"The aspirant, under the guidance of his teacher or master - St. John designates this being as an Angel - enters a temple to undergo many trials wherein his strength, will power and perseverance are tested to the utmost. If the disciple is victorious, his reward comes as his spirit is bathed in Elysian air and he is companioned by angelic beings of transcendent beauty and slender."

C. Heline, "New Age Bible Interpretations, Vol. V."

The Elysian song is known as the the song of the Angels, the celestial choir and sounds of the divine that may be heard when one is attuned to them, usually in deep meditation or prayer.

Surely, by the definition of the above quotation, Elvis Presley’s life was an initiation of the ‘Elysian Song.’ He underwent "many trials wherein his strength, will power and perseverance" were "tested to the utmost." As a child he was visited by Heavenly Beings who showed him his destiny, and told him that they would be with him until he no longer had need of them.

Elvis’ Aunt Lorene recalled a very young Elvis:
".... on one occasion when we missed him and finally he came down out of the pasture and said he had been talking to Jesus. He had tears running down his little cheeks."

Mary L. Jones was seventy-four when Wanda June Hill visited her in 1979. Mrs. Jones held dear to her heart the memories of an Elvis no journalist could have invented (as so many have tried). She is a simple woman, with simple memories of a young boy, bared by poverty not of his making, struck to the bone by the cruelty of a time and place far from his true spiritual home. Mary lived next door to Elvis and his parents in Tupelo, Mississippi - next to the same one room dwelling in which Elvis had been born and over which the strange blue light shown on the night of Elvis’ birth, lighting his father's way to the well. Later, she then moved into the same housing project as did Elvis and his family when he was 13. Mary shared with Wanda her recollections of Elvis as he was then, and also the tragedy in which he lived in that past time, when Elvis Presley (the singer) was still only a dream from a Shaman’s pipe; a faint song in a lonely boy’s heart.

Mary Jones sat in her rocking chair, spitting tobacco into a nearby pint jar, as she unrolled the canvas of her memories, and painted a tender yet graphic story for Wanda on that rainy day in 1979.

The following is Wanda Hill’s condensation of Mary Jones’ conversation with her:
"Mary knew Elvis from his birth....Elvis adored his mother, cried after her and always obeyed her. He was very small, thin and sickly and he had fevers and colds often, and very bad coughs every winter. Mary would worry about it, give him medicine she had for her own kids and gave him hot drinks and food. Elvis was so polite, often he wouldn’t take it or anything until he had asked his mother.

When he was three he nearly died from fever, he was paralyzed and couldn’t breathe and Gladys (Elvis’ mother) was beside herself. There was no money for a doctor and Vernon (Elvis’ father) was out of town looking for work. An old black woman took Elvis, wrapped him in hot towels and kept him alive. She breathed into his lungs for him (artificial mouth to mouth resuscitation) and then when his fever cooled she began putting him in tubs of warm water, making him move his legs and arms and taught him to walk again. Gladys was working in the cotton field and left Elvis with the black ladies who watched the little kids. Elvis ran around all day naked, brown as the Negro babies he played with while his mother worked. The black woman would put him in the pot they had washed clothes in just before Gladys came in, then they dressed him and he was spiffy for his momma come evening time. Elvis was the favorite of the black women, they held him, played with him and cuddled him all day and he got stronger and stronger and was happy that summer..."

(speaking about Elvis) "Mary said, ‘He was such a sweet boy, so good hearted and kind and was especially nice to old people and kids and needy people.’ Mary’s son was killed in Korea. Elvis had followed him about and worshiped him as he grew up in Tupelo. When her son died, Elvis was a singer and doing well. He heard about it and came to visit her. He brought her $500 in cash and gave her a $400 check to buy her son a tombstone. He brought her a bouquet of red roses, sat in her house and cried over her son, told her how much he had thought of him and how he loved her and felt close to them all these years. He said when he left that he thought she could use a new roof. The next day roofers came, put one on, then painted her house and put down new carpet - it was a two room house next door to Elvis’ old place in Tupelo."

(As a small boy) "Elvis used to sneak off from home to go to a creek that had a small cove with still water and he went there to pray and to talk to Jesus, he said. He also said he talked to the ‘angels’ on the water and they sang to him. He told his mother when she came and caught him, and she said he was evil, doing evil things and whipped him. She also spanked his hands with a board once because he was ‘using devil sign language’ (hand signals of some kind). Elvis was small, yet he didn’t cry even though she hit his hands until they were bright red. He told her when she started crying, ‘It’s okay Momma, you don’t understand, It’s okay.’ Then he cried too and hugged her. Elvis also liked to sit in the moonlight and stare at the sky, but when asked what he was doing he would say, ‘getting moon beams in my heart’ and said he could hear music in the heavens - beautiful singing, angels on high. His mother told him never to tell people because they would say he was evil, crazy, and lock him up. And his grandmother said Gladys often washed his mouth with soap when he did talk about hearing voices and seeing things. So Elvis learned to keep quiet and only told a few who understood about people with ‘the gift’ as Mary called it. Elvis, she said, had ‘the gift’ and had it in abundance. She told him to treasure it, that it was God talking to him. He hugged her and said, ‘Thank you Mrs. Jones, I know.’ He’d say to her, ‘Some day, I’m going to tell people all about God and they’ll listen to me! I’m going to make them listen to me all over the world!’ and they did - he reached the world with his singing gospel.

"Mary said that when Elvis was about twelve he was crying and she asked him what was wrong. He said, ‘Mrs. Jones, I got nobody to talk to and I need to so bad.’ She said to him. ‘Talk to your Momma’, and he said , ‘Mrs. Jones, my momma don’t understand - I can’t explain - she just gets upset and I can’t upset her with this. I got nobody and I’m scared that no one will ever understand. Do you know, Mrs. Jones, what it is to be all alone in a place that is not ever going to be your home? I am going to be there - and I got nobody to understand.’ And he cried until he shook."

Elvis’ mother, Gladys Love Presley: "(as a child) Elvis would hear us worrying about our debts, being out of work and sickness and so on. He would say ‘Don’t you worry none. When I grow up, I’m going to buy you a house and pay everything you owe at the grocery store, and get two Cadillacs; one for you and Daddy and one for me.’ Little as he was, the way he’d look up at me, holding onto my skirt...you know, I’d believe him."

In a January, 1978 interview with ‘Good Housekeeping’ magazine, Elvis' father, Vernon Presley spoke of his son, and the insight he had concerning him:
"I believe Elvis’ career and contribution to the world were fated from the first. For during his early life, certain things happened which convinced me that God had given my wife and me a very special child for whom he had very special plans.

"Gladys and I were so proud of Elvis and enjoyed him so much that we immediately wanted more children. But, for reasons no doctor could understand, we had none....When Elvis was about 10 years old, the reason was revealed very clearly to me in a way I can’t explain. I can only say that God spoke to my heart and told me that Elvis was the only child we’d ever have and the only child we’d ever need. Elvis was a special gift who would fill our lives completely.

"As soon as I realized that Elvis was meant to be an only child, I felt as though a burden was lifted. I never again wondered why we didn’t have additional sons and daughters."

During his son’s life, Vernon had difficulty accepting Elvis’ metaphysical beliefs, and yet, after Elvis’ death, he came to acknowledge what he had really known all along, what had been whispered into his inner mind, about this "very special child."

Ted Harrison, from ‘Elvis People The Cult of the King’:
"He believed in UFOs and read voraciously the esoteric theories which referred back to Atlantis, a brotherhood of masters, and visitors from Venus...A poem by a London fan entitled ‘Message from Elvis’ talks of ‘our friends the Milky Way, mysterious in the sky’ and ends:

I know those years on earth

were really just a trial

for each to find a mate

of their eternal style.

For death is not goodbye

for we shall meet again

to share eternal youth

on some Nebula plain.

 

Larry Geller, in his book, ‘If I Can Dream’:
"Elvis believed that he was working under the aegis of these masters (the White Brotherhood), including Jesus. He felt somehow connected to them and thought that they had helped him....In Elvis’ mind, his life was being directed divinely by the brotherhood of masters and illuminated beings, enlightened entities that have existed since time immemorial."

The following was transcribed from a telephone conversation between Wanda Hill and Elvis in 1973:
Wanda: You look like your father’s side of the family - and your mother’s also - they are all nice looking people.

Elvis: Yeah - you know, I look like my people. We all look pretty much the same, straight nose and all, and we are blonde. I don’t like being blonde - I wanted to be different. It fits this incarnation - fits what I am here on Earth - to be dark, I mean.

Wanda: You mean, your former life? Your eh-what did you call it ?

Elvis: My former entity - my home out there - where I am from.

Wanda: How did, I mean, when did you figure out that you are from out there, as you say?

Elvis: When I was about ten they told me.

Wanda: Who?

Elvis: The two men who talked to me - have talked to me since I was five when they first presented themselves to me and said, "I am that I am and you are you - we will be with you, as your Lord is with you until you have no need of us again." And they showed themselves to me - as Light forms, and one of them touched me and I felt Light inside me - floating sort of. And the other one said when he put his hands on my head. "You are now and you will be for all time." I didn’t understand then - I was scared, but they said not to be and told me to speak of it to no one. But I told my mother and (he laughs) she washed my mouth out with soap and spanked me for making up things and lying. So I never told her anymore about them.

Wanda: How often did they talk to you? Just when you were alone?

Elvis: At night - when I was alone and sometimes when I was in the - the closet.

Wanda: The closet?

Elvis: Yeah - hiding or - or being punished or something - you know.

Wanda: So you heard voices - what did they tell you to do?

Elvis: Nothing - just to listen. They played music for me, showed me things - instruments like in sounds, and they told me about my home and who I used to be and still am - and that I would-would-would be a great person in this life - and they showed me a guy dancing, kind of, on stage under lights dressed in-in white, with colors all around, and they said-said to learn. I didn’t know what he was doing - the man, you know, but then I later saw karate and I knew immediately then - it was me - they had showed me the future.

Wanda: What else - what did they tell you about?

Elvis: Oh, many, many things. Most of it too far over my head - I was just little...but it made a deep impression. I had dreams - dreams about being on stage and singing - but I didn’t realize it was me - it was like I was seeing a silent movie. And...

Wanda: You mean no sound? No music?

Elvis: No-no at first none, then they talked to me, told me to listen hard - in a quiet place to listen. And so I got so I listened to everything - music especially. I loved the way-way it made me feel inside - so-so good. I don’t know the words to-to ever tell anyone about it. It is like unto a great sense of-of soaring, of freedom and a-a rushing of my-my emotions through something that-that sort of (is) like being cleansed. I can’t tell you - it’s a feeling. But I can tell you it is the best feeling I have ever had that was mine alone, a personal feeling not shared with another...not like sex - I’m not talking about that kind of emotional feeling; though I would liken it to that in intensity. But it is better - better!

....it’s divine, celestial, Godly, I don’t know the words. Sometimes I feel so stupid - they are right there, and I don’t know them! In fact, the English language is so-so lacking in expression, all of them (languages) are as a matter of fact. It’s - this is silly, I know, but sometimes I feel like I could talk, speak, whatever, in some other tongue, but I am not sure what it is. You know? It’s like, I know it, but I don’t consciously know it or something. Like maybe, I used to, but have forgotten.

Wanda: Did the men who talked to you speak it?

Elvis: I-I---don’t---know. Maybe they did and I heard it in English? Hell, I don’t know.

From the magazine ‘T.V. Movies Screen’ 1972 interview with a young woman, who is describing her visit with Elvis:
"He stopped every few moments as if he were in a daydream. Sometimes he spoke so softly that I could not hear him. It almost seemed as if he were praying or chanting instead of talking to me. I left the room and when I returned he was still in the chair. He seemed to be in deep thought. Some of his words seemed to be in a language other than English, I didn’t recognize the other language. I tapped Elvis. He moved quickly which startled me. ‘I’m sorry’ is all he said as we walked into the next room."

To continue with the same conversation from 1973:
Wanda: When did you start hearing music? Were you on stage in dream then?

Elvis: Oh yeah - it was-it came slowly. Simple at first, then I began, as I listened to the radio and such, to hear more and to put my own ideas together, and I wanted so to have a piano or something - Momma taught me at church and I loved that. So they got me a guitar - it helped, but I heard more complicated things.

Wanda: How old were you?

Elvis: Six or so - yeah, six. Funny, now it all makes sense. I wish they’d talk to me now...

Wanda: They don’t?

Elvis: No - not much - it’s not like it was - kinda hard to hear them now - so much is in my head - you know - the music, the noises of the crowd. I can’t hardly hear them for it - I can’t-can’t shut off the noise

Wanda: Who else knows about your voices?

Elvis: Oh, Charlie - some of the guys - they think I’m crazy though - they-they don’t understand - it’s way over their heads. They think I’m talking to ghosts or something-they don’t-don’t have any grasp of it. But that’s okay - I don’t need them to understand anyway.

Wanda: You know, you are pretty weird - but I want you to know that it does not seem strange to me, only curious. I’ve heard voices, seen some strange things and so you seem pretty normal to me.

Elvis: (laughs) The weird talkin’ to the strange, huh?

Wanda Hill described to me two photographs of a young Elvis that were shown to her by Mary Jones:
"...he was so pathetic looking - so thin, sad-eyed and woeful in all but one. In it he had caught a big fish and he was grinning and his eyes were shining as he held it up so proudly. Vernon stood beside him, so young! He was really slouchy-poor looking. Elvis was standing with his fish, wearing shoes that looked so old - one foot turned on the side as if they hurt his feet and his pants were patched on the knees. His shirt was too big and his hair too short and he had on a hat that was too big, too. But he had the happiest smile and eyes - one of the few pictures of him young that looked happy."

"She had another of Elvis and her son. Elvis was little, looking up at him adoringly and the young man was giving Elvis a toy pistol which Elvis wore in a holster and belt that was about to fall off his little hips. He was barefoot but there were patches of snow on the ground. The bigger boy had a coat - Elvis had none and was bareheaded. Their old car, a Zephyr Lincoln, sat in the background with a flat tire on the front. It had snow on the window and hood."

Elvis to Wanda: "Sometimes when it's late and I can't get to sleep, or else I've woke up early 'n' everyone's quiet, I lie here thinkin' about before-before now. It's kinda scary considering, I mean, I wasn't anyone special, just a poor white trash kid with nothin' goin' for him ‘n’ not much better ahead either. I mean, I wasn't smart! I'm still pretty stupid in many ways. I’m not a brain, hell, I damn near failed in school. It's a wonder I graduated - they took pity on me! I was already a year older and behind a grade so-so they passed me on. It sure as hell wasn't 'cause I was smart or anything. And then, what was I doin'? goin' to 'lectricians school, studyin' to repair appliances and such, 'n deliverin' stuff for a hardware. Man, a real definitive goal in mind! But you know, I dreamed. I dreamed of doin' something big. I wasn’t sure what - then too, I wanted to sing, get in a gospel group, or somethin', I really did. I spent every minute in music. I went to every singing I heard about and could reach. I listened to the radio - Momma said, "Son, you're gonna have to grow yourself some more ears the way you're listening so hard." She was right. I tried to hear everything - not miss a show. And the - there was the-the feelings I had. I wanted so much to do something big, to have things for us and for the family. It hurt me so to see how some of 'em lived. We were so much better off, even though we didn't have much either. We were living like kings in comparison. Really hard to picture - huh? But it's so. Some of my relatives were farmers - most of 'em, really. Sharecroppers and such. You don't get rich farmin' somebody else's fields - not then, not in those times, I mean. My family didn't 'n I don't recall anyone else doin' so either. Back then, to me, doin' well consisted of havin' a roof over my head -that didn't leak! Food on the table three times a day, a car that would run 'n cash enough left over for gasoline 'n maybe a movie on Saturday night. To me, in those, days, wealth meant havin' money left after all that!

It's funny, I've never forgotten those days, the feelings and wants from those times. I hope that I never will. It keeps my feet on the ground 'n my head out of the clouds. Because when people forget where they came from they also start thinkin' too much of themselves and that's when the trouble begins. You never get so high and mighty, full of self but what you can't get knocked down. It's better to keep a level head about it in the first place.

I've been doing this (performing) since I was nineteen you know, 'n it's been a trip. Man, it's been something!....I wouldn't trade this life for anybody's existence. No one I know man, equals my life. I'd do it all again - there are a few little things I'd do differently, but mostly, I'd do it just the same. (pause...takes a deep breath) Damn, I'm a fool - huh? (laughs, then becomes serious) It was worth it all, every tear, every heartbreak, every fear. It was worth it all."

In 1970 Elvis was chosen by the National Jaycees Association as one of the ten men in the U.S. whom it considered to be the most outstanding in their field of endeavor for that year. This function was held in Memphis, Tennessee, in order for Elvis to be able to attend. He was awarded for his outstanding contributions to the humanities. A visibly shaken Elvis approached the podium with tears glistening from his eyes. He spoke to the assembly:

"I’ve always been a dreamer. (As a child) I read comic books, and I was the hero of the comic books. I saw movies, and I was the hero of the movies. So every dream that I ever dreamed has come true a hundred times. And these gentlemen over here (gesturing to the nine other men chosen by the Jaycees), most of these type people who care, who are dedicated - do you realize that it is not impossible that they might be building the Kingdom of Heaven? It is not too far fetched from reality. I learned very early in life, that without a song, the day would never end. Without a song, then you don’t have a friend. Without a song....So I just keep singing a song. Thank you very much."

And so Elvis lived the path of the spiritual initiate, as witnessed by the many hardships he endured from a very young age without complaint, and consequently was graced at key moments in his life with direct experience of the Angels, and their Elysian song, which he in turn sang to the masses.

From the song ‘The Impossible Dream’ as sung by Elvis Presley:

"I know if I’ll only be true to this glorious quest, that my heart will lye peaceful and calm when I’m laid to my rest.

"And the world will be better for this, that one man, scorned and covered with scars, still strove with his last ounce of courage, to reach the unreachable star."