Sunday, December 29, 2013

Salt Of The Earth

Arrogance and Sovereignty are not at all the same thing or even related,
although either could be mistaken for the other – and sometimes or often is.
 
Sovereignty is recognizable for its fineness of character
combined with an inclusive and nourishing consciousness,
revealing itself by humble awareness and a sense of inner wealth,
quite regardless of outer material circumstances.

Arrogance, parading as sovereignty, is marked by poverty of character.
Whatever accomplishments or seeming wealth or beauty or achievement,
arrogance will claim these for itself and poison everything with its narcissism.

Sovereignty leaves a scent of generosity in its wake, and an after-taste of culture;
arrogance a scent of insecurity, an after-taste of bitterness;
where the former is capable of expressing lovingkindness,
the latter is left cynical, and its display of kindness is actually
an empty, self-promoting indifference.

Even a Mercedes driver might be seen to show the least arrogance,
whereas grossest arrogance can be hopelessly glaring at one
from the faces and actions of bicycle riders – one may please
take Münster for example, there one has an entire city of them.

Love is known for being sovereign, for to arrogance it is entirely foreign.
Sovereignty is a challenge to attain (not maintain,
as that wouldn't be authentic sovereignty – for if you've got it you've got it,
regardless of what you are doing);
in arrogance is a daily challenge to rid oneself of it.

Arrogance is primitive even when being stately or sophisticated,
turns the knife in the wound even when holding a glass of the best wine.
Sovereignty can afford to be noble and gracious because it has nothing to lose by it;
sovereignty knows itself – and that is what makes it sovereign.

Arrogance may well find itself nestled in the breast of crawlers as well as kings alike,
of peasants as well as presidents, of sycophants or sultans, secretaries or CEOs,
of ruled as well as ruler, those of standing or those with little or none: it eats equally
into their psyches all, like a cancer, poisoning the heart's blood as with lead.

Sovereignty likewise may be found in those of high or low station – it is the birthright
of every living Being, especially Human. It is that light in the eye,
it is the salt of our own earth.




Wednesday, December 25, 2013

Brick of Possibilities

Religion reminds one of a brick.
You take a fine, sturdy, dumb brick.
Paint it in your best hand, make that
Christ or Cross, Krishna or Kabir,
inscribe the entire Qur'an or Torah there,
or Siri Guru Granth Sahib of the Sikhs
literally, it's all been done.

And it's still a brick, but what a brick!
If you paint on it that which binds you
with your most sincerely cherished Love,
then please do it, I'll weave garlands with you
and we'll place them there together.

Knowing that a brick is a brick,
we'll contemplate together and open our hearts
to what's creatively imaged into that brick;
knowing that as what was painted came from within,
so is the very Love and Source being depicted –
and the intimate Knowledge of That – entirely within,
to be merely, albeit strongly, reminded, directed there again.

But shall this be the brick of Cain or of Cathedral?
The brick of Egypt or of the Bridge which bonds us
in mutual sovereignty?

If it's to whack another in the chops or break windows
or be more bric-à-brac to keep you off-track –
then we have a problem, then a brick really is just a brick.

Let each have their brick most suitable or exchange them
you can't exchange the Self anyway, there is only one of That.
Yes, a brick's a brick – but oh, what a fine looking brick indeed!

Sunday, December 22, 2013

Christmas 2013

Even if December isn't even nearly right, whatever:
HAPPY BIRTHDAY BABY JESUS, we love you!
Now, I've invited my dear friend Vatican Frank and everyone else.
So first, make your breath long and deep and ever so refined, like music.

And now – let's all breathe in: Kyrie eleison – and out: Christe eleison.
And in: Christ-in-me – and out: United with all.
And in: all the love, the joy, the peace you can draw into you –
then out: all that love, that joy, that peace out out out into your world.
And really FEEL IT!

Don't join any clubs, and don't jump on any bandwagons, BUT:
also never be afraid of praising God,
and never be ashamed of praising God,
and never ever entertain the notion "I'm not worthy" because you're not –
and it's NOT ABOUT THAT!

Trust me on this – or hear it yourself:
the rocks and trees and rivers and
every living breathing form on this Earth
(hence the fullness thereof)
is praising the glory of God ceaselessly
for "atoms reel in praise of Thee!"
Now get very very still … and BE.

And now: let's say we rock

 

Friday, December 20, 2013

On Fourth Advent

Friend, don't believe! It's often hollow –
Love, rather – belief will follow.
Love fiercely, love deeply, belief comes easily;
Most natural is that faith which calls Love master,
And therein is effortless, solid, everlasting.


Love is the First Idea, and the going forth,
The guiding impulse, the measure of worth –
The whisper, the call, the quick'ning spirit;
Birthing belief, training trust, feeding faith in action,
Love's the secret intention and its destination.


Be Human, be real, don't be ashamed to feel
All that courses through you – Love understands,
And that faith in your breast, belief on your brow, is its seal;
Love is most natural unfettered, and most itself when it bonds –
Now be kind toward yourself this Fourth Advent.

Monday, December 16, 2013

"Getting Religion" II

Religion is like a body –
like a body it has a head,
a heart, a gut, a yoni and a lingam.
And an asshole.

Religion is like a body –
the head is for thinking-too-much;
the heart is for bringing light into the world,
circulating divine nourishment into all organs,
manifesting love as Human so this world might survive
in knowing joy through that One Breathing Truth;
the gut is for drawing the darkness out of its scary corner:
to do the work of offering it into the light;
the lingam is for positive penetration of Consciousness
into the Earth; the yoni is for warmth and depth, bringing forth life.
The asshole, in over-abundance, gives us jihad and all manner of control issues.
(Every body has one of these – only in religion there are ever so many.)

Religion is like a body –
in which head defines and calculates, feels separate from body;
whereas heart is in that body, nourishes it constantly, earthy and divine.
Head thinks thoughts, writes a theology, says heart doesn't think;
heart indeed thinks – but in dimensions of Unity head cannot grasp.
The asshole is entirely thoughtless, narcisstically striving to
dominate and to rule with unquestioned authority.


The Bringers of light – for whom religions were named, systematized
– these always were first of the heart,
feeding the body as only heart can.
They taught in heart, knowing there would be heads later.
And they knew that religion is like a body –
there would be assholes.

When Sufis give themselves over to zikr,
or Yogis to nada and laya, the Yogas of sound –
when these are practiced devotedly in homes,
in temples, in caves, or in ashrams;
when choirs move listeners and members both
to inner heights which only heart can offer:
then is religion like a body well-served.

(O pious egos! Ablutions will never remove your dirt,
a clean heart will: clear your hearts not of taste of pork –
but rather of envy and intrigue, of bigotry and loathing,
of supremacism and subterfuge, of primitive posturing.
If enemies would just finally love their enemies, then
"the enemy of my enemy" just might well be my friend.)

Then you can think with your heart, act from your heart,
heal other hearts through your heart, as God so intended.
For God is Love, and this Love brought us into manifestation.

Tuesday, December 10, 2013

Buddha Did This

The sun ever burning its own ego
is a powerhouse of Light for that;
it sees no clouds, doesn't even know
what a cloud is!

Clouds for their part, belong
to our weather, protect us
from all that seamless solar might.
The clouds of your opposition, however,
seek only to block and inhibit your light.

Be that sun you are, dismiss their existence –
let your ego burn and let their shadows
swallow them, not you.

Be Light, travel light, in this delight,
triumph without a fight.

Right.

(on Wanta Jampinjinpa of the Walpiri Community)

I briefly heard an Aborigine,
watched his face and felt his timbre,
how he softly told of moving and acting,
thinking and feeling with the earth of
this world, the surroundings...

And invariably every second phrase or sentence
he would end in all but a whisper with, "... right."
Mild, sovereign, humble – but reflective, not self-conscious,
rather like an afterthought, matter-of-fact.

As he spoke before the camera,
punctuating his simple and generations-rich
statement with that barely audible "... right,"
he was doing more than talking, he was giving Teaching.

He could have been Native American,
Native this, Native that, but he's Australian,
Native of there – and whether they all do this
or just he does this, what came across

were all those thousands of generations
of living in close Wisdom with the Earth and her creatures,
all the Knowledge and Heart and Being, in that "... right."

And all that he wanted was, for us to finally get it … right.

Sunday, December 8, 2013

Thoughts After First Advent

"Belief" or "unbelief / disbelief" in "God" remains for me a superfluous curiosity.  Superfluous because it has more than anything else to do with, not God, but "God" – that is, someone else’s conception of God which you don’t want to buy into – or which you do.  Curious is, why so much energy is expended in a) wanting others to believe in your God, b) cajoling, even forcing others to believe in your God, c) rejecting / denying God at all and copping an Attitude over this, d) worrying about God, or e) spreading death and destruction on account of your God.

This believing or not believing in God is as superfluous to – well, God – as we would naturally see any notion of belief or unbelief / disbelief/ nonbelief in our own Body, our own organs, our own circulation, our own respiration and respiratory system.  This body functions;  as this body is so, God is so.  As these organs, this circulation, this respiration are so, God is so.  Try this:  stop believing that your heart pumps blood through the arteries which carry nourishment throughout the body and the lungs, which blood returns for nourishment and reinforcement of oxygen through the lung passages – all of this functioning, entirely indifferent to your knowing or believing or denying it.  So stop believing in that going on without let-up, and stop believing that those lungs draw in all that life-reinforced fresh air into themselves, to go through the conversions and transferences which make your Body a rich tapestry of perfectly orchestrated harmony and wholeness, well-Being, with or without your being consulted; that your brain is in constant coordination with all functions, that your glands and your tracts, from growth and development to consuming, digesting and expelling, from over all defense to activity and rest and the in-joyment of both.  All this is there.


Now, here’s a catch:  believing, you give attention to, offer your attention to, perhaps even your concentration and even devotion to, that which is being consciously contemplated – that’s contemplated, folks, not complicated – by doing this with your Body you become no longer the indifferently passive non-participant, you become the active, creative participator, you are now with your Body, and in it by being conscious of it.  Does it mean becoming a "Vegan" from another planet?  Or hitting the fitness center like a fanatic, or jogging your guts out?  Or preaching granola?  None of this, it means just being with yourself, with your body, loving this Body merely by knowing it and validating it and being in it.  This kind of attention already wards off illness, this kind of attention is entirely oriented toward your health because it addresses the wholeness.  When you are bending, talk with your back, through your breath, ask it if it’s alright with what you’re doing, let it suggest something better.  If you are eating, does your stomach have a vote?  Every single part of you is indispensable, and part of every other part of you.

Be clear in your Mind that you are not about illness, that you don’t need sick leave to feel whole about yourself. And as this makes the question of belief, for me, so superfluous - because Body is so - likewise and even more does this apply toward God - because God is so.  When you love you have every reason and power to believe, and as this belief develops into faith and into devotion and into Knowledge, then you become the active, creative participator of that inner life which expresses outward in all directions.  Kabir, as rendered by Robt. Bly, tells us:  "What is God: he is the breath inside the breath."


Making that subtle, you become subtle.  Becoming subtle in that, you meet with the subtle.  Meeting with that, you come into contact with That, about which we bandy about words like "belief" in the first place – which then makes the latter superfluous.

Tuesday, November 26, 2013

Two for Rachael

(at about age 4, in Sapphic verse-meter – sung and choreographed accordingly)

Innocently gazing with wide-eyed wonder,
Soft now, sweet breath, why tear my heart asunder?
Graceful child your form speaks of sweet surrender
Cradled in my arms.

Part now, daughter into your mother's summer,
Let her sing you soothe you into a slumber;
Always there remains between us a glimmer
Of love remembered.

Rachael, Rachael! tirelessly I hold you
In my heart by whose vision I behold you,
Seeing you in all children as I've told you –
Season by season.

(photo @ ca. one year)


(specifically on the occasion of her 7th birthday)

Rachael the beloved        tender of flocks        herself a lamb . . .
The Rachael I know was born in a spasm of light and soft quietude.
            Her open beauty revealed an impish charm.
The Rachael I know eats ice-cream 'til it runs, and dances on the rug,
            showing off.
The Rachael I know is shy until she giggles and tells you what she knows.
The Rachael I know swings at playgrounds and whispers to her friends
            at lunchtime in a jumper.
The Rachael I know is growing up as sure as sand in spinach
            and blossoming like a Rocky Mountain Columbine
                   in the pure air of a high pasture.
Rachael the woman is yet to come        and where's the hurry . . .
Let her heart be kind, her smile warm, her touch
           enough to make anyone kiss her fingers and leave
                  with generosity on his lips . . .

let her be a happy girl, a healthy and inquisitive girl,
     let her face be always, please always, her own face.

O Rachael, your birthday is my birthday!

 (photo @ ca. age 14)

Zu Eurer Hochzeit, auf Sapphische Strophe

Zu Eurer Hochzeit, auf Sapphische Strophe

Kátarzýna mít der Anná gebúnden,
Íhr habt Eúch dreizéhn Jahre her gefúnden;
Lásst Euch éndlich áll das erwártet múnden:
Gánz miteinánder.

Hánd in Hánd hab' ích Euch wohl blüh'nd geséhen,
Dúrchaus klár in Eúch, veréidigt geschéhen;
Líebe gílt für áll die vier Jáhreszéiten,
Gánz für einánder.


