Contrariwise: Literary Tattoos Tattoos from books, poetry, music, and other sources.

Circles

This tattoo was submitted by Julie:

This was my second ever tattoo. It comes from a poem I found in in art book titled 'The Flights Of Icarus' when I was a teenager in high school. I used to obsess over the eight poems in the book, reading and rereading them at lunch time.
Years later I hunted down the book and now own an original printing, from 1977.

The poem is by Donald Lehmkuhl and out of all the possible lines, I chose these as they most clearly align with my personal belief system.

ORACLES
The Ultimate Movement.

Knowledge expands perception of the unknown.
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Self-knowledge reveals the absence of the Self:
The absence of Reality.
The light of form.
The acceleration of Time.
The creation of Space.
The presence of Becoming.
The finiteness of the Universe.
The purpose of suffering.
The pulse of Existence.
The role of Consciousness.
The rule of Consciousness.
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Consciousness is a phase in Evolution as important as the creation of matter itself.
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Consciousness is more remarkable than life because without Consciousness life could not be remarked upon.
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Consciousness is the witness to becoming.
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Consciousness is the womb of Reality.
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Consciousness is pain.
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When we take pains, we take Consciousness.
What we get in exchange for our pains we get in exchange for Consciousness.
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Consciousness is the limitation to which we are all confined.
We have not the major freedom of the voluptuous innocent panther.
We are not beneath choice, not above it.
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We have no choice: we have choices.
We are condemned to choose.
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It is Consciousness that denies us Freedom, yet it is Consciousness that sets us free.
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Consciousness is the manifestation of thought in matter.
Consciousness is energy's last leap and greatest leap toward Reality.
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In the crucible of human suffering, Consciousness is creating god.
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The Universe is filled with mindscapes: oceans and islands of thought, continents that ripple with canyons and sierras of joy and fear.
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The mind is studded with stars.
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The mind is a jar into which space is poured.
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The Universe is a convoluting brain.
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The Universe is, therefore it thinks.
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It thinks me.
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I am, therefore I am thought.
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The Universe and I is One.