Dante
Lisa Walford
The Last Canto of Paradisio, Dante
As I drew nearer to the end of all desire,
I brought my longing's ardor to a final height,
Just as I ought. My vision, becoming pure,
Entered more and more the beam of that high light
That shines on its own truth. From then, my seeing
Became too large for speech, which fails at a sight
Beyond all boundaries, at memory's undoing—
As when the dreamer sees and after the dream
The passion endures, imprinted on his being
Though he can't recall the rest. I am the same:
Inside my heart, although my vision is almost
Entirely faded, droplets of its sweetness come
The way the sun dissolves the snow's crust—
The way, in the wind that stirred the light leaves,
The oracle that the Sibyl wrote was lost.
Canto 33 (lines 46-48 & 52-66), by Dante Alighieri (translated by Robert Pinsky)
For centuries mystics, theologians, monks, priests, rabbis, imans, shamans, sufis, poets, have mentioned an experience akin to a divine presence within. Here, Sibyl refers to female prophets or oracles in Ancient Greece. Perhaps we were once more atuned to these transcendent moments.
The nineteenth century poet Goethe called it The Holy Longing and explained is like this (partial):
Tell a wise person, or else keep silent,
because the massman will mock it right away.
I praise what is truly alive,
what longs to be burned to death.
...Now you are no longer caught
in the obsession with darkness,
and a desire for a higher love-making
sweeps you upward.
Distance does not make you falter,
now, arriving in magic, flying,
and, finally, insane for the light,
you are the butterfly and you are gone.
And sl long as you have not experienced
this: to die and so to grow, you are only a troubled guest
on the dark earth.
Iyengar says: To discover the individual soul you need inspiration, the creative force of breathing in. To discover the Cosmic Soul you need the courage to release, to breath out, to make the ultimate surrender. (Light on Life)