Ark in Time

Mankind rides the swallowing sea of time and death, rising
and plummeting, flourishing then all but disappearing
from the hollowed horizon. Through it all, ever sheltered
in the heart that mothers the mind, is an ancient wisdom,
transformation’s secrets readying their next expression:
Ascending in Egyptian pyramids from a great science
of immortality, then eroding into dead stone;
rising again as temples of philosophy that then lose
through centuries their reason in arthritic argument;
in Christ’s cathedrals climbing heavenly light, in stupas
to the Enlightened One blessing like stars the landscape’s peace,
then drained and distracted, abandoning shells of glory
to rot in dogma and buy the insurance of belief.
So as mankind transforms his fateful craft, his Ark in time,
so the single human being, on his own scale, transforms
the chaos of his thoughts, the earthbound bargaining of flesh,
and finds in the Ark’s ongoing an artistry of life,
a consciousness of higher being, a deathless purpose.
The Ark abides in Golden Age and in Apocalypse,
and from its deck of willing work to each instructed man
extends eternal possibility – transcendent sight.
No hope for man without the Ark, no Ark without each man
resolving to a soul. So we sail on, remastering
the ocean’s terror and despair, the perils of this age,
with each aware of feeling, breathing, thinking going on
here below observing consciousness. There is room aboard.