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Headless Wonder
When I was born I had no head
And my eye was single
And my whole body was filled with Light
And the Light that I was, was the the Light that I saw by
And the Light that I saw by, was the Light that I was
"Douglas Traherne Harding" by Mike Heron - Incredible String Band
Go ask Douglas....when
he's ten feet tall....
or some sentient beings
and also the headless Tao
Or look at Thomas Traherne, if you have a mystical Christian tendency... or just like art, science and spiritual matters
Enjoy!
I have put this up with the full knowledge of what Douglas put in the introduction to the first edition of the book in 1967 - about what happened when he tried to explain his wonderful moment of 'illumination' -
'Discussion proved almost invariably quite fruitless. "Naturally I can't
see my head," my friends would say. "So what?" And foolishly I
would begin to reply: "So everything! So you and the whole world are turned
upside down and inside out..." It was no good. I was unable to describe my
experience in a way that interested the hearers, or conveyed to them anything of
its quality or significance. ... Here was something perfectly obvious, immensely
significant, a revelation of pure and astonished delight - to me and nobody
else! When people start seeing things others can't see, eyebrows are raised,
doctors sent for. And here was I in much the same condition, except that mine
was a case of NOT seeing things. Some loneliness and frustration were
inevitable. This is how a real madman must feel (I thought) - cut off, unable to
communicate.'