Kundalini Splendor

The monk known as "Symeon the New Theologian" is one of my favorite poets. He captures the essence of "true Christianity" in his embrace of the mystical and loving elements which that faith has to offer. In this, he is in marked contrast with those who seem to favor a religion of judgment and condemnation, rather than love.

I think that the kundalini experience makes loving mystics of us all, by whatever name you call it. (And of course there are loving mystics of many kinds, not just those who have been graced by kundalini awakening.)


By what boundless mercy, my Savior,

By Symeon the New Theologian
(949 - 1032)

English version by John Anthony McGuckin

By what boundless mercy, my Savior,
have you allowed me to become a member of your body?
Me, the unclean, the defiled, the prodigal.
How is it that you have clothed me
in the brilliant garment,
radiant with the splendor of immortality,
that turns all my members into light?
Your body, immaculate and divine,
is all radiant with the fire of your divinity,
with which it is ineffably joined and combined.
This is the gift you have given me, my God:
that this mortal and shabby frame
has become one with your immaculate body
and that my blood has mingled
with your blood.
I know, too,
that I have been made one with your divinity
and have become your own most pure body,
a brilliant member, transparently lucid,
luminous and holy.
I see the beauty of it all, I can gaze on the radiance.
I have become a reflection of the light of your grace.

-- from The Book of Mystical Chapters: Meditations on the Soul's Ascent from the Desert Fathers and Other Early Christian Contemplatives, Translated by John Anthony McGuckin

(poem from Poetry Chaikhana)