(For Your Wedding, in Sapphic Meter)

Katarzyna with Anna bonded,
Thirteen years ago you found your way to each other;
Let yourselves finally savor all that you've awaited:
Totally with one another.

Hand in hand I saw you so radiant,
Thoroughly clear in yourselves, sworn, done;
Love applies for all the four seasons,
Totally for each other.

Monday, November 25, 2013

Why Do These Tears Fall Suddenly Now

You are as a brother to me,
and it pleases me to love you as one,
you tirelessly post statements, I send you poetry,
both of us are serving Hanuman.

I feel so internally this bond, HD,
why else should this verse interrupt me at prayer!
I know this eternally between two such as we,
I stop at merging, the better to behold your face the more.

Sitting with you alone, on this ancient temple ground,

our inner ear full of the sacred timeless Sound –
our outer ear bombarded by chattering monkeys all around.

I am absorbed as are you; I could embrace,
draw the world into my bosom like Amma –
or a mother hen, as Jesus lamented Jerusalem;
I could outrun horses with Jap Sahib on my lips,
sword at my hip, in the service of Gobind Singh.

Sunday, November 24, 2013

Devotion

Don't come to prayers clothed with piety,
leave your plans and your banality!
Do you want to bore the Beloved to death
with all your pre-digested litany?

Don't pranam out of bland formality,
save the salaams and all your solemnity –
if your heart is not aching for love in depth,
then dance, dance till you drop this charade of "I"...!

Come naked, come with open hands,
come only with your desire, only that, and
all your most awake attention – give breath
to your words, infuse the silence with expression!

Just don't fall asleep during japa or zikr – don't zombie out!
I know what I'm talking about, I've done it a thousand times.





Tuesday, November 19, 2013

Breath of Buddha, Breath of Christ

As Christmas Approaches: The Breaths

Friends, readers, browsers: this is to be put to use and it's free. This is nothing new, I put it to practice but am not its originator. This is as old as Buddha and as fresh as your own very next breath, it is for all regardless of what you call your faith, your religion, your ecclectic sortof-sortof, or most valuably: your highest most intimately cherished reality.

And as Christmas approaches I decided this year to put this out there, as it has been received, and in my own manner of presentation – if being Christian (whatever denomination or however you define that) you take this and own it, make it yours – not by reading and thinking about it or having an opinion about it but only by giving it your devoted concentration and following the simple few steps, you will be really fulfilling both the Sermon on the Mount and the Prayer of St. Francis: by letting yourself be made an instrument of service in the most Christian real sense there is. Now do it and I'll shut up:

Sit up straight, whether on a chair (feet flat) or on a mat or rug, however you best do that, back straight but relaxed, neck also. All breathing is through the nose. What you do with your hands is of little matter, mudra or no mudra or hands held or free – just concentrate. Take a few shallow breaths, a few deep ones, some strong then gentle, adjust – consciously adjust your breathing to be long and deep, into the belly and back out, let your focus settle in your chest, just central there, your Heart. Just breathe. You can direct your thoughts better with any of the following, they are only three suggestions of many: Inhale “Toward the One” and exhale “United with All” (meaning all the illuminated souls who are actually leading you in this as we speak) – or, inhale “Christ in me” and exhale “United with All” – or if you're Jewish doing this you can inhale “Ha-Shem Echad,” and exhale “Baruch-Ha-Shem” – whatever works for you.

Now: you have adjusted your breathing and it's long and deep, you should focus your most devoted thought on Whom or on That which you most love – and yes, you are “worthy” of doing this – let the feeling in the center of your chest open to that and receive that. Let into you the presence of your greatest Trust, your greatest Love, let yourself imbibe that, be sourrounded by that, just as the conducting wire (you) inside a glass bulb is surrounded by a generated current and light is produced going outward. Just breathe this way. Let it fill you, in and around you. As this is a Christmas Concentration I'll address it accordingly. Let Jesus abide here, or as it says in Scripture, put on the Mind of Christ, you can even mentally intone Jesus Jesus if it helps – now we can begin.

Refining that breathing, refining like a bare thread coming and going, breathe into yourself all the Love you can draw in from the Universe, from the Cosmos, from the space around you, from so many dimensions, and from the here-now, and in reality. And breathe it out, out, out. Let it be with you, let it be in the room, let it abide, in and out. Whatever else is there with you, family or cares or worries or joys – let all this be of no disturbance, for you are sovereign, