Sage Pontiff
TurnbuckleNewzNetwork ( @TurnbuckleNW ) Video post, Instagram, 02/26/2023
Across the screen we see, in diagonal white block letters, is “SAGE PONTIFF – OUT OF THE HOSPITAL” festooned with a couple of flexing arm emojis and some “100s”. What we’re seeing is clearly cellular video, as someone is rushing across a parking lot that is clearly the Emergency department intake to catch up with the dreadlocks-and-baja hoodie fashion sense of the man himself, who is moving extremely gingerly, hardly able to shoulder his backpack. He’s also bearing a gauze head wrap that makes him look like a Trustafarian Spirit of 1776. The voice comes breathless.
“Sage, Sage! I’m Baxter, I work for Turnbuckle News Network–got a second?”
The Bodhisattva turns, and frankly, he looks fucked up. Most of his dreadlocks bear blackened remnants of dried blood, as does his goatee. His left eye is lumpy and swollen, and he’s bent at the waist like an elderly man. But he seems grateful for a chance to set down his backpack, and his smile is as benevolent as ever, if a bit more tight lipped than usual.
“Namaste, Baxter. Please, how can I help?”
“Sage you just lost to Paxton Ray in a bloody confrontation–and really got hurt in the process. How are you feeling?”
“Like I’ve just been in a bloody confrontation with Paxton Ray, Baxter. But it’s not all negative feelings, quite the contrary. Pain isn’t a bad thing. That’s a black and white, cookie cutter mentality–something that gets drilled into you by our culture. Pain can be…transformative.”
“Speaking of that, does this loss kind of deflate your idea about being this agent of change? You showed up talking a lot of mumbo-jumbo about spiritualism and enlightenment and all that–and you’ve lost a lot of matches. There are some people in our comments sections who say you were a mistake to sign. How do you respond to that?”
At this, Sage’s face darkens. Rage, sadness, who can tell. But he speaks softly at this, choosing his words carefully.
“Enlightenment is not a microwave dinner, fellow traveler. Ascension is not a Door Dash away. These are processes that take time. And they will have stumbling points and things that stand in your way, as all great journeys do.”
He looks up, locking those intensely beautiful eyes with the man holding the phone.
“You would turn around after a few failures, right? That is what separates a Bodhisattva from a sleeper, Baxter. And one day, hopefully, you’ll stop hearing me and start actually listening.”
He bows slightly and shoulders his pack with a wince. He begins walking away, destination unclear.
“Hey, Sage, where you going next?”
“To a friend’s farmhouse. Then I’ll go see some folks about yoga.”
—
03/12/2023
“Look you fuckin’ hippie, you can’t meditate your way out of this. Can he, Ollie?”
The man asking the question is broad everywhere, clearly used to being the intimidating presence in these interrogations. Dressed in the telltale tan and black that shows him to a Sheriff, he’s almost a caricature of a southern lawman, Joe Don Baker with tin on his chest. He stalks like a sciatic gorilla, making sure to keep himself behind the seated figure: Sage Pontiff, the Bodhisattva, who looks…well, not particularly bothered. He’s not in the lotus position, but he is chilling, one leg up on the seat, expressionless.
“No he cannot, Mark.”
The seated man is in a cheap suit that hangs off him like he’s a display rack–as broad as his associate is, he’s equally drawn in, scarecrow proportioned and frankly uncomfortable-looking. But he never moves an inch, glowering at their suspect with an unnerving stillness. The combination is to sweat people out, make them feel off balance. Can’t turn to look at the beast behind you, can’t match the reptilian stare of the man in front of you. The cops have a rhythm going.
“We got multiple witnesses who place you at the Wilkes property during a yoga festival. Same witnesses say you and some poor rainbow child son of a bitch walked off into the woods. 45 minutes later you come out practically dragging this guy behind you, both of you scraped up and bloody. Ollie, what was the total?”
“Broken nose, multiple contusions, a couple of deep lacerations, one missing tooth, and some cracked ribs. Nasty stuff. But you’re a real solid guy, right? That fella looked like he’d been worked over by three people and what do you got…little boo boo on your lip?”
Sage softly smiles at this. He’s nursing considerably more than a split lip, but a lot of it is not that visible. Mark steps to his left side and leans in extra close.
“Know what I think?”
“What’s that, Mark?”
“I think this piece of shit gets off on it. I think he’s a sicko, real trash. Can’t help himself but to hurt people. Bet you had a real hardon when you were beating that guy half to death, didnt you?”
At this, Sage closes his eyes–but not to cry or to confess through his gritted teeth. This isn’t television, this isn’t Law and Order: Central Texas. No, Sage closes his eyes and begins to calmly recite a mantra.
“Om Muni Muni Mahamuni Shakyamuniye Svaha, Om Muni–”
The orcish Sheriff slams his palm on the metal table, cutting him off.
“Hey, fuckface! English.”
Sage’s eyes open, and he regards both of his interrogators with his trademark chill–but there’s some play at the edge of his lips. He knows the mantra calms him–but now he’s certain that it enrages the reactionary lawmen. He begins to speak clearly.
“There is a great pain in you two. Agents of capital, stormtroopers of the power of the dollar–your mere existence is atavistic to a lifetime of corruption and jackbooting. So you look at me, someone who lives well outside of the square community, and you figure it would be easier to put me away than to confront the man inside yourselves, right?”
This deflates the room a bit. Mark seems like he’s trying to make sense of it, hands on hips. Ollie interlaces his fingers, the first time he’s moved in who knows how long.
“So why did you do it?”
A switch flips. For all his intensity in the ring and his placidity outside of it, often forgotten is that this man was raised by activists, and has spent most of his wandering young adulthood among the same. It’s like a boxer suddenly remembering his combos after being out of the ring for too long: Sage Pontiff the Bodhisattva turns savvy, and his contempt for the police is no surprise. His eyes focus on Mark, narrowing.
“The festival goers, they saw me go into the woods, right?”
“Go into the woods and beat the shit out of that guy, yeah.”
“But did they see me do it?”
“Let’s say they did.”
“Not what I asked, officer. You’re fooling yourself if you think this is the first time I’ve been harassed by fascists like you. Let me paint you a different scene: a couple of concerned granola moms have pointed the finger at me, horrified by what they saw. You can place me there, you can place me in the woods, and you can place me and him, mutually beaten and bloodied, right? But no one saw what we did. And Redwood isn’t giving you anything, right? And I bet he’s already declined to press any sort of charges. So you bring me in, not arrested for anything, just for questioning…because you look at me and you see a burnout. A casualty of the lifestyle. A fool, and you think badgering me is going to get me to confess to something so you can stick me in some cage and forget about me–maybe even line your pockets with some kickback from a for-profit prison.”
Mark leans every ounce of his bulldog weight forward, almost coming nose to nose with the defiant Pontiff. There’s a tense moment here, likely because The Bodhisattva seems about two seconds away from getting his head split open. Notably, Ollie doesn’t make a move to stop him, or even clear his throat. His stare doesn’t falter, even when his partner utters a threat.
“If this were back in the day you’d regret talking to me like that.”
“Then it’s pretty cool that we’re evolving past that point, right?”
Sage stands to his full height, idly stretching.
“Charging me?”
“Not right now.”
“Am I being detained in any way?”
“Not yet.”
“Namaste, Ollie. Namaste, Mark.”
—
This is probably the most intact we’ve seen him: lip split, a couple of lumps, and his knuckles almost completely healed over with white lacings of dead skin.
Where he has arrived, we’re unsure. But here he stands, atop the roof of his van, practically nude–all that he wears is a sarong patterned in an elephant print. And when he speaks, he’s not looking toward us. He’s looking toward the horizon, bathed in a neon pink sunset.
They say that he lived a thousand lifetimes before he ascended. Back then, they knew him simply as a Bodhisattva, before he attained the highest consciousness.
When he was born, the Brahmins examined him. They said he bore marks that meant he would be mahapurisa, basically destined, right? He was either gonna become the Buddha, or he was gonna become a great king. 32 signs of a great man. When he left his home, he saw four sights. He saw an old man, a diseased man, a corpse, and an ascetic. The sights inspired him to seek Nirvana.
32 signs of a great man. Because though he inspired many, the Buddha didn’t like…lead them. Not in your traditional western sense. He didn’t get a compound and print his teachings. He just existed. And that existence inspired others.
You know what’s funny? I thought that was the way to do it.
But it’s not my way. That was the way of Siddhartha Gautama. His way was his.
My way has to be mine.
They also called him Sammasambuddho, “the perfectly self-awakened”.
Make no mistake, I’m not so full of ego to draw direct parallels, but the parallel exists and I have flirted with it. But there were no Brahmins in my home to examine me. I have had to come to my 32 signs through a lived life. And though the thought doesn’t come to me often, I wonder when I am looking at the magnificence of the sky…do others I face share those same signs? Are they also mahapurisa? When I come to those thoughts, I realize that no, no…like, a lot of you are not great men. You are not destined. You are not awakened.
But you could be.
We’re not talking about three counts or submissions. We’re talking about the…democratization of enlightenment. Why should only a select few beings from ages past be the only ascendant beings, right? But you’ve all been asleep for so long that simple words aren’t having the effect they could have in the ancient era. You’re so deadened that leading by example can no longer inspire you to a greater existence like it did in Guatama’s era. You’re so smothered by the modern world that even if you had 32 signs of a great man…you wouldn’t know where to look. You wouldn’t recognize them if you were staring at them. It’s one of the reasons that so many of you look at me with real amusement, unsure of my intent or my power despite me showing you, over and over, both of those things! What this world has done to you is wild, man. It’s harrowing stuff.
Do you think you have those signs, Jonathan-Christopher?
I think you do.
But I think that the world has turned you into a codependent mess. This isn’t your fault, per se–it is the fault of greed and a lust for things that feel…perfected. Antiseptic. Hollywood.
But I think you have the 32 signs of greatness. They’re buried in you. The problem is, you’ve become too comfortable in a life that is unbalanced. Sleepwalking. Hoping that if you hustle just that much harder, if you drive yourself just that much further, that the idyllic sweet life will be just around that corner, just over that hill, just another mile down the road. Ask yourself, my brother, when has that yet proven to be true? When have you pushed yourself and gotten what you dream of?
Never, right?
Now, is that your fault? Are you just that bad at working hard and trying to achieve your dreams?
No.
The dreams aren’t attainable by design. It’s a small club, Jonathan-Christopher. And we aren’t in it.
This is always going to be the way it is for you, so long as you cling to the life and dreams that you lead now. Which, hey, I get it. That’s a scary thing to hear, right? I’m not blind to how this feels. I’m just a random being, speaking to another being, and I have the temerity to seemingly cast judgment on you–that has to make you seethe. But what this is, man? This isn’t judgment. I’m not telling you the way you’re conducting yourself or structuring your existence is wrong. I’m merely observing a plain fact, that it’s not fulfilling you. Not spiritually. Not in here, right? Because there’s always this hunger that eats at you.
But my message is not one of hopelessness.
My message is one of achievement.
Because there are attainable things, real actual steps, that you can take to be a more fulfilled person.
All you have to do is make the first one.
I know, I know. There’s fear in you.
It was scary for me, too.
But I hold on my form 32 signs of a great man. They became more apparent the more steps I took, the further I walked into something unknown and became who you see now. They sang to the cosmos when I attained an enlightened mind. And when I finally realized my mahapurisa, I gained sight that allowed me to see it, Jonathan-Christopher. We are all in possession of this. It merely takes…that.
One step, my man.
One step, my brother.
One step to begin the path. Another to stay on the path. By the third, you’ll hardly realize you’re on a path any more. The enlightenment will wash over you like waves of the purest water.
All you have to do is take the step. But to take the step, you have to cast off the chains that keep you immobile.
And that part…that part is the hardest.
But I believe in you, Jonathan-Christopher.
I believe in your will and your drive. It’s just been misdirected.
But The Bodhisattva is here now. I have walked my path and seen the old man. Now I’m looking at the diseased one.
And I will provide for you the cure for your sickness.
Hit. By. Hit.
Until you are free.