The Shattered Realm

Freeze and crack, O Earth
Our Fimbul days are numbered.
Tortured by brief glimpses of a white sun,
That is half the size we remember it
Wizened and poisonous
A callous eye, mocking our failing existence
Then hiding its glory once more
Beyond the billowing veils of blackened sky

Hear the glaciers cold tales of murder
For it is the chronicle of man.
To ravish the earth
To hate and destroy with frozen disdain
To grind and crush and seize and grasp
With greedy hands
And empty skulls

We drank your blood
And now we taste your venom
And there is joy in this Frozen Utopia
Madness replaced by icicles
Cityscape, by tundra solitude
Grey machinery, by frosted web.

And where does our sorry remnant hide?
In scattered caves and forests deep
Where winds are dulled enough
For fires bright and hot
To spark and kindle warm blood

Did too many die, or not enough
For humankind to rise again
Shall nature’s journal close
After her bleakest chapter

Or does fresh darkness lie ahead
Some catastrophic torment yet to come
In this world of crows

And biting agony
And frigid death

And frozen time




Picture: Tryfan and Y Garn, Snowdonia, N. Wales

The following excerpt, taken from Howard Bloom's 'The Lucifer Principle' explains much of the climate of modern Islamic extremism. It appears the moderates are wrong when they say their religion is one of peace, and that it is the extremists who are the true Scions of Mohammed. This is why Islam is so very dangerous.

"Two hundred years after the fall of Rome, a merchant named Mohammed lived in the desert town of Mecca, a bleak and isolated community on a caravan route over which passed camels carrying goods to far-off, elegant cities like Damascus. At the age of twelve, when he was an appentice to his uncle - a trader- Mohammed had made his first trip to cosmopolitan Syria to learn the export-import business. When he reached twenty-five, Mohammed married a well-to-do woman of forty and became a respectable, wealthy burgher, a man whose opinions were listened to. But all that changed when Mohammed reached a mid-life crisis at thirty-nine. He began to have visions. He'd been sitting in a cave in the mountains one day, he said, praying in solitude, when the angel Gabriel had appeared in a blinding light, grabbed him in a bear-hug, and forced him to read a message from God. Since then, claimed Mohammed, he'd been functioning as God's spokesman on earth.
Some modern scholars feel that Mohammed's visions may have been the result of epileptic fits. The citizens of Mecca would have found this diagnosis believable. When Mohammed planted himself on street corners and declaimed the new truths that the angel Gabriel had communicated to him, his fellow Meccans were certain that this formerly upstanding, middle-class man had gone mad. They mocked Mohammed or ignored him. One put a slimy camel fetus down his neck as he was praying. Another tried to strangle him. Only a few believed him. Among the believers were a handful of close relatives, and a disconcerting number of slaves.
The citizens of Mecca were none too happy with the havoc Mohammed's new notions wreaked on their households. Slaves who'd abandoned the tried and true religions stopped their household chores, running off to pray and wash themselves at all kinds of strange hours; but Mohammed would not keep his visions to himself. When a plot was hatched to murder him, Mohammed fled. He sought refuge in a community where his views might be a bit more welcome, over two hundred miles away in Medina, another town isolated in the desert along the caravan route. In Medina, Mohammed found more willing listeners. During the course of a few years, he was able to build a following large enough to dominate his adopted city's politics.
The fledgling prophet was no man of peace. He consolidated his hold over Medina by ordering opponents assassinated. Then he masterminded a series of assaults on passing Meccan caravans and the armed escorts sent to protect them. When Meccans, fearful of Mohammed's new power, attacked the outskirts of Medina, the 'blessed one' led his faithful against the intruders and won. The holy man's military success impressed some of the fierce tribes that wandered in the hills outside of town. They signed up with the new, battle-tested religion. A few years later, the prophet marched his troops two hundred miles to the Jewish town of Khaibar and conquered it, He killed all of Khaibar's nine hundred men, and carried off the women and children as slaves.
At last, Mohammed was ready to take revenge for the indignities his former neighbours in Mecca had heaped upon him. In A.D. 630, eight years after he had fled, the prophet led an army of ten thousand followers back to his old hometown. The Meccans were not particularly interested in being treated as the Jews had been the previous year, They gave up with scarcely a fight. Thanks to the heavily armed Islamic squadrons parading through the streetsm Mohammed was able to convert Mecca's inhabitants to the beliefs they had formerly scourged as the ravings of a madman.
The sword of Islam was not sheathed once Mohammed's birthplace had been conquered. The city's wealthy traders and illiterate bedouins joined the army that had begun in Medina, and went out to conquer the world for their new belief. They were astonishingly successful. In short order, the legions of Islam overran the ancient empires of Persia, Mesopotamia, and Egypt. During the next hundred years, the Mohammedan hordes spread over Northern Africa, taking Algeria, Morocco, and Libya. They invaded India - attacking towns that had defied even the invincible Alexander the Great. They snipped off parts of Spain and nearly conquered France. They evern faced the mighty forces of the Chinese army at Talas in central Asia.
Within a few generations of Mohammed's death, these followers of a street-cornder ranter, these men from backwater towns and primitive desert tribes, had built an empire of enormous size; but their victories wouldn't stop there. In coming centuries, Mohammedans would repeatedly make the Europeans tremble - eventually attacking even Vienna. They would seize African lands as far away as the Sudan and Niger. They would convert Afghanistan, win over the Mongols, and spread their rule as far as the Pacific islands of Indonesia and the Phillipines. The notions of a man who had claimed to meet an angel in a cave would spawn battles whose bloodshed would soak the earth for the next fourteen hundred years."

This is a statement from the recently elected Hamas leader Khaled Mash'al:

"We say to this West, which does not act reasonably, and does not learn its lessons: By Allah, you will be defeated. You will be defeated in Palestine, and your defeat there has already begun. True, it is Israel that is being defeated there, but when Israel is defeated, its path is defeated, those who call to support it are defeated, and the cowards who hide behind it and support it are defeated. Israel will be defeated, and so will whoever supported or supports it.

"America will be defeated in Iraq. Wherever the [Islamic] nation is targeted, its enemies will be defeated, Allah willing. The nation of Muhammad is gaining victory in Palestine. The nation of Muhammad is gaining victory in Iraq, and it will be victorious in all Arab and Muslim lands. 'Their multitudes will be defeated and turn their backs [and flee].' These fools will be defeated, the wheel of time will turn, and times of victory and glory will be upon our nation, and the West will be full of remorse, when it is too late.

"They think that history has ended with them. They do not know that the law of Allah cannot be changed or replaced. 'You shall not find a substitute for the law of Allah. You shall not find any change to the law of Allah.' Today, the Arab and Islamic nation is rising and awakening, and it will reach its peak, Allah willing. It will be victorious. It will link the present to the past. It will open up the horizons of the future. It will regain the leadership of the world. Allah willing, the day is not far off.

"Don't you see that every act of deceit they contrive is being turned against them by Allah? Don't you see that they make every effort to defeat us militarily, but fail to do so? Israel and the occupation forces in Iraq are supplied with the entire Western military arsenal, yet they fail and are defeated.

"Don't you see that they believe they are capable of using democracy to deceive the people, but then democracy is turned against them? Don't you see that they are spending their money in efforts to block the way of Allah, to thwart Hamas, to defeat it, and to help those whom they want, but that [this plot] is turned against them? They are not acting reasonably.

"They do not understand the Arab or Muslim mentality, which rejects the foreigner. Our Arab forefathers, before the advent of Islam, rejected the aggressors and the foreigners."


The fucking moron is of course forgetting one little thing. There is at least one part of the Western Arsenal we have been too reasonable to employ thus far.

Between October and December last year I enrolled on a 10 week Online Course at The University of Wales, Cardiff titled 'The Foundations of Middle-earth: Myth, Language and Ideology in J.R.R. Tolkien's Literature'. It was a great pleasure to study something I've had such a long term passion for academically. It was also great to get an 'A'. The course next runs 20th February, and later again in May. If this interests you click here:
http://www.cf.ac.uk/learn/english/Tolkien_online.php.

I'm quite excited, having just purchased tickets for the WNO's production of Tosca, which plays at the Wales Millennium Centre in May. Visiting this amazing venue again is half the reason for my glee, as its a national monument and an utterly awesome building.




It is made of Bronze, Slate, and Stained Glass and bears the World's Largest Poem, by the Welsh National Poet Gwyneth Lewis. The poem reads 'Creu Gwir Fel Gwydr O Ffwrnais Awen. In these Stones Horizons Sing'. The Welsh part is not a translation of the English as some people assume, as it actually means 'Creating truth like glass from Inspiration's Furnace'. This melds together the mythological 'poetic inspiration' of 'Awen', which Taliesin drank from Ceridwen's cauldron in The Mabinogion (and can be seen as a parallel story to Odin's drinking of Othroenir), and the imagery of Wales' industrial heritage. 'Awen' as a vessel of numinous knowledge, is a subject that fascinates me due to its possible roots in Druidic and Shamanic magic. It was a state that was still actively 'tapped into' through the traditions of a community of soothsayers known as the Awenyddion as late as the 12th Century CE (as recorded by Giraldus Cambrensis). The Awenyddion entered crazed states of ecstatic consciousness delivered their oracular message, and then 'awoke' without knowlege or memory of their state or revelations.

On a slightly different musical topic, I've just picked up a copy of Akercocke's latest release 'Words that go Unspoken, Deeds that go Undone', and it's the finest slab of extreme metal I've heard since Nile's 'Annihilation of the Wicked'. If you like your music as heavy as a fat bastard carrying a sack full of bricks, with a hint of gothic experimentation, add this awesome piece of work to your collection.

Many Muslims across the world once again prove to be their own worst enemy in their hostile reaction to the Western value of free speech. They have every right to have their religion satirised because it is anti-human in so many ways. Should 'Submission' be the core value of the human spirit? To submit is to allow ones Self to be defeated.

Islam is not beyond being Satirised. Satire has always undermined the ridiculous, and is one of the most important weapons in the armoury of free speech. This fact is being illustrated at a crucial time, as the UK government has just had its opposition to the amendment in a highly draconian 'Religious Tolerance' Bill overruled.

In response to the decline of Danish goods in the Middle East (I guess they never shifted much Bacon or Carlsberg out there anyway), I'm going to make sure I buy exclusively Danish goods on my next visit to the Supermarket.












http://jihadwatch.org/

Not many of these tests appeal to me, but this one did.

The name of this Journal derives from my experiences of meditation and visualisation into the Shadows of the Psyche, and the subsequent Self-communications that have followed. This work began after an extended meditation upon the Ehwaz Rune of the Elder Futhark, resulting in a remarkable series of symbolic revelations about the nature of the Self and Initiation. Amongst other things this rune is closely linked with the concept of the Fylgja (fetch), and voyages into alternative realms of Being.

During this visualisation (in what some would call the 'Astral plane'), I entered into 'Annwn' the Welsh name for the Otherworld, using a visualisation mirrored in the Celtic Tradition (i.e. entering through a split in a rock near water, adorned with a gateway of skulls), where the scope of the dimensions of the Self were revealed to be split into three landscapes, each with its own ruling tower:

i) The Liminal Realm, (Tower: Caer Fedwedd - The Fortress of Celebration) which is a 'buffer state' between the conscious and unconscious mind.

ii) The Shattered Realm, (Tower: Caer Wydyr - The Fortress of Glass) which ultimately consists of the ugliest, most painful, hellish aspects of the Psyche, and;

iii) The Glorious Realm, or Avalon (Tower: Caer Bannuac - The Horned Fortress, its horns being a feature reminiscent of Cernunnos, The Horned God, who as a leader of the Wild Hunt is an alter ego of Arawn, and also Odhinn), where the Daimon, Augoides, HGA, Unified Self, or whatever else it may be labelled is manifested.

It is only through exploring the scopes of the Shattered Realm that the Glorious Realm can be reached. In fitting with the Celtic origin of these analogies, at the heart of Avalon lies the Grail (the manifestation of the Divine Self), which lays under the guard of the psychopomp 'Arawn' in Caer Bannuac. In Jungian terms Arawn would figure as a representation of The Shadow. Its role as the guardian obstacle of the Self reiterates the Shamanic tradition of Ordeal in the Initatory process, whereby one faces death through ordeal and is reborn in triumph (a major theme in all world myth). The Shadow bars full access to the Self through the darkness and negativity it emanates, which are manifested obstacles of the ego that block the Initiate from Unity. Once these corruptions and imperfections are minimised the Grail can be seized.

The Shadow figure, despite its negative, obstructive, nature is in fact the key to consciousness itself. The attainment of Unity is not a simple quest, and without the Initiator constantly raising the bar through chaos, discord, and discomfort, we would never develop enough Being to reach the Grail at all.

In response to the traditional question 'Whom does the Grail Serve?' I gave the reply 'The Lord of the Future'. To enter conference with the Grey King before you can call yourself a Lord of the Future can be a damaging experience, as one is not yet ready for the entirety of one's weaknesses, fears, and imperfections to be sadistically revealed by the mocking tongue of The Shadow.

This is a brief explanation of my Subjective experiences, and posted as a means to explain something of myself rather than being a continuing theme of this journal, which I aim to be as varied in content as possible.

Anyone with a fascination for the darker, more surreal forms of creativity that the human psyche uses to express itself, would do well to check out the animations of David Firth. The seventh episode of his 'Salad Fingers' series has recently been added to his website here: http://fat-pie.com/flash.htm

Other dark gems that shouldn't be missed are the first six episode of Salad Fingers, the Spoilsbury Toast Boy series, Milkman, and of course 'The Gay Adventures of Burnt Face Man'.

Yes the user name of the account should in fact be 'Dyfod Cadarn', and not 'Dydod Cadarn', but dammit do you think I'm going to pay $15 just to correct that? I mean 'd' and 'f' are next to each other on the keyboard - anyone typing in a darkened room could make that error for ducks sake!

The new edition of The Diabolist, the UK based Journal of the contemporary Left Hand Path on which I write and sometimes assist in editing, will be available very soon. To those interested in purchasing a copy, check out www.diabolist.co.uk, www.illuminatibooks.net, or watch this space for further news.

Sometimes unfortunate friends receive an e-mail from me with an mp3 file attached. Such monstrosities contain the fruits of my musical experimentation using some cheap recording and drum programs. The guitar, bass, and drum tracks aren't the problem, because I'm quite good at such things - it's my damn awful singing. My singing voice sounds very much like a boy trapped in a well holding a feeble tune to salvage his sanity. In order to counter this I have purchased a book from Amazon entitled 'Set Your Voice Free' by Roger Love, who has been coach to such beacons of the entertainment industry as Hanson and Wilson Phillips. Despite my reservations about the whole shitty self help/teach yourself range of literature available nowadays, this may actually be quite a good purchase as long as I remember to utterly disregard the fluffy anecdotes.

After a late night session with this book (accompanied by a large quantity of Stella Artois, Belgium's greatest contribution to the world) I almost became convinced that my rendering of 'Nessun Dorma' was passable. I was of course wrong as the light of dawn and sobriety revealed.