Threshold

Copyright 2011 by Stefan Bolz

This poem came about while thinking about an experience I had during a play I was in. I had been nervous before the show and just sat there trying to calm my mind a bit. For a moment I saw myself standing on stage in front of the audience, looking at them. My nervousness, my fear of judgment from them towards me based on my performance was for a moment exchanged by a deep experience of love that flowed freely between us. It was as if the veil of fear was lifted for an instant and the true emotion - love - was allowed to flow freely. At that moment, there was no fear of judgment, no nervousness, no dread to go out on stage. All there was - ALL there was -  was an intense feeling of love that was flowing between me and the audience. Everyone was very dear to me and I knew that I was dear to them. There was just no question about that. It was a given, like the sun rising in the morning and setting at night. It was the only reality there was between us. And like an underground river that nobody on the surface notices, the love flowed, not only unnoticed but also undisturbed by what was going on above it. I felt at that moment that love was the only true emotion that existed between us and that everything else was made up by me for one reason only - to not experience it. After a minute or so, I went back to my old and well known feeling of nervousness, a bit lessened perhaps but still present. The memory of the experience lingered a while longer before it disappeared leaving but the slightest trace behind.

*     *     *

Behind appearances
Beyond the sights you see
On the far side of the veil of fear
Far past the reaches of the world
And yet more near than breathe itself

There lies your brother's love waiting at the threshold to your Self
To give you comfort and the memory of love so deep
Your worldly feelings of it are no more
Then the tiniest sun beam is to the sun
A drop of water compared to the ocean.

Just past all grievances, all hatred and all fear,
Past conflict and each others guilt you hold so dear
You will find everything you want and everything the world
Has promised you since time began but hurled
Far far away from you beyond your hopeless grasp
Just one step past all this it waits in patience for your choice at last

And then in golden silence arising in your mind
The memory of home
Your love, your light, your life
The drop returns into the oceans womb
The sunbeam finally remembers that it is the sun

And with your fingers outstretched and your heart
Finally open, seeing what you are
The lover returns to the beloved
The endless circle ends where it began
And we say 'Amen'
And we say 'Amen'