The Dungeon of the Ribcage

This is an incredible lecture, as they all are. In this video, Siri Singh Sahib Ji first recites his poem, “The Dungeon of the Ribcage”.  However, there is much more in this lecture, besides this poem.  Enjoy!

Here are the words to his poem:  “The Dungeon of the Ribcage”:

I am me.
Myself.
My environments.
My projection.
My parallel.
My perpendicular and my principle.
That many I am.

And if all that many of me are not understood,
Not felt, not taken care of, not loved and not put together;
I will just die as an unknown mystery ―
Unremembered and forgotten.

That is the story of every man or a woman born in the rib cage,
The dungeon of karma.

In my ecstasy of consciousness,
I see the skies,
I see the stars,
And I know and I feel
The movement and the magnetic field,
And the infinity,
And the light,
And the darkness.

But in that culture of so much happening
I am still a very, very, very, extremely, very, very, lonely man.
A slave of the dungeon of the rib cage.

I hear music.
I create music.
I know rhythm.
I know voices.
I hear the birds.
I even hear the fishes talking.

I’m trying to see and feel
Everything in the world I know.
And I know the sounds,
And the sounds, which I can’t hear,
But I am the slave of the rib cage,
And nearest to me is my heart.
And I do not recognize its very sound.

So arrogant and so ignorant
And much in duality I keep living.

Each day gives me the message of beauty,
Of bounty,
Of prosperity,
Of flourishing,
Of blossoming.

I’m going, and going, and going and going…
On the path of infinity.
Cycle after cycle.
Prayer after prayer.
Grace after grace.
Rosary after rosary.
Feast after feast,
And fast after fast.

I’ve gone through the passage of life,
But still I’m the slave of the dungeon of the rib cage.

Many have called me human.
Many have called me beast.
Many have called me a lower being.
Some people have called me a higher being.

Sometimes I did experience the infinity of God,
And the light of the heavens shined through me,
And sometimes I spoke the word of Truth
Which God gave me to be,
I was channel.
I was channel.

And many times I’m just the lowest of the low,
And the creature, and the dungeon of the dirt of the dirt
Of the human caliber and behavior.
And in that duality I keep on living.

But still I’m the slave of the dungeon of the rib cage.

Now I feel the touch of God has touched me and I’m free.
In that freedom I feel the ecstasy of light.
I’m polite.
I’m good.
I’m God.

Listen to Yogi Bhajan reciting this poem:

Here is Simrit singing this poem:

You can listen to the full lecture where Yogi Bhajan recited this poem here: