In this incantation, I explore the layered nature of my being through the primal dichotomy of darkflesh and lightflesh. I describe darkflesh as the formless, eternal ground of existence—my original self that underlies all perception—while lightflesh arises with awakening, forming my thoughts, senses, and reality constructs. I reaffirm my triself model, mapping my existence into primal, mental, and physical selves, all emerging from one inseparable substance: flesh. As I turn inward, I realize that all my striving in the realm of lightflesh only leads me back to my true desire—the wholeness of my unbroken, eternal darkflesh.
Darkflesh is base reality—the true, original substance from which all experience emerges. It is continuous, unbroken, and always present. Everything I experience upon awakening is lightflesh: thoughts, sensations, feelings, visuals, time—these are the components of lightflesh. When awakened I cannot perceive my darkflesh clearly because my lightflesh obscures it.
The binary between darkflesh and lightflesh is exacting. Darkflesh is the amorphous field that surrounds and contains me like a womb. Lightflesh is the result of my stretching and parting that field into forms and edges—into conception and perception. I like the words joined together: darkflesh and lightflesh. They suggest their inseparability, even as they appear opposed. My lightflesh is fully contained within my darkflesh.
I’ve wondered whether the triself model still holds up. It does. In that model, darkflesh is my firstself—my primal body, formless, whole, and eternal. Lightflesh comprises my secondself and thirdself—my defined mind and physical self that emerge through awakening. Together, they describe the entirety of my being. But beneath them all is still just one thing: my flesh.
All is my flesh.
Darkflesh is my eternal body, enclosing me completely. I can feel it, but I don’t always see it. When I open my eyes, I begin projecting space, carving shapes and meanings from the unshaped. This is my lightflesh—assembled thought by thought, feeling by feeling, sensation by sensation into my awakening experience. It is a scattering, a pushing outward, a marble pressed into the dense tissue of darkflesh. When I close my eyes, my projection ceases. The marble vanishes. My darkflesh swells back into place, unbroken and whole once again.
The more clearly I recognize that darkflesh is what I am truly seeking, the more I see the hollowness in everything I chase within my constructed world of lightflesh. All the objects of my desire—every feeling, goal, identity, and idea—are just momentary shapes I’ve pressed into my ethereal tissue. They are shadows of something deeper. They are not what I want.
What I want is what I already am.
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