This is a very mystic statement from Bowie. I think Blackstar is a very nondual song. It contrasts the aspect of the self that dies and is impermanent, with the aspect of the self that is immortal.

The "flash in the pan" is the ego. The personality. Bowie sings "I'm not a gangster/popstar/wandering star". Because all those roles fade away. Die. Somebody else will step into those roles.

What remains is "the Great I Am". God, who in Christianity calls Himself "I Am". Brahman who in Hinduism is called the Atman, or the Great Self. The "I Am" feeling shared by all life. That persists regardless of form.

That duality of reconciling the seemingly opposite points of view - being a transient ego that is constantly going through "c-ch-ch-changes", and being the feeling of consciousness that persists throughout all changes ("and still the days seem the same")- is transcended in the concept of the Blackstar. Something that is void and light, all at once. Life and Death, shining darkly.

After Bowie died, his ashes were scattered in a Buddhist ceremony in Bali. Bowie was very interested in Buddhism, as seen in his album "Seven Years in Tibet" but also throughout his life.

The fundamental "non-idea" at the core of Buddhism is the idea of Void, the not-self, the annata. It is the same thing as "the Great I Am" (the Hindu Atman) but seen from a different point of view. Either everything is the Self, or nothing (no-thing) is the self.

And what is the closest thing to a void, in our universe? A black hole. A blackstar. As the Heart Sutra says: "Form is emptiness, emptiness is form". Thus death becomes life. Another change. Somebody else takes his place, the same "I Am", the same "Blackstar" in a new form. We bravely cry.

What an artist. How I love him. He really reincarnated into all of us.