Indian Summer
(Strand Knob west of Mountain View, Ark.)

Critique: The Cheyenne Mirror

These Indians summed up all the reverse twists (in Storm, SEVEN ARROWS) by simply calling the Cosmos a mirror. More "literate" civilization has broken down this obviously paradoxical "dualism" into the full panoply of "opposites." These tricky words approach the same big idea but confuse us with semantic/ logical and ideological complications; which exemplify our linguistic fragmentation of reality—as demonstrated throughout this website—more than does the word "mirror." It signifies a reflecting phenomenon commonly perceivable as a whole chunk of reality.

By contrast we bookworms have been led to suppose, by complicated verbiage, that all "opposites" are similarly real--as separate things-in-themselves--whereas they are likely emblematic of relations (among things) identifiable more by language than perception.

The Cheyenne "way" thus affords a more fluid vocabulary for understanding better the (reversible) subtleties of Natural Law: which itself provides the pivot for such a vocabulary—summing up the traditional teachings of all disciplines, including religion—without necessity for the usual assumptions which are wishful, non-empirical and downright arbitrary.

A transcendental transition can be visualized accordingly—toward holistic thought using all our faculties—to vindicate a natural craving for spirituality elevated beyond the banalities of verbalized materialism (jammed as it is with a rather schizoid manner into the non-empirical conjectures of theology designed to descriptively identify an ultimate Source of it all).

The idea is to grow beyond such preparatory exercises of verbal opinion—Plato's "conjecture" and "belief"--toward the fuller knowledge of reality to forthcome from use of higher faculties as well within the purview of advanced empiricism.

McCord

Stone County

December 22, 2003 (Solstice)

The sacred arch of Stone County