September 17, 2014

Absorbed as much in my Blake class as my students. When we came to the phrase “All material Effects have spiritual Causes,” it was as an earthquake. Suppose I believe that; how do I affect it? How do I purge a spirit that must, if the saying is true, be dark and ailing?  If I take Blake’s answer–spiritual war–I am already doing it, without being able to see an end or any clear victory, or any release of final defeat. I did dream oddly and beautifully last night. I was at a sort of summer camp which featured a fair, and in the fair was a sort of labyrinth set in the wall, like those provided for hamsters, but big, through which leopards and bears were running with great joy. I had skipped supper, but after supper a great company of my friends from through the years appeared, looking like they did in their youth. All those I must have missed inside without thinking about too much. They chided me for being by myself, and crowded around in a show of love that I must admit never to sensing in the waking world. I took that as a sort of benediction, but on what leading to what the hours must reveal.