I read and ponder once again
The wisdom of a favorite sage
And realize that on this page
Are thoughts and visions of my youth

What happened to the "I" who sits
Some fifty-odd years now beyond
The boy who really sensed and knew
The universe and Nature True?

The obfuscations were built up
By straying from the purity
Of innocent acceptance of
Direct experience of Now

The seven sins, the Sirens' songs
Encaptured then enfeebled me
And now that I can set them by
I happily regain the mien...

...Of Lewis Carroll's favorite:
"... child of the pure unclouded brow"

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3 July 1998
Los Gatos, California
NB1: The "favorite sage, in this case, is Alan Watts. The book: "Nature, Man and Woman."
NB2: The quotation is remembered from a circa 1947 reading of the dedication by Lewis Carroll to his "Alice in Wonderland": "O child of the pure unclouded brow." I did not then understand what it meant -- I thought it might be a joke that I didn't understand due to my youthful ignorance. I remember this quite clearly.

07/03/1998

Posted on 01/03/2002
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