Paul Lonely: Luminous Poet, Postmodern Priest, Integral Visionary

Last month I got to meet Paul Lonely, author of what he calls a "contemporary Upanishads" - Suicide Dictionary.

If you move in Integral circles and/or read the blogs of Ken Wilber or Stuart Davis, you already know that this first-time author is much touted as the visionary Integral artist-in-waiting. But whether you've heard of him or not - this book is a must read for anyone interested in poetry, religion, literature and the possibilities of a spiritual next-stage as intuited and mapped-out by Integral Theory. It's also a really fun,  trippy, exciting read!

Don't let the title put you off - this is no depressing journey into the void - it refers rather to a deep embrace of what I think of as the many deaths of  our ego-defenses along the road of revelation.

Paul explained to me that the story takes place in Rainbow Abbey and that most of the text follows the conversations between the Quantum monks of a secret religious order dedicated to the vast project of understanding the underlying unity-in-diversity of the world's spiritual traditions - and these conversations and meditations are written in sonnet form!

This is Sonnet A:

Tangible angels we are One and All,
Under and over and inside the flesh;—
There is no frontier for World-centric to draw,
If truly world-centric the angel has meshed.

A Stupa was built on the sands of Iran,
Each native said prayers and accepted its worth;
They all remained Muslim and nothing was gone,
But added to Islam was Buddhism's birth.

Allah as a Baby was from Jewish men,
Which leaked to Muhammad who Journeyed at Night;
The Prophet was tested but mastered zazen,
And now simply twirls as a Dervish in white.

A relic of Buddha in Mecca will stand,
When Islamic integrals...open this Land.

Oh yeah and the chapter headings follow a dictionary form in which each sonnet and description of life at Rainbow Abbey relate to an evolving lexicon of words - Paul plans to spend his life working on the "A's" and invites other Integral writers to help him complete the alphabet.... He's also collaborating with a visual artist Todd Norman Guess on getting his sonnets paired with stunning images:

See that work here. Here's the first product of that marriage:




Sound heavy going?

Well it's not - it's as luminous as it is serious, as playful as it is brilliant and as down to earth as it is mystical. I am only a thrid of the way into the book and plan a full length review of this masterpiece before the month is out - but I wanted to recommend it to you as a gift for yourself or the Integralist/poetry-lover/mystic in your life. My Mom is an inter-faith minister and I sent it to her in anticipation of her deep appreciation! It's available through Amazon here.

The radiance of the text gives off James Joyce as much as Dylan Thomas, Arundhati Roy as much as  Ken Wilber, Allen Ginsberg as much as William Shakespeare - but in the end it's all Paul Lonely and he is a rare find indeed.

Find out more about Paul and the Suicide Dictionary here.