what the poet must do. He must be that bridge, and Coleridge would have rather failed--or died-- than to do it imperfectly. But imperfection is all he is ever able to achieve, as "Kubla Khan" only hints in fractions at this world in which he saw. Perhaps fully attaining this world is impossible for humans--even poets-- and we dull our senses striving for that eternal flame that perpetually eludes us. The coal of Coleridge's "poetic genius" burned hot and bright for a short time with nothing to fan the embers, and keep the fire going.

Again I am caught, is he really genius? or just manic and stubborn? I feel the disconnect of the worlds Coleridge describes. I have seen the changes in myself over the past 7 years; from striving for the castle in the sky to loving the earth where my feet are planted. Cradled between a love of literature, rhetoric, and discovering beauty, and being practical, I've questioned the validity and relevance of "Kubla Khan". Its so distant from us, almost unattainable?

I both cherish and detest his somewhat vain and solipsistic quest. We must seek more than this world--yes Coleridge we must stay flexible to the impossible--but we must also be useful in this life, to this world and not absent from it. I too have one foot on the ground and one in the sky, and a fire in my belly to build a bridge, but I do not wish to burn my toes, or float away.

I've concluded, after considering this paradox, that I must learn to be comfortable in contradiction, and the meaning comes in balance. I do not wish to float away to Xanadu, but maybe to bring it closer to home, home being where ever I plant my feet for the time being.

I create my world

One of the romantic ideas: it is the individual that constructs and creates everything that exists.
But isn’t this valid today as well? I create my world as I want it to be. I want a world full of music? Than my world will be full of music. I like reading – my world will contain a lot of books.
I construct my world.
You construct a different world; you construct your own world.
How I see the world depends on my dreams, wishes, imaginations. It depends on my cultural background and education. It depends on my experiences; it depends on my personality.
I decide what shall be important in my world, so I somehow create everything that is in it. And by doing so,
I create my life. Every year, every day, every minute.
There must be thousands and thousands of worlds around me which I do not know. But I can discover them.
Isn’t this a wonderful idea?

World Liters

Full of ideas, emotions, loves, hates, desires, questions, answers
Overflowing with the need to express---
Everything
Nothing
Of the world, and for the world,
But most importantly, this is our
body. soul. mind.
online.

A Class of Literature, An Assembly of Students

An environment,

Where text pages are heavy from analysis, Time, and immortal words.

Where we observe the pace of Nature at our own.

Where we saunter, making full our baskets of Knowledge with blooms unique to the Path we wander.

Where we feel first, feel second, and finally Act but not before feeling a little bit more.

We do as the Romantics did.

We read what they said, bleed as they bled.