“One day the Goddess sang to her lover,
Beloved and radiant Lord of the space before birth,
Revealer of essence,
Slayer of the ignorance that binds us,
You who in play have created this universe
And permeated all forms in it with never-ending truth.
I have been wondering…
I have been listening to the hymns of creating,
Enchanted by the verses,
Yet still I am curious,
What is this delight-filled universe
Into which we find ourselves born?
What is this mysterious awareness shimmering
Everywhere within it?
I have been listening to the love songs of
Form longing for formless.
What are these energies
Undulating through our bodies,
Pulsing us into action?
And this “matter” out of which our forms are made -
What are these dancing particles of condensed radiance?
The Goddess then asks,
What is this power we call Life,
Appearing as the play of flesh and breath?
How may I know this mystery and enter it more deeply?
Beloved, my attention is ensnared by a myriad of forms,
Innumerable individual entities everywhere.
Lead me into the wholeness beyond all these parts
You who hold the mysteries in your hand -
Of will, knowledge, and action
Reveal to me the path of illumined knowing
Lead me into joyous union
With the life of the universe
Teach me that I may know it fully
Realize it deeply,
And breathe in the luminous truth of it
The One Who is Intimate to All Beings replies,
Beloved, your questions require the answers that come
Through direct living experience
The way of experience begins with a breath
Such as the breath you are breathing now.
Awakening into luminous reality
May dawn in the momentary throb
Between any two breaths
The breath flow in and just as it turns
To the low out, there is a flash of pure joy -
Life is renewed
Awaken into that
As the breath is released and lows out,
There is a pulse as it turns to flow in.
In that turn, you are empty.
Enter that emptiness as the source of all life…..”
Taken from the first 2 verses of Lorin Roche’s translation of the Radiance Sutras.