The story of
why this volume had to be re-released is actually the most fun part.
But let's start with the volume itself.
Essays From Our Universe Experiencing Itself collects a neat set of nine
essays (amidst sundry
poems), and was originally published in 2020 under the slightly different title
Essays From The Universe Experiencing Itself ("The" instead of "Our," you see).
So here is the whole story. A third
Pandeism Anthology volume was supposed to come out in mid-2020. But there must have been a mixup at the
dictionary store, because instead of Pandeism we got kicked a few lines down to a
Pandemic. So instead of a new Anthology volume, we took what we had and put out this slimmer non-Pandeism focused collection. It had its fans for a while, and then, in mid-summer 2024, a funny thing happened (well, another one).... you see, around that time,
country singer and
Trump fan
Lee Greenwood published his "God Bless the USA Bible," featuring the regular text of the
Bible to which was added some US historical documents. Oh, and, of course, the
lyrics to Greenwood's hit patriotic song,
God bless the USA, because why
wouldn't you expand the Bible with that? And this quickly became the official Trump-endorsed version of the Bible (despite
a Bible-expert's review panning the print and paper quality, amongst other things.
It having been abundantly pointed out that the Bible was a
public domain book, and anybody could print their own version of it (and many have), I was riffing on this with my
literary agent and his artist brother, and we came up with this quite amusing idea that we could just put out our own version of the Bible containing much the same historical documents -- but instead of calling it the "God Bless the USA Bible" could include instead the song "
God Bless America" (which Greenwood had left out, probably to avoid calling the obvious attention to the similarity of his title) and call it the "God Bless America Bible." And within a few weeks of our thinking this, that book was indeed up on Amazon, with a cover designed by the brother for a fee, and it sold (or so we were told) a lovely few dozen copies. All was well. Until....
Apparently, somebody complained. Which is itself kind of funny because the "God Bless the USA Bible" wasn't even available on Amazon at all, and whether the complaint came from a buyer or the competition, it was about a higher-quality product. But still, without
warning, my literary agent's account for selling books there was wiped out, with the
flick of a
switch. And I mean totally wiped out. Not just this "God Bless America Bible," but all of the dozens of titles that he sold there on behalf of his collection of clients (including a half dozen of mine). And, naturally Amazon wiped out the royalties owed as well, thousands of dollars evaporating in the
blink of an eye.
No
information was given as to what specifically was the reason for this, though we all knew. And, it turned out, no real means of contesting it existed, either. Inquiries were replied to with botlike responses indicating in only the vaguest terms that the matter had been reviewed and the decision would stand. Theoretically, this could be appealed via an arbitration process, but a little research showed that the arbitration mandated under Amazon's
airtight ironclad contract had two hitches: 1) it had to be conducted in-person in an inconvenient state, and 2) the arbitrators always sided with Amazon anyway. And of course they would, that's where they're getting their business.
And so, after a suitable period of time, I opened my own account, and reposted most of my books which had disappeared with the destruction of my literary agent's. But just to avoid any accusation of circumvention of Amazon rules, I published my books as new editions, with some slight changes bringing them up to the current day. I actually published a few entirely new books there as well -- one being my E2 poem, "
The Three Kinds of Ghosts" (suitable illustrated with a variety of ghostly scenes), and another being my foray into writing an overchargedly
erotic science fiction novel, "Shell's Journey: A Romance."
Now, how about
Essays From Our Universe Experiencing Itself? The twenty total pieces in that book are organized something like this:
⦾ ‣ “Patterns” by Amy Perry
⦾ ‣
The Promising Path of Pandeistic Paganism, Or Having Your Spiritual Cake and Eating It Too! by David W. Bradford
⦾ ‣ “And Just Like That” by Amy Perry
⦾ ‣ “Taoist/Pandeist Alarm Clock” by John Ross, Jr.
⦾ ‣ “For Bulls coach, God is no game” (excerpt) by
Phil Jackson
⦾ ‣
Waking Up into Understanding: A Positive Vibration by Nichole Machen
⦾ ‣
An Entheogenic Exploration of Pandeistic (Seeming) Experiences by Brian Graham
⦾ ‣ “Simple Pandeism” by Amy Perry
⦾ ‣
Spiritual Perspectives of a Wandering Sexual Artist by
Joey Kim
⦾ ‣
Winds of Change — The dystopian future of our world by Sridhar Venkateswaran
⦾ ‣
Enoch, the Second Messenger of God, Volume I (excerpt) by
Edward Vaughan Hyde Kenealy
⦾ ‣ “Stage Drama” by Amy Perry
⦾ ‣
Man of Sorrows by C. Norman Myers
⦾ ‣ “It, My Yin-Yang Tao” by John Ross, Jr.
⦾ ‣ “Tao-Te-Ching: Chapter Five” by John Ross, Jr.
⦾ ‣ “Being Alive” by Amy Perry
⦾ ‣
The Ouroboros Code: Speculative Panendeistic musings on the Eschaton Omega Hypercomputer by Antonin Tuynman
⦾ ‣
The Super-Now by Ewan Mochrie
⦾ ‣ “The Keeper of the Sheep,” VI by Alberto Caeiro (pseudonym of
Fernando Pessoa)
⦾ ‣ “
Song of Myself,” 48, by
Walt Whitman
The essays vary in length, from a few pages to 25 at most, with the book overall clocks in at 135 pages, about a quarter the length of the typical
Pandeism Anthology tome.
The book, to
paraphrase the blurb, includes poetic meditations by Amy Perry, co-editor of the anthology, alongside compelling essays like David W. Bradford's joyful
synthesis of
paganism and
Pandeism, and Brian Graham's mind-bending journeys into
consciousness via
Salvia Divinorum. Readers will encounter insights from spiritual leaders, physicists, philosophers, and creatives -- for example, John Ross, Jr.'s
Taoist poetic reflections, C. Norman Myers' humanist reimagining of a pandeistic Jesus, and
Joey Kim's bold intersection of
sexuality and
spirit. Historical and speculative voices add depth, with excerpts from figures like Edward Vaughan Hyde Kenealy, with his esoteric 19th-century work Enoch, the Second Messenger of God, which presents a poetic and prophetic vision steeped in mystical symbolism and spiritual yearning. Reflections on the computational
universe are provided by by Antonin Tuynman, whilst Ewan Mochrie offers a contemplative exploration of time which complements themes of presence, interconnectedness, and cosmological unity.
So that is it, that's the story of this book, and why if you go to its page it will tell you it was published in 2025. Because it was -- this version of it, anyway. Blessings!!