There comes a time when you have to acknowledge the ease to which the red tide can furiously flow forth along narrowed gulleys, scarring the land with molten words and burning the soul with righteous indignation. Oh the ease to which the fire can violently heat the waters of the heart, scalding those select few that you chose to bathe with, tattooing your entire world scarlet, binding you to the perpetually rotating Wheel in chains of vitriol.
Why should you tame the flame, you hear the Voice say. You have the right to react, to defend, to protect, to survive, after all. It is dog eat dog, isn’t it? Darwin said that it is survival of the fittest, strongest, loudest.
What goes around comes around. They had it coming. I’m not taking this anymore. I’ve hidden away for too long. I will have my say. I will put them in their place. I want you regardless of the consequences. I’ll have you. You’ll get some. I’ll teach you…
Perhaps you feel justified to vent, letting out the insufferable steam, directing towards those who have triggered you. Perhaps you are overcome with a sickening myopic desire, a rising tide that feeds an insatiable hunger that burns your soul. Or perhaps you tire of keeping it all in…
But there comes a time when you have to choose between what is true and what is easy; what is right and what is justice; what is simple and honest and what binds you.
Will you walk through the pillars of Grace and Severity, taming your ego so you can hear the droning tone of spirit, freeing yourself from the fettered binds that trap you within your own prison walls and the repetitious circuit of grinding stone around and around? Will you transmute the curding adrenaline, freeing yours aching soul from self-centred righteousness and the ache of guilt and the pain that has to be destroyed? Will you transmute the fire of the belly into the flame of the soul? Will you open up to a heart-centred consciousness and live metaphysically instead of physically?
Remember, the easy path is the familiar one. Has that worked?
Maybe it is time for the path less travelled.
Art by Kevin Carden
Reflections on Mars’ conjunction to Antares, at the Heart of the Scorpion and the Flaming Arrow of the Spirit.
