The Nameless Quest in The Gate of the Sanctuary from The Temple of the Holy Ghost (Collected Works, Vol I) by Aleister Crowley.
“The overwhelming sweetness of a voice
Filled me with Godhead. ‘Still remains the choice!
Thou knowest me for Beauty! Canst thou bear
The fuller vision, the abundant air?’
I only wept. The elements rejoice;
No tear before had ever fallen there.” [via]
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Consider also:
- “Up rears the pillar. Quaintly shaped and hued, It focussed all the sky and all the plain To its own ugliness. I looked again, And saw its magic in another mood. A shapeless truth took image in my brain.”
- “The king was silent. None of us would stir. I sat, struck dumb, a living sepulchre. For–hear me! in my heart this thing became My sacrament, my pentecostal flame. And with it grew a fear–a fear of Her. What Her? Shame had not found itself a name. Simply I knew it in myself. I brood Ten years–so seemed it–O! the bitter food In my mouth nauseate! In the silent hall One might have heard God’s sparrow in its fall. But I was lost in mine own solitude– I should not hear Mikhael’s trumpet-call. Yet there did grow a clamour shrill and loud: One cursed, one crossed himself, another vowed His soul against the quest; the tumult ran Indecorous in that presence, man to man. Stilled suddenly, beholding how I bowed My soul in thought: another cry began. ‘Gereth the dauntless! Gereth of the Sea! Gereth the loyal! Child of royalty! witch-mothered Gereth! Sword above the strong, heart pure, head many-wiled!’ The knightly throng Clamour my name, and flattering words, to me– If they may ‘scape the quest–I do them wrong; They are my friends! Yet something terrible Rings in the manly music that they swell. They are all caught in this immense desire Deeper than heaven, tameless as the fire. All catch the fear–the fear of Her–as well, And dare not–even afraid, I must aspire.”
- “‘Resolve all question by a moonward tread. Follow the moon!’ Even so the king had said. My thought had thanked him for the generous breath Wherewith he warned us: for delay were death. And now, too late! no moon is overhead– Some other meaning in the words he saith? Or, am I tricked in such a little snare?”
- “Yet resolute I put my love away. It could not live in this amazing day. Love is the lotus that is sickly sweet, That makes men drunken, and betrays their feet”
- “The Godhead in me! As a flash there came The jealous secret and the guarded name. The quest was mine! And yet my thoughts confute My intuition; and my will was mute.”