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This Face That Burns Upon My Eye In Searing Fiery Gale (Heaven 006)

from Dr Who Am I and the Zen Trails of Hafiz (album) by Bardonthewire

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about

What happens

The grail knights ascend to the sixth heaven, to attain mastery of the heart, (ie the second aspect of the mind - feelings.) They endure an agony of bliss. All that is left of them is an inner Eye consumed with the fire of love. The crashing of their Lancelot vessel (the highest craft of all) in the searing fiery gale (the Beloved's revealed Face/ the Sun) occurs not at the end of the heaven but is itself the heaven. Now only a lover's leap remains between them and the God that fills their Eye, but they cannot leap themselves to do it.


Form and technique

The Hafiz prefix - a couplet describing the sixth heaven- is spoken during the main sung ghazal The overwhelming feelings in this heaven are relentless and incessant suggested first in an unforgiving rhythm and then an unresting melody. There isn't much time for a singer to breathe in between the relentless beats and notes of this ghazal. Only consummation of self in the other can relieve the strain and this is impossible while separate existence continues.

The spoken dialogue attempts to describe the blissful agony, referencing Frodo in Mordor but with Lothlorien in his mind's Eye. The theme of imminent self-consummation through the highest human love is supported by allusions to the Eastern and Western self-transcending loves of Leila and Majnun; Lancelot and Guinevere and the grail quest. The paradoxes employed throughout the track convey the ambiguity of this heaven- a love-bliss of complete fulfilment (indescribable to anyone who has not experienced it) that is un-endurable.


The allegory

In the sixth heaven the grail knight achieves full mastery of the mental world, feelings as well as thoughts. He/she wants only Everything - God - which s/he contemplates in blissful agony but cannot actually have without surrendering his/her own separate existence.

lyrics

Ma darpiyalih ak-i rukh-i yar didih im
Ay bikhabar zi lazzat-i shurb-i mudam-i ma (Hafiz.)
'We have seen the face of the Beloved reflected in the (heart's) cup
O ignorant one, no notion have you of the bliss we imbibe therefrom.'

This bliss is agony. I’m looking at you and seeing a Me I can’t have.
So near and so far.
Everything!
And nothing.
Frodo stumbling through Mordor. Seeing Lothlorien in his mind’s eye
I’m going out of my mind. There’s a ring of fire where my mind’s eye used to be.
Step into it.

This face that burns upon my Eye in searing fiery gale:
More clear than any seen on Earth or heavenward trail.

The Lancelot shot down in flames, the highest craft of all:
Conception deconstructed lifting Guinevere’s veil.

‘I see your face in everything, but cannot leap the gulf
Between belief in what I see and being what I fail.’

It’s Leila’s I-consuming, never-ending, parted love
For Majnu, her sole bleeding where his sole trod upon a nail.

He feels his wreck in her, a bliss that pierces his heart
And bleeds from hers like wounds of Passion’s holiest nail.

The agony of longing long, the ecstasy of pain
In hearts that See their grail through golden bars of a gaol!

Your Sun is Everything and there is nothing that is not the Sun:
My black hole All-consumed in one whole - yet shadows prevail.

In sainted flames of love, with nothing else it can see
It burns away in grief, this Eye that can’t have the Grail.

O Heart of Hearts, her Absent Heart is All to you now.
She’s in the Seventh Sun, where Lovers leap and visions...fail

©Gareth Calway 2016 published in "6 Degrees of Separation; 7 Degrees of Love" (Sheriar) http://garethcalway.blogspot.co.uk/2016/01/6-degrees-of-separation-7-degrees-of.html

credits

from Dr Who Am I and the Zen Trails of Hafiz (album), released July 10, 2021
Voices, (R&B) beatbox, guitar chord. Hendrix's "Burning of the midnight Lamp" for the second melody.

Pic of Lancelot and the Grail Maiden by Bhas Allan."We have seen the face of the Beloved in the heart's Cup/ O ignorant one, no conception have you of the bliss we derive therefrom." (Hafiz)

Source books for all seven heavens are "God Speaks" by Meher Baba; "The Nothing and the Everything" by Bhau Kalchuri/ Meher Baba.

Check out the sixth heaven on Gabriella Tal's sister album here - thebabalovers.bandcamp.com/album/gabriella-tal-performs-seven-flights-of-love

See also garethcalway.blogspot.co.uk/2016/01/6-degrees-of-separation-7-degrees-of.html

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about

Bardonthewire England, UK

Performance poetry with a library card (voice & drum, folk ballads, ghazals, sonnets, beat poems, sound poems, raps) much of it happening 'on the street' or jostling to be heard in the tavern. Researched stories of folk heroes and real folk. History for you. Bardic poetry striving (as all arts do) for the condition of music (from punk though rap to to prog). Visionary lit. for your average Blake. ... more

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