Anthroposophy NYC Blog

KEEP TALKING
(dispatches from social isolation)

First Offerings: Richard Thomas, Dorothy Moore, Katherine Vode

The 21st Century Warrior

Dorothy Moore

I don’t remember when this quote by Karl Koenig came into my hands. Years ago, I think. I do remember the resounding THUMP of recognition and guilt the first time I read it. It was like having my ears boxed for having not understood or forgotten something really important. Since then I dutifully kept it near at hand, or so I thought. For a long while Koenig’s quote lived pinned to a bulletin board in a large fancy font, but you know how bulletin boards are. Gradually it became obscured by other, more immediate memos. The bulletin board disappeared in one move or another. At some point I found the tattered paper again in an old file. THUMP! After that, a freshly printed version lived under a paperweight on my desk. But you know how it is with desks. Attention shifts, and things pile up. The paper disappeared again, and reappeared again any number of times. THUMP, THUMP, THUMP! It never became less important. But slowly, painfully, it became less a thing I needed to re-read to remember, and more an understanding that I don’t forget.

Here we are. In the 21st Century. Warriors, all.

*****

Knighthood of the 21st Century

Karl Koenig

There is a knighthood of the 21st century
Whose riders do not ride through the darkness of physical forests, as of old, but through the forest of darkened minds.
They are armed with a spiritual armor,
And an inner sun makes them radiant.
Out of them shines healing,
Healing that flows from the knowledge of the human being as a spiritual being.
They must create inner order, inner justice,
Peace, and conviction in the darkness of our time.
They must learn to work side by side with angels.