Ferments
O Child of the twentieth Century
Brought up on junk
Know
Mother’s milk was the norm once.
O traveller of the internet
Know information travelled then too
O laptop-hugging walking encyclopedia
Know your seniors were as smart
Sometimes smarter too
O devourer
Of instant infotainment
Know some history too.
The Conjuror in the Sun
19th century Spain was a mosaic of smuggling, sects, and scandals. The country tolerated many cults — for they brought in money. Among them was Aleister Crowley, an Englishman whose reputation as a wizard preceded him like incense smoke before a procession. With charisma and cunning, he convinced wealthy patrons to fund his villa of magical practice. One afternoon, under the burning Spanish sun, he performed a ritual: a hen, a circle, a chant in a forgotten tongue — the bird frozen in time, neck stretched in eerie obedience. His friends, awed and horrified, witnessed what felt like theatre, or real enchantment.
Crowley Moves Eastward
As Europe stiffened around him, Crowley set his sights on the East — on India, mystery’s favourite child. Among mountaineers planning to conquer K2, he found kindred spirits and a test of will. Rejected as team leader, he cursed them and walked off into isolation. An avalanche claimed three lives. Legend bloomed like mold in damp cellars.
The Invisible Walk in Calcutta
In a Calcutta alley, stalked by hoodlums, Crowley declared invisibility upon himself and his companions. The thugs passed them by. His friends felt something odd — but would not say they had vanished. Crowley’s myth was now self-fueling.
The Theosophists and Their Box of Secrets
Not far behind, another occult tide was rising. Madame Blavatsky and Dr. Annie Besant — the Theosophists — claimed Himalayan masters sent messages into a wall-mounted box. The ritual of opening it was grand. Until Blavatsky was caught slipping in the notes herself. The doctrine cracked — but Annie Besant held the center. A Tamil boy, Jiddu Krishnamurti, was their hope.
Renunciation and Revolt
Krishnamurti renounced the title of World Teacher. He turned away not only from theosophy but from all cages of doctrine. The child of prophecy became a philosopher of freedom.
Yeats and Crowley: Mirror and Flame
W.B. Yeats, poet of stars and sleepwalkers, was also a member of the occult Golden Dawn. Crowley fled it, stealing rites and secrets. Yeats composed ‘A Vision’; Crowley wrote ‘Hymn to Pan’. Both channeled spirits through their wives — or so they said. Their words birthed visions:
Thrill with the lissome lust of the light,
O man! My man!
Come careering out of the night
Of Pan! Io Pan!
Io Pan! Io Pan! Come over the sea
From Sicily and from Arcady!
Why should you leave the lamp
Burning alone beside an open book,
And trace these characters upon the sands?
A style is found by sedentary toil, and by imitation of great masters.
The 19th century was a fault line: magic met machine, mysticism danced with materialism. The healers became doctors; the curses became diagnoses. Crowley and Yeats, Besant and Blavatsky — they each whispered into the approaching void.
Medicine remains an art. Behind every prescription is the shadow of a spell.
The Rhapsody
We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death’s other Kingdom
Remember us — if at all — not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men.
And so we return to Eliot, whose words echo like a ritual chant. The audience stirs, each person hearing a different ghost. Science scoffs, philosophy ponders, poetry listens. You, dear reader — do you feel hollow, or merely… stuffed?