The Abyss Beneath Hell

(dream of 11/28/2018)

Last night I had a dream,

really.

This is a real dream,

I had last night.

I went straight to hell.

But it wasn't so bad.

It was a lot like Mario.

There was stuff to do,

places to go,

goobers to kill.

Quite boring,

a little linear.

But not really uncomfortable. 

Come to think of it, 

it had the same feeling to it,

as my normal,

everyday life.

Go to work,

do the stuff,

go home,

do the other stuff,

sleep.

Quite boring,

a little linear.

But not really uncomfortable.

The thing about hell is,

you can't get out of it, 

you can't go up,

otherwise, it wouldn't be hell.

So I began to wonder. 

What's beneath hell?

There's got to be something, right?

As I meandered,

over the boring grassy hills,

I began to look for a hole;

a cavern;

something that would let me go deeper.

And there it was;

a little hole,

at the bottom of a hill;

just big enough,

for me to crawl into.

So I did.

As I crawled through the dirt,

it felt wet.

Almost without knowing,

I was in water.

I was in an underground lake,

and the water was draining.

Slowly,

while I floated on the surface,

the level dropped,

til I was standing on the massive cavern floor.

The light from above:

nothing more than a tiny pinhole.

That was my only way out.

Ah, I thought,

More hell is beneath hell.

What a clever trap!

In the center of the cavern,

there was a wide black abyss.

It seemed to be,

the endless void.

I was afraid of it and took great care,

not to fall in.

But as time passed,

and I assessed my options,

diving into the pit,

seemed like the only one.

I certainly had no way 

of returning to the surface.

So I resolved to descend again.

I had to take a running leap,

into the gaping abyss,

I had no idea how quickly the walls converged,

or even if they ever would.

I aimed for the center.

After a long fall, 

I landed on something soft. 

It was a giant plant; 

with leaves as large as a house.

There wasn't anything down there,

but the plant,

and a shimmering pond,

of blue magic water,

surrounding its tiny island.

This is the bottom,

this is the end.

What now?

I entered the water, 

and when waist-deep, 

drank.

Oh I see, 

water is life.

I dived in, 

completely submerging my entire body.

I was in the water as the water was in me.

I could see that the source shown through me,

and my actions,

just as it shimmered through the water,

and grew the plant.

I suddenly knew that I was in no hell,

I was in mind,

my mind,

and hell was within me. 

I saw the truth;

that I was dreaming.

And not dreaming only,

of hell,

and caverns,

and water,

but also of work,

and family,

and Earth.

Dreams within dreams within dreams.

Pleasant nightmares all of them.

An endless cycle;

the boundless void;

immortal illusion;

one eternal round.

And all this,

to search for meaning in existence,

or to forget myself. 

The things I wanted in life,

the stuff I thought mattered,

the goals I had:

irrelevant hallucinations, 

distractions, insubstantial.

There is no treasure but the journey.

There is no moment but now;

no future to work for,

no past to haunt me.

There is no problem but one:

what to name all things.

That is called:

finding meaning.

How things are seen,

determines what they are.

There is nothing to do

but enjoy the fall.

There is nothing to hold on to,

but the boundless void.

There is nothing to be,

but myself.

There is nowhere to go,

but where I have always been.

 

There is nothing at all,

to be feared.

Where I am not looking,

nothing is.

There is no truth but the paradox. 

No adversary but ego,

No sin but pride,

No privacy from the subconscious,

No way out of myself.

Hell is hell,

because it's meaningless.

The self is a trap,

because existence can't not be.

Being is God,

and awareness:

God's body.

The void is observation.

It is the light behind all eyes, 

the sight throughout all minds. 

I am not inside myself,

looking out.

There is nothing to be in

because there is no outside at all.

Existence cannot contain itself.

There is no center,

There is no edge.

Reality is held together,

by just a misunderstanding.

Only illusion can have a context;

a boundary, a war.

Only separate things,

can point to another other.

To unite we must be partial:

play the game of suffering,

and be one with our friends.

Imaginary figments;

echoes from long ago,

and shadows,

of things to come.

The self;

forgetful omniscience,

eternally mortal,

endlessly repeating,

endlessly renewed;

making the emptiness bearable,

for each other.

 

Compassion cannot discriminate.

My limitations can be nothing 

but what I believe

the others to know.

There are no others.

There is not knowing.

We are the hiding, 

mere simulations 

of what it might be like

to be ourselves.

All people know life is a dream.

All people know existence isn't real.

All people know they live in the story

they, themselves, tell.

People are afraid they might not exist.

I can tell them they matter.

I can listen to them.

They will tell me

what they want to tell themselves;

what they want to put right. 

My mind is the mind,

as the mind is in all.

All perception; a choice:

to find meaning in the all,

or to venture somewhere darker;

somewhere more isolated,

somewhere more fake.

There is nothing to build reality out of

but delusion.

It is The Great Paradox of Being.

In the abyss beneath hell,

I learned again,

what I have always known.

We are split;

each of us merely pretending,

to be a person,

unable to be a God.