Five Mirrors

Somewhere in the desert there is a circle
of five broken mirrors left
by the first settlers from Europe.
They were set by a missionary,
a mystic, renowned for his eccentricity.
He would sit there in the middle of the mirrors
with a pile of stones
and look at his reflection all around.
After he sat there for forty-nine days
he took up the stones in his hands
and threw them through each in the ring of mirrors.
Without the five-fold testimony of his own image
the mystic no longer knew himself
apart from the universe.

Don’t be the whirlpool; be the ocean.
Don’t be the lightbulb; be the circuit.

I am like three acute angles
that set in a circle imply a triangle,
but I’m not a triangle, I’m the center
which is empty and anywhere equally.

I am like these metaphors,
like fingers pointing to an empty spot,
pointing to something left unsaid.
I am the unsaid thing.

The words of the metaphor are spoken
and fall into silence once again.
Erroneously we call the words the self.
In this sense, there is no me at all.

I am like ten thousand dervishes whirling for annihilation,
yet when they pass out they simply wake up again.
I am a rock passing through a circle of mirrors,
but hitting only the empty space in the middle.
I am like life evolving through a billion forms
and never finding any type of permanent perfection.

I forget I am the openness.
I forget I am the desert.

-BTN '07