Chapter 2

Silence is All

1

Silence is all, say the sages.

Silence watches the work of the ages;

In the book of Silence the cosmic Scribe has written his cosmic pages:

Silence is all, say the sages.

2

What then of the word, O speaker?

What then of the thought, O thinker?

Thought is the wine of the soul and the word is the beaker;

Life is the banquet-table as the soul of the sage is the drinker.

3

What of the wine, O mortal?

I am drunk with the wine as I sit at Wisdom’s portal,

Waiting for the Light beyond thought and the Word immortal.

Long I sit in vain at Wisdom’s portal.

4

How shalt thou know the Word when it comes, O seeker?

How shalt thou know the Light when it breaks, O witness?

I shall hear the voice of the God within me and grow wiser and meeker;

I shall be the tree that takes in the light as its food,

I shall drink its nectar of sweetness.