THE UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY

[RonPrice]

As my own days pass swifter than the twinkling of an eye, I offer here in this autobiography something of my experience with the relentless acceleration of forces[1] in the dynamic span of epochs that have been the background of my life. I offer, too, layers of memories that have coalesced, that have condensed, into a single substance, a single rock, the rock of my life. But this rock of my life possesses streaks of color which point to differences in origin, in age and in the formation of this rock.

It helps to be a geologist to interpret their meaning and I, like most people, have no advanced training or study in geology. So it is that my memories have fused together and they are not fully understood. Perhaps by my latter, my later, years; perhaps in an afterlife, in that Undiscovered Country when I enter the land of lights, then, I will understand. In the interim, though, I give the reader my rendition of the creative, revolutionary, unprecedented character of a new spiritual and social vision, a complex one that transcends eastern, western, traditional and modern categories of social analysis, one that has inspired my life.

[1] The Universal House of Justice, Ridvan 157.

 

[RonPrice]

As my own days pass swifter than the twinkling of an eye, I offer here in this autobiography something of my experience with the relentless acceleration of forces[1] in the dynamic span of epochs that have been the background of my life. I offer, too, layers of memories that have coalesced, that have condensed, into a single substance, a single rock, the rock of my life. But this rock of my life possesses streaks of color which point to differences in origin, in age and in the formation of this rock.

It helps to be a geologist to interpret their meaning and I, like most people, have no advanced training or study in geology. So it is that my memories have fused together and they are not fully understood. Perhaps by my latter, my later, years; perhaps in an afterlife, in that Undiscovered Country when I enter the land of lights, then, I will understand. In the interim, though, I give the reader my rendition of the creative, revolutionary, unprecedented character of a new spiritual and social vision, a complex one that transcends eastern, western, traditional and modern categories of social analysis, one that has inspired my life.

[1] The Universal House of Justice, Ridvan 157.

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More on the afterlife.......

THE LANGUAGE OF THERE

1992 was an auspicious juncture in the history of The Baha'i Faith. That year Roger White published not only his final major book of poetry, Occasions of Grace, but also two small volumes: The Language of There and Notes Postmarked the Mountain of God. 1992 also marked the hundredth anniversary of the ascension of Baha'u'llah in 1892. In the Ridvan Message that year, in April 1992, the Universal House of Justice referred to "an onrushing wind...clearing the ground for new conceptions," "some mysterious, rampant force" and a "quickening wind." It was this wind which was ventilating our "modes of thought...renewing, clarifying and amplifying our perspectives." Perhaps White's final blasts of poetry were part of this "befitting demarcation," this Holy Year.

By the end of that Holy Year in May 1993 White had left this earthly life. This "special time for a rendezvous of the soul with the Source of its light and life....a time of retreat to one's innermost being," to which the Universal House of Justice called all Baha'is in April 1992 did arrive quite literally for Roger White. Perchance the soul of Roger White was being filled, as that year came to an end, in that undiscovered country "with the revivifying breath" of Baha'u'llah's celestial power "from His retreat of deathless splendour."1

In October 1992 I received a copy of The Language of There in the mail. Six months later Roger left this mortal coil and all "the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune," "the heartache and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is air to" that Hamlet spoke so eloquently of in the beautifully modulated rhythms of that soliloquy in Act III Scene I of Shakespeare's play by that name. The last published poem and piece of prose on the last two pages of this small volume of poetry speak volumes and so I will quote them here. White's last words, quite literally, seem perfectly appropriate in this final essay on his final works. These last words embody the thinking of a lifetime, as so many of White's poems do, and the delight he found for his spirit in giving expression to the truths he found in life.

THE LANGUAGE OF THERE

I mean to learn, in the language of where I am going, barely enough to ask for food and love.-James Merrill

Yes. There, light will be our language,
a tongue without words for
perhaps, or arid, or futile,
though shadow will be retained
that we may contrast the radiance.
Almost will no longer be a measure.

We will learn a hundred synonyms for certitude,
and love will have a thousand conjugations.
Ours will be the italicised vocabulary
of delectable astonishments.
The possessive case will play no part
in the grammar of joy and burgeoning,
infants will speak at birth, and only the ancients
will remember the obscenity exile.

There, laughter will be spelt in capitals,
sadness grow obsolete,
and negation be declared archaic.
Hell will be pronounced remoteness,
and vast tomes will be devoted
to the derivations of yes.
Where all is elation and surprise
exclamation points will fall into disuse.

There, food and affection will be ours for a smile,
and immortality for a fluent, knowing wink.
In time, our desire to speak will abandon us.
All that need be said the light will say. Yes.


[1] All of the references in this paragraph are to the Universal House of Justice Ridvan Message 1992.