AT LAST CONVERGING

Literature dwindles to a mere chronicle of circumstances, or passionless fantasies and passionless meditation, unless it is constantly flooded with the passion and beliefs of the past and, of all the fountains of passion and beliefs of the past, Baha'i history has again and again brought the vivifying spirit of excess into a Baha'i consciousness in the arts. The history of the Bab and Baha'u'llah, the seemingly endless martyrs, the life story of 'Abdu'l-Baha and Shoghi Effendi and the accounts of many of the great teachers now over several epochs, are slowly creating a new literature and changing the very roots of people's emotions by their influence on people’s spirit and their sense of oneness. -Ron Price with thanks to W.B. Yeats for an idea, source unknown.

Most of life takes all that I am,
its many roles and stages;
the candle of my days burns low
while I strut and fret between the pages.

There is within this tempered sword
which I use to cut these lines
something brittle called fatigue
I feel it often times.

The past collapses into moments;
I create a world of leaves
they hang upon my boughs
with green and shiney weaves.

These verses are no crown or banquet;
they are not part of dance or play.
They aren't meant for entertainment,
not part of song, renoun, or suit so gay.

I feel as if something is emerging,
although these lines come from my mind. .
A civilization is at last converging
with this adventure that I slowly unwind.

Ron Price
23 March 1996