breathing and the hum of the life support machinery that surrounded us. She was unconscious and I was reading a poem by William Blake called ‘Ah, Sunflower’. Like most of his poems it is short and simple, but really deep. Completely out of the blue, when I wasn’t even trying to understand the poem, I knew I was being talked to. Talked to by a guy who had been dead for a couple of hundred years. It was as clear and fresh as if he was standing beside me in that little room. Instead of finding meaning in the words I found God in the words. It was like getting an email straight into your brain, but a thousand times more powerful. Like William Blake himself stepping into my body and moving a few things around. It’s never happened since. It doesn’t need to because it still resonates in me like the music from a giant gong. I can’t imagine it ever going away now.”
I have never been much of a one for God and all that stuff, or the people who reckoned they spoke to Him on a regular basis. It’s like there’s this great joke that’s been told, and you’re the only one that doesn’t get it.
“From this one visitation,” Uncle Frank continued, “ everything made sense. I knew immediately that I had stumbled into the Palace of Wisdom after years of blundering around on the roads of excess. And from this one lesson, other teachings followed, and the main one is this…”
I waited but nothing followed. We sat for a long time saying nothing. Uncle Frank seemed to be struggling with something.
“We followers of William Blake don’t involve our children in the teachings directly. They must come to them through their own pathways when they are ready. But I think in your case, after what has happened to you, it is a bit different. So … so I’ll tell you this, for what it’s worth.”
Uncle Frank shifted on the fence post where he was perched and then began to speak slowly and carefully.
“Maybe it will make sense to you – maybe it will be complete gibberish. The universe is divided into two parts in the human mind, the known and the unknown. These two worlds are separated by the doors of perception. If we are lucky then at key times in our life we are able to open these doors and what can I say? Things make sense. Sounds simple but it gives you a marvellous feeling. Like floating on an ocean of peace.”
For some reason I thought of angels, lying about on fluffy white clouds.
“That sounds nice.”
“It
is
nice, and it will happen for you, and your dad, but it will happen in its own time and in its own way.”
“So this is the sort of stuff that you and the other Immortal William Blake followers talk about in the Palace of Wisdom. You learn stuff like this?”
“We don’t acquire knowledge so much as become knowledge.”
Well, he lost me there, so I let the matter drop. It doesn’t pay to show too much interest in these things otherwisepeople like Uncle Frank will never let up, and that’s pretty boring.
“Most of us live on the slopes of this mountain. There is a reason for that too.” He climbed stiffly off the strainer post and gestured to the snow capped peak behind us. “It’s a very special place this, Sandy. We see it as a new Jerusalem.”
“That’s how the farm got its name?”
“Exactly, but Jerusalem isn’t a place so much as a state of mind.”
I let him ramble on for another five minutes or so after that. It was all a bit much for me. Sick roses, worms, mental chains, poison trees, that sort of thing. I just kept on nodding and he kept on talking. It must have made sense to the other adults though, because they had formed a group called the New Jerusalem League.
After this we made our way slowly down the hill to where there was a proper path and then on to the race which led back to the house. There was a stand of trees just near the race and beside them stood a group of beehives. We detoured over to them.
Uncle Frank was keen to show me the honeycombs but I was nervous.
I have never been much of a one for God and all that stuff, or the people who reckoned they spoke to Him on a regular basis. It’s like there’s this great joke that’s been told, and you’re the only one that doesn’t get it.
“From this one visitation,” Uncle Frank continued, “ everything made sense. I knew immediately that I had stumbled into the Palace of Wisdom after years of blundering around on the roads of excess. And from this one lesson, other teachings followed, and the main one is this…”
I waited but nothing followed. We sat for a long time saying nothing. Uncle Frank seemed to be struggling with something.
“We followers of William Blake don’t involve our children in the teachings directly. They must come to them through their own pathways when they are ready. But I think in your case, after what has happened to you, it is a bit different. So … so I’ll tell you this, for what it’s worth.”
Uncle Frank shifted on the fence post where he was perched and then began to speak slowly and carefully.
“Maybe it will make sense to you – maybe it will be complete gibberish. The universe is divided into two parts in the human mind, the known and the unknown. These two worlds are separated by the doors of perception. If we are lucky then at key times in our life we are able to open these doors and what can I say? Things make sense. Sounds simple but it gives you a marvellous feeling. Like floating on an ocean of peace.”
For some reason I thought of angels, lying about on fluffy white clouds.
“That sounds nice.”
“It
is
nice, and it will happen for you, and your dad, but it will happen in its own time and in its own way.”
“So this is the sort of stuff that you and the other Immortal William Blake followers talk about in the Palace of Wisdom. You learn stuff like this?”
“We don’t acquire knowledge so much as become knowledge.”
Well, he lost me there, so I let the matter drop. It doesn’t pay to show too much interest in these things otherwisepeople like Uncle Frank will never let up, and that’s pretty boring.
“Most of us live on the slopes of this mountain. There is a reason for that too.” He climbed stiffly off the strainer post and gestured to the snow capped peak behind us. “It’s a very special place this, Sandy. We see it as a new Jerusalem.”
“That’s how the farm got its name?”
“Exactly, but Jerusalem isn’t a place so much as a state of mind.”
I let him ramble on for another five minutes or so after that. It was all a bit much for me. Sick roses, worms, mental chains, poison trees, that sort of thing. I just kept on nodding and he kept on talking. It must have made sense to the other adults though, because they had formed a group called the New Jerusalem League.
After this we made our way slowly down the hill to where there was a proper path and then on to the race which led back to the house. There was a stand of trees just near the race and beside them stood a group of beehives. We detoured over to them.
Uncle Frank was keen to show me the honeycombs but I was nervous.
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