Eyes in the Sky

This from the dome in Hagia Sophia - viewed from any angle the curved ceiling takes the shape of an eye:



This the Aspe in St. Catherrine's in Sinai, Eygpt, year 565;



Abbess Hildegaarde's eye appears to be blue man - the Christ - coming from the Sun; blue in art or black suggest comeing form Unconscious time (Khrishna translates, "dark one") - 12th century. Black Elk also spoke of the "blue man" in an apocalypic dream:



Jefferson's oculous at Montecello; an eight-sided figure; a Bagua, like the hadron colloder, which is also an eight-sided figure and an oculous:



Pantheon's occulous - "eye" searches here as in UFO mythology and pop fiction:



Close Encounterrs - same "eye of God" called a moment in the history of religionritic Stanley Kaufman by c:



Oculous in UFO culture ofpost-war:





I think this picture of the Hadron collider is fantastic as it is presented as an eye in this photo in an angle much like those as St. Sophia in Constantinople. The subtitle says: "It's going to fucking kill you dead." The same fears were present as in the 1950s UFO art. We were not told when it would start but on that morning my wife had a dream that she had a baby.

Letter RE "Twilight"

Mr. Granger: Thoughtful piece on Twilight saga. Twilight could well be seen as a North American Creation Myth repudiating old Logos/Eros of the Anglo European tradition for a new world Logos/Eros. The villain in Twilight is not surprisingly named Victoria – the Third Phase (dark moon) of Robert Graves “White Goddess” – she must be dispatched so that Graves White Goddess – (Bella – new moon) can begin the goddess cycle again. Note that Victoria’s “intuitive friend” is the Irishman Riley. Bella’s is the Native American, Jacob. The Voltori also appear to draw on the Italian - Eros realm of old school where love and religion resided and awakened Europe - , thus in Meyer’s Mormon saga they are the bad guys (Edward hates tradition, he says). The English and the Italians are displaced by a bonding of Mormon (Logos) and Native Americans (Eros). A new Quaternity is formed on the new continent and possibly for the new century – a west coast Mormon/Indian North American Quaternity: Father (Carlyle) Son (Edward), Trickster spirit (Jacob) and Psyche (Bella). Bella is the only human in this situation. Edward kills Victoria (the Red Queen) so that Bella (the White Queen) can be born again and can bring forth the goddess cycle on the new continent. Notice the cover of book four, “New Dawn”: it is the chess piece of the White Queen. And in book four Edward and presumably the other vampires are identified as archangels. Related to this, the old vampire movies and books can be seen as “empty crypt” myths and Europe entered the painful “silence of God” era (And Frankenstein, attempts like Rabbi Loeb’s to conjure the savior but finding only Golum). But here, the gods – archangels – awaken again in the unconscious.

Bernie Quigley
Haverhill, NH

"Twilight" - Victoria's Shadow - American Quaternity

As per the conversation below about "Twilight" as n oriignal Creation Myth it should benoted that is is a western event and one which may run opposite with the eastern United states. Bella as the rising "white queen" begins the first phase of the great Mother cycle - this in hippie lore can be estimated as rising in 2012. 2012, claimed to the an "end of the world" year on the AStez calender and causeing much fanfare, is actually auspicious as it is also a "beginning of the world" phenomenon or pyshic event.
NOteworthy that Victoria - the "third mother" or Death Moon has a "side kick" or lover - that would be Riley, the Irishman. While Bella, the "white goddess" has Jacob, the Native American. I wrote in Quigley in Exile early on how the Irishman was the awakening trickster in innigratn America (ADams" gardener in "The Educaiton of Henry Adams" and in pop works like "The Ghost and Mr. Chicken." But Native America is true guid in North America - the Natty Bumpo figure; Hawkeye in the Cooper tales, or the AFrican-American. I think this will regionalize. West and northwest are informed by Native America, South and north east by African American.

It is possible to see an American Quaternity rising now: South (black), North east (Old mother England), Southwest (Mormon - or the vampires in Twilight which are identified as archeangels in book four) and northwest Native American.

Twilight: Return of the White Goddess

Noted below, Eclipse, the third book in the Twilight quartet brings a ritual killing of Victoria, the "third Mother" in the Earth Mother triple goddess cycle best described in Robert Graves' classic, The White Goddess. Killing the Third Mother enables the return of the First Mother; the White Goddess or the White Queen. I just noticed as I picked up the fourth book, Breaking Dawn that the cover picture is a chess piece, the white queen.

Indians and Mormons: "Twilight" is a North American Creation Myth

RE the note below, Twilight is a North American creation myth. Bella links Native American intuition with Mormon structure (Twilight is a dream of Mormon writer Stephanie Meyers) - a new Logos/Eros for a new age and a new continent. The villians are England (Victoria) and Italy (Colturi); Logos/Eros or order/intuition of a former age. My commentary at The Hill is constantly based on the idea that our times including the recession do not resemble the 1830s as the Keynesians are driving it, but the 1830s when Native American intuition (Natty Bumpo) was a major influence and the Mormons were starting their journey across America.

Ritual killing of Victoria in "Twilight"

So much happens in the Twilight series; the Mormon suggestion of the vampires, the bonding with Native American intuition - Bella is Brahma, the benign vortex between Vishnu (ascending karma - Edward and the vampires) and Shiva (receding karma - Native Americans; the meeting of the Three in Italy (as Jesus and Abraham met the Three) but what I think is most significant is the killing of Victoria. There is a strain of the English civil conflict between Puritan moving to Unitarian and Mormon and heading west when the Anglicans appear in New England threabouts. But Victoria in astrological lore is the Third Mother - the death Mother; the world conquerer at the end of the age of Pisces. Pisces was a yin age - an earth and water age. The vampires here are benevolent and responsible - like Mormons, family and honor oriented. But before the new age - aquarius rises, the Third MOther - Kali must be ritually put to rest - that is the poin tof the Twilight saga; the destruction of Victoria, the third mother, so the first mother - the white goddess, can rise again.

If pop culture brings an archetype forth this series has taken hold of a generation. The ritual destruction of Victoira, the third mother, will allow for the awakening of the First Mother - the Earth Mother incarnate awakening in the new astrological cycle. That is perhaps the terror felt for Sarah Palin; she is representative of the first mother. Victoria dies in book three - the movie should be out in a year.

The Christ Dance in Dali's "Poetry of America"

In Dali’s Poetry of America the white figure has his arm across his eyes - in the dream folk lore when one sees a vision from the Unconscious they are told to cover their eyes. The "disintegrating Christ" is also seen here as partial and perhaps used up (blood turned to oil and coke, etc.) at journey's end - the vision of the Unconscious is "through a glass darkly" and only partial. I've had that dream with three ancient sculls – told to keep my head down. The Egg appears here as a tiny football with little man and will manifest in Geopoliticus Child . . .



In The Phantom of the Opera, for example, a classic folk opera about the fall of Europe in 1917, Madame Giry, Christine’s caregiver who sees into the Unconscious, tells the hero to cover his eyes when the "phantom" occurs and she leads him to the phantom's den in the underworld (when Christine tears off the Phantom’s mask the house falls and brings the death of Europe, indicated as the Paris Opera House).



Likewise, as Jung pointed out in the UFO dreams - their faces were burned by the confrontation with the Unconscious. As a dream, this picture represents a “vision” of Christ – the blue figure (blue; fro the Unconscious in a dream) by the dreamer in white. Ending the transition over decades of the pictures of the Knight, now a man with a staff. The egg first appears here rising out of the tiny man who rises out of the white dreamer.

Reading Dali's "Poetry of America" picture dream

One more point while I am on this on how a representative painting - one that stays beyond its generation or place - can be understood as a dream or a collective dream; a dream relevant to the Collective Unconscious. I've read a lot of comments about the tower in the picture "Poetry in America" and the Africa map hanging beneath it but nothing systematic. The Surrealist group especially DeCirico was preoccupied with towers - white and red towers suggesting the US and the USSR. The long sequence and the ancient qualities would suggest something rising from the Unconscious much as the sacred primal phallus that Jung talked about in Memories, Dreams, Reflections.

Looking at Dali's pictures over several decades they appear to present something rising from the Unconscious over a long period of time and coming into consciousness in the year 1943 in the heat of WW II when he painted Poetry in America and Geopoliticus Child Watching the Birth of the New Man. The technology today gives the opportunity to isolate elements in these pictures to see the procession rising from the Unconscious over time. The Knight "from the Unconscious" changes over time until he becomes a man in 1943. The Tower changes as well and in the same 1943 picture there is a clock - the Knight from the Unconscious has entered "time" - reality as we daily experience it, so we are ready for the "birth" of the "new man." It would work better if I had the dates of these older Knights but I don't have the time to go through them all right now.

These details match the paintings above. In this first, the Knight sees the Tower emerging, but it is still behind a natural veil: I have seen dreams like this with a natural veil of trees dividing magic animals from a group of people eating in a restaurant (dividing the Unconscious from the conscious).





In the next period, years later (as I recall), the Knight is more defined and less ancient. Light is dawning in the picture. The Tower is coming into focus; coming closer to "time."





In 1943, the Knight is now a naked man entered "time." He has arrived in the world. The Tower is completely "real" - come into time. The "old Christ" - dark figure dancing with candle in head will yield to the new "white dancer" and a new "Eggman" will be born.





I would say the tower represents here the journey of consciousness via the Knight of the Unconscious out of the long and ancient journey of ancient evolutionary consciousness, now entering a new phase. Thus the clock, representing the awakening of the new day and the "new man" - the "new Christ" if the wound and the fresh drip from the Egg is indication.

Eggman, "Geopoliticus Child," "Poetry in America"

I received several thousand viewers this past few weeks RE a few comments published elsewhere on how Salvador Dali's two paintings, Geopoliticus Child Watchign the Birth of the New Man and Poetry in America, both painted in 1943, are companion pieces and explain each other. They form the vortex of Dali's work and the apex of his mythic journey. They have significance to the collective passage of his times and our; the artist dreams the collective dream of the culture and the dream can be understood archetypally, as an individual dream can. Essay is repeated here: "Eggman" enigma solved at the DMV. Should note that in the last sentences I completely reversed myself and realized that Poetry in America features time reverting back and bringing forth the Egg in Geopoliticus Child.

"Eggman" enigma solved at the DMV

Whenever I have to go the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) I enter a state of trance of some kind or detachment. Questions come up that seem unanswerable and processes unsolvable, creating a koan situation and sending the mind in exile to more pleasant pastures. I was there today (Nov. 4, 2008) with one of my sons to take the test for his driver’s license and while we were waiting in line I solved an enigma for myself that I have been thinking about for about 13 years - it just popped in my head when I was looking at a kid who looked like Kurt Cobain.

The answer is/was incredibly simple. I'd been thinking about John Lennon's tune "I am the eggman" and I had put together that as the song begins with the phrase "I am He" - and continues with "I am the Eggman, I am the Walrus," I understood it to be a reference to the Upanishads and other Eastern texts, which use the phrase "I am he" followed by "I am the Atman. I am the Brahmin." It refers to the individual consciousness as an individual coming to the realization that she or he shares consciousness with others and everyone and everything. So I felt John was cloaking this in comic imagery from Lewis Carroll (Walrus was in Through the Looking Glass if I recall correctly - so was Eggman; Humpty Dumpty in Alice . . .).

I'd also written a lot about links between Lennon and Salvador Dali and Magritte; Lennon can be seen as fulfilling "prophecy" of Magritte and Dali - I proposed that Dali and Lennon went into the same "room" in the Unconscious and some how connected there through the talisman of the white grand piano. But waiting in line I realized that when Lennon said "I am the Eggman" he was likely referring to a painting of Dali's about the "Geopolitical Child" - virtually the global man - the Aquarian - climbing out of an egg and waking in the new world. This is an important painting by Dali and lived and grew in the Unconscious for decades before it went to canvas.

Here are some illustrations.

The white grand piano became the icon of Lennon; it is where he composed his anthem, "Imagine."

Dali painted Grand Pianos for decades, pulling images from the Unconscious:









There are more. Magritte, in 1964, did this, "Son of Man" - from Book of Daniel, signifying the Aquarian would be marked by a green apple - the sign of The Beatles Apple Corp.



This is more significant; it starts with a Knight from the Unconscious:



But what is significant is a long - years long - series Dali did of this Horseman of Death entering consciousness through a Knight and a Tower. There are many but they all go between these two.





If you look at these two pictures above you can see that the Knight with spear has brought something from the Unconscious to the Conscious. And in the Conscious picture (with the dancers - titled Poetry in America), he is no longer a Knight, but a naked man sitting off to the side on the left and the Tower has entered "time" - it has a clock and a deflated "egg" - which is a map of the United States and South American hanging. (Note: No it is probably Africa hanging - the "Egg" in Geopoliticus Child has entered "time" in Poetry of America and is deflated illustrated by the clock and the hanging map. Quite possibly Dali saw the "dual nature" - the two dancers; the wu chi egg entering tai chi as a dance, is a white man and a black man; the "African-American" as the "shadow" in America. By this we mean the unexpressed contents of the psyche. Jung made the point in MDR on his visit to America that the spirit of the African-American and the Native America pervade and inform America. John Hope Franklin, the American historian makes the same point. It is worth noting as well that these paintings are both made in 1943 I believe and are wu chi/tai chi relatives. AS in Tolkien’s Rings story when the quiet quest of Frodo goes on while the world is involved in battle, so this discovery does on beneath the Second World War.)

Here are two of Dali's world/egg pictures, the second, the important Geopolitical Man - Eggman.

This is Baby Map of the World:



It turns into Geopoliticus Child:



This is the Eggman. This is what Lennon referred to when he said, "I am the Eggman" - I am Geopoliticus Child; I am the new man of the world; I am Brahma.

If you go back to look at Poetry of America, the one with the dancers, you can see the content of the Egg. Notice both pictures have a cloth beneath them and something is pouring onto it. It is oil and Coke in Poetry in America. It is blood in Geopoliticus Child. This identifies the pictures as a connected sequence. IN Poetry in America we can see that the dancer on the right has a candle in his head - he is "the Enlightened One" - we can see that Geopoliticus Child is intended to be the Enlightened One. Notice as well that the Enlightened One - dancer on the right - has a hole in his right chest - it is the wound where the Christ was hit with the spear; Geopoliticus Child is the "second Christ" the Aquarian - it is Eggman. Late in live, in pain, Lennon say, "I was the Walrus (Brahma) but now I'm John." Tibetan Buddhists say after Enlightenment, life is a broken glass. He never smiled again for the cameras after India.
Note to Remi on Quaternities - Remi - Of course The Beatles form a quaternity: Paul (Father - brought in to give the "Silver Beatles" structure as it was only a play thing for John and Stu before), John (Son), Ringo (Trickster), George (Psyche - was George who introduced John to the East and Hinduism). Unfortunately my French is not so good and I'm unable to read your site - looks interesting though. Will have my kids translate when they get home. My very oldest ancestors are Parisian I believe (de Coursy) and I feel very at home there.

After India, John actually believed he was "channeling" Jesus; that is why he dressed in white like the Christ after the Transfiguration on the Abbey Road album, their final work together (they walk to right of screen in the picture, "entering the conscious world."). The "Christ" episode is reported by the very reliable journalist Mark Hertsgaard, who writes for The New Yorker and the LA Times in his excellent book, A Day in a Life.

NOTE to Remi RE Quaternity: With Abraham and the Three Visitors and the Christ and the Three Magi, you can see the constellation of Quaternity taking the shape of three + one. IN each case - and this is the same in Taoism with the Three Celestial Ones - the Three represent the agency of the Unconscious while the One is their manifestation in time. (Exactly like Scrooge and the Three Spirits in Dickens' A Christmas Carol - likewise, the Three send Scrooge through a "Transfiguration".) The three humans - like those who channel the gods and the archetypes - are blissfully unaware that they are manifesting life force from the Unconscious. Thus, the "Son" is a manifestation of the Three. 'Twas ever thus.



What I think is the coolest thing about this is that the Third Spirit who visits Scrooge, pictured here, is clearly the Green Man.



Additional Thoughts on Geopoliticus Child and Poetry in America in 1943

The two dancers in Poetry in America represent the “dual nature” of creation; two figures light and dark – like that described in Tao te Ching – the “knights of dark and mysterious consequence” one walks in the Inner world and one walks in the Outer world. “Krishna” means “the dark one” - the one from the Unconscious - and the “Christ” figure here (candle - "enlightened one") is in shadow – thus the “Christ” is the receding figure and the figure of the Unconscious who feeds the conscious dancer, the "New Man". They both appear to be wearing football helmets.



and other secondary images suggest America in 1943 when Poetry in America and Geopoliticus Child were both painted - Eisenhower and Gerald Ford. The "Geopolitics Child" Egg may have cast its skin and morphed into tower clock




when the dream and the naked Knight, now a mortal,



entered “time” – but the Egg - a new unhatched egg - is present again in this picture – with the small figure rising out of the back of the “light” figure.


This is the “new creation” and it is a dance in essence, rising out of an egg.



The football helmets also bring to mind Edinger's thinking about American football in Archetype and the Apocalypse; sports forming a primal outline of a world to come - in effect a pre-civilization matrix. Football is the American matrix forming out of WW II and identifying regions. The U.S. can be seen today as a hole in a donut: the donut is the world around which plays soccer (old aspect of chronos) - 2 billion watched the World Cup. The hole in the center the ones who watch football (new aspect of chronos) - 94 million watched the Super Bowl.

Football program, 1944:




You could look at these two pictures in reverse - Poetry in America coming first, the Tower under the Black Son (the Son in the Unconscious) - the dance of the millennia represented by the passage of the Knights in Dali's pictures over decades, to the moment of the Egg, rising "reborn" out of the Dancers - the Twins which accompany the Awakening. The Geopoliticus Child being the awakening, fully informed by the traditions represented in Poetry in America. I have always thought of this tower as the tower on the campus of U. Michigan, Ann Arbor - the "center of the world" in the "new creation" by the Great Lakes.

IN either case, as an original creative arc, Dali had said that all Dali is one Dali - his work's rise and descent and that of the Surrealist grouping from which it emerged might be seen as rising to this singular moment, 1943. The Knights lead here then they disappear or manifest in the human form holding the staff. It is interesting that this "creation moment" rises from the heat of war and the destruction of Europe.

IN this view, which is probably more likely, the dark "old Christ" would seem worn, used up at the end of journey, yielding to the football player - the "new Christ" in white. Also, things seen in the Unconscious are often only partial as this figure is - and much in all Dali's work is partial. Dreamers, often see Unconscious behind a vein or in highlight, as per the request not to look at God direct or speak his name in all religious traditions and folk lore.

C.G. Jung on Sgt. Peppers cover

As noted, C.G. Jung is top row center between W.C. Fields and Edgar Allen Poe,on the cover of the Sgt. Peppers album the single most definitive artifact of the 1960s. Jung's Red Book has found publication. - Quigley

Note on "Millennial Star" on "Twilight"

The books and movie Twilight form Anima and Animus for a new generation - a group now just still in high school and led first by girls by this popular romance. I'm reading the second book, New Moon, and have been commenting on it on the Mormon web site, The Millennial Star." The Twilight author is a Mormon and the novels contain Mormon thinking. On Remo's web site - Unus Mundus - I've suggested that Joseph Smith and the Mormons are part of the Aquarian awakening. My comment:

It is a family rule that we, the adults, read any book that our kids tell us to. On the second book, New Moon, I am fascinated by the mythic and archetypal elements rather than the literary skill. Bella casts off ordinary and traditional human friends and family, just as Krishna rises out of his old skin for a new “. . . dance of life and death”; a new “creation.” Quaternity is common in naïve literature; Seinfeld is a Quaternity, Fraser is a Quaternity, the Wizard of Oz is a Quaternity. Bella’s Quaternity forms a new relationship with the cosmos; a new Quaternity with “supernaturals” in which she is the only human: Carlyln, (Father), Edward (Son), Jacob (Trickster) and Bella (Psyche). Yale’s Harold Bloom says that Joseph Smith has done much the same - formed a new relationship with the cosmos - and has been the only American to do so successfully.

Khrishna - Radha

Pete: Khrishna is translated as "the dark one" - it is like when someone dreams from someone from "the other side" it is often in different element. This is much like your drawing with the three-armed man and the skeleton guy in the different realm - notice when Khrishna's arm goes through the line it turns human - also Radha is playing a game of chess; the way of the world, and Khrishna brings to it a cosmic turn.

“Eggman” Fulfills Surrealist “Prophecy”

In hindsight, the “automatic writing” and the desireless desire of Andre Breton and the originally-intentioned Surrealists in the 1920s and 1930s can be seen as beginning at a point and ending at a point. The ending can be seen as John Lennon’s final pieces, “I am the Eggman” and “Imagine.”

Prophecy in the religious sense, in that the Book of Revelations consists of prophecy, is in fact, automatic writing. There is a theme beneath, but it is a theme with patterns which form in the Unconscious and draw a picture over time – inner time – time in the Eastern Orthodox sense; Chronos – all time is one time in a holistic package: It sees things “ahead” in lineal time happening in a coherent package to form a picture with things in other lineal time. That is, the paintings of Magritte and Dali and some of the writings of Eloud and Bretin are related by fem spirit – like the Pandu brothers all married to the same woman. The piano that Dali paints over years as a talisman for the Unconscious condition is the same piano that John Lennon played – the white grand piano – in composing Imagine.

John Lennon is the Eggman; Eggman, in this tip point of the work is the Surrealist’s Christ; the Second Coming, the Yellow Buddha. IN the song, Eggman refers to the phrase from the Vedas: “I am he; this is that.” I am Atman, I am Brahmin (I am Eggman, I am Walrus). It is precisely what the Christ said in seeking the Father, that he had become at one with the Father – the Self – the Unconscious, the Universe (the Eight Planets; the Bagua).

Likewise, in Dali’s painting of “Geopoliticus Child” (1943) viewing the awakening of the “New Man.” Dali is the child in the picture riding the dream “as a child” and following the Anima next whom he follows to the picture. Many pictures over Dali’s lifetime lead to this: See Quigley in Exile. The “new man” emerging is identified as the Christ by the dripping blood – it is revealed in “Poetry in America” – the blood comes from the Christ wound and the candle in his head identifies him as the Enlightened One. IN Poetry . . . he dances with his Shadow; Dual Nature, Jesus and John, Sanat and Sanada at the turning of the Platonic Month to Aquarius.

IN particular, Magritte's Son of Man, Biblical phrasing for the Chosen One from Daniel, is pictured in two pictures in 1964 as an Englishman - Bowler Hat - with an apple for a face: Apple became the sign for The Beatles who awakened into the world in 1964.

Lost: Season 5 finale – Ben Linus is Pisces

In final Lost of the season, Astral Locke enters the foot of the colossus Ammit to have Ben Linus kill Jacob. It is necessary for Jacob – the spirit of the passing age – to die so that the new age can awaken. The Lost series is a parable of descending age of Pisces and the rising age of Aquarius. Linus has in several ways been identified as the Piscean; in second season and fifth he receives the “Christ wound” – a wound in the right of the chest where the Christ was speared on the cross – Christ is the Piscean in lore of the zodiac (the Magi were Persian and Zoroastrian astrologers following the star to greet the opening of the age). Ben = “Son” in Hebrew. Linus is “Son of Apollo.”

In this episode on the way to the foot of Ammit Ben actually tells John Locke he is Pisces. The foot, where Jacob lives, is the body symbol of Pisces. Lower leg, which Locke is always breaking, signifies Aquarius. There will be 12 avatars in the full cycle of the Egyptian temple – Anubis is seen on the walls as well – in the 24,000 year cycle of the Sun. Jacob – a Hebrew name suggesting the first patriarchs out of Egypt – and his “leader” Ben/Son is the first. Astral Locke is the second; Locke, the name suggests the Enlightenment, is the Aquarian. He is Astral because he is really dead and his body is delivered to Richard Alpert (Ram Dass). Dual nature is key to all J.J. Abrams work. The Platonic Months – 2,000 year intervals – alternate yin and yang or Introvert and Extrovert. Pisces was a yin age. Aquarius is a yang age. Some say the alternating nature is Jesus/John, the Twins which accompany the change, seen in Lemuria as Sanat and Sanada.

John S. Bell is Daniel Faraday on "Lost"

Note to Scientific American on Lost: John S. Bell is Daniel Faraday

I appreciated the article on entanglement, not least because of the picture of John S. Bell which came up in the magazine. He is clearly the prototype for Daniel Faraday, the renegade theoretical physicist who did his work in a broom closet at Oxford in the imaginative TV show Lost. The Lost island keeps shifting in time and place and some of the islanders do as well because Faraday left some of his notes with his mother. Now I understand it. Sort of.

Understandin David Bowie's Ashes to Ashes

Notes to Understanding David Bowie’s Ashes to Ashes

David Bowie’s 1980’s song and video Ashes to Ashes is a classic dream journey and understanding it will explain the fundamentals of a “journey into the Unconscious.” It is a mythical journey fraught with psychological danger ("I shall waste no time passing judgment on those among my initial companions who have become frightened and turned back . . ." - Andre Breton); the one who will survive is the one who can see – and walk – “as a child.” C.G. Jung pointed out that this must be as a child sees, not like a child sees. It often becomes a kind of infantilism; one acts like a child to avoid adulthood and responsibility. But not Bowie. He feels first broken and afraid – “no money, no hair” – useless to the world even with his material and celebrity success. And now he is genuinely afraid, because he is receiving a “call form the Unconscious." He has received a call form the “action man”/ the SELF - a call form teh Unconscious – “oh not, say it’s not true.” He understands the danger of the dream journey, which causes madness to the many artists who actually enters the Unconscious and are unable to navigate. You should look at this video as telling two storys: The pictures tell one story as a painting or a children’s folk tale tells a story. The words tell another story. For the mythical dream journey, the words are irrelevant. Entering the Unconscious actualizes different region of the psyche; words fail there as the artist enters a kind of trance - the more lucid the trance, the more irrelevant the words and teh more important the picture story: dreams talk in pictures. The artist follows Anima; the female inner spirit – much as Neo in the Matrix followed the girl with the white rabbit tattoo. Bob Dylan in “Visions of Johanna” and John Lennon - “The girl with kaleidoscope eyes” - in “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” both follow Anima into the deep part of the Unconscious where the artist jewels are (Lennon finds an eight-pointed star; a BaGua - in this case an approximation of SELF as well) - there they came up with their best and most lasting work. These two, with Bowie’s Ashes to Ashes are among the most profound of artistic expression of that period. Anima brings Bowie to the Earth Mother herself – the spirit of the earth. He enters “as a child” dressed for the journey in clown suit. Remarkably – better even than in the Dylan and Lennon pieces - he encounters the Three Sisters; the essence of yin consciousness and the ancient Brittania earth memory of the Earth Mother religion. This runs parallel to the German folk tale – and many others – of the Rhine Maidens – another aspect of the Three Sisters archetype; they tempt the adept to the bottom of the river – the Unconscious: that is where the gold nuggets are. But only the artist may go there and in during so, the artist, reflecting Bowie’s comments at the beginning on “sordid details” of love, loses the gift of love.



And Siegfried, the external warrior is warned away. But Loki, the Trickster, archetype of the artist, with the flaming red hair, can be seen as a prototype of Bowie, dangles his toe in the water.



The external story is conspicuously about drugs but that is irrelevant to the inner story - and always a good marketing tool. It is the journey into the Unconscious which is causing him fear and trepidation. The earth mover plows through and eventually ballerina - Bowie's anima guide - and the Three Sisters lead him to SELF; the core of human psyche. The use of drugs with these three - Dylan, Lennon and Bowie - at first drops away the normal external reality and the artist finds ability to enter there. But it is irrelevant to the actual journey. Here though is what makes the artist: Many took drugs, but only these three and a few others found their way to the SELF. As with the Surrealists, these are extremely private and conservative stories; little windows to God, said Marie Louis von France, hiding in distraction and bizarro to dissuade the uninitiated. (This is the actual drawing which inspired "Lucy in the Sky" done by Lennon's son Julian. The star in the right top has eight points.)




David Bowie - Ashes to Ashes; the Way of the Three Sisters

In an illustration on how the “three sisters" accompany the artist’s journey, the video on David Bowie’s “Ashes to Ashes” available on You Tube is instructive. It is a most creative tune which recalls the “action man” – that would be Major Tom (Self), from ten years earlier in Bowie’s career (“Ashes to ashes/funk to funky/ we know Major Tom’s a junkie.”). What is interesting about this video is that Bowie expresses drug addiction but without fear and loathing; rather as a channel between Creative Anima and Working Ego and Self. He doesn’t have to fight to find Eros/Anima. If finds him. In one of the photos he is walking with the three “dark sisters" – and dressed like a clown/trickster - the artist path - with a “real world” dancing girl behind him. She is Anima who guided him here to the heart of the Earth Mother.



Real Girl is Anima; he follows her lead and the Three Sisters find him. But Major Tom, the Action Man/Self, finds him as well. Major Tom is pictured here as firmly male Bowie in space suit; but living in a womb, connected by tubes to “mother”; resting in the womb of the Divine/Earth Mother. This is a perfect image of Self residing in Psyche (I can't find a picture of it on line but it is in the video). In another still he is in the kitchen with the Three Sisters; one wearing a cross - the kitchen is always the womb - a cave - in such a dream or active imagination.



Bowie walks the way of the artist without resistance or complaint. More than most other artists he is able to leave the Mother and return to his ego - man in suit - see how comfortable and relaxed and happy he is in this picture when he is just entertaining. AS Emerson says, when the muse leaves you go work in your garden. Reality is the saving retreat in the way of the artist.



More on Three Sisters here in The Titan and the Egg. Here is Arthur and the Three Sisters at the Death of Arthur.



This Bowie clip is one of the most perfect manifestations of Deathless Child/Self and Three Sisters – See Robert Graves, The White Goddess – the Way of the Three Sisters was Britannia religion until the 14th century. As Bowie is an Englishman, he is actualizing and manifesting ancient memory.


Understanding David Bowie’s Ashes to Ashes

David Bowie’s 1980’s song and video Ashes to Ashes is a classic dream journey and understanding it will explain the fundamentals of a “journey into the Unconscious.” It is a mythical journey fraught with psychological danger; the one who will survive is the one who can see – and walk – “as a child.” C.G. Jung pointed out that this must be as a child sees, not like a child sees. It often becomes a kind of infantilism; one acts like a child to avoid adulthood and responsibility. But not Bowie. He feels first broken and afraid – “no money, no hair” – useless to the world even with his material and celebrity success. And now he is genuinely afraid, because he is receiving a “call form the Unconscious. He has received a call form the “action man” – “oh not, say it’s not true.” He understands the danger of the dream journey, which causes madness to the artist who actually enters the Unconscious. You should look at this video as telling two story is: The pictures tell one story as a painting or a children’s folk tale tells a story. The words tell another story. For the mythical dream journey, the words are irrelevant. Entering the Unconscious actualizes different region of the psyche; words fail there as the artist enters a kind of trance. The artist follows Anima; the female inner spirit – much as Neo in the Matrix followed the girl with the white rabbit tattoo. Bob Dylan in “Visions of Johanna” and John Lennon - “The girl with kaleidoscope eyes” - in “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” both follow Anima into the deep part of the Unconscious where the artist jewels are (Lennon finds an eight-pointed star; a BaGua - in this case an approximation of SELF as well). These two, with Bowie’s Ashes to Ashes are among the most profound of artistic expression of that period. Anima brings Bowie to the Earth Mother herself – the spirit of the earth. He enters “as a child” dressed for the journey in clown suit. Remarkably – better even than in the Dylan and Lennon pieces, he encounters the Three Sisters; the essence of yin consciousness. This runs parallel to the German folk tale – and many others – of the Rhine Maidens – another aspect of the Three Sisters archetype; they tempt the adept to the bottom of the river – the Unconscious: that is where the gold nuggets are. But only the artist may go there and in during so, the artist, reflecting Bowie’s frustration at the beginning on “sordid details” of love, loses the gift of love. And Siegfried, the external warrior - the extrovert - is warned away.



Loki, however, he of the flaming red hair; the Trickster, prototype for the artist, who can be seen as a prototype of Bowie the artist, dangles his toe in the water with the Rhine women.



The story is conspicuously about drugs but that is irrelevant to the inner story. It is the journey into the Unconscious which is causing him fear and trepidation. The earth mover plows through and eventually ballerina and the Three Sisters lead him to SELF; the core of human psyche. The use of drugs with these three at first drops away the normal external reality and the artist finds ability to enter there. But it is irrelevant to the actual journey. Here though is what makes the artist: Many took drugs, but only these three and a few others found their way to the SELF. As with the Surrealists, these are extremely private and conservative stories; little windows to God, said Marie Louis von France, hiding in distraction to dissuade the uninitiated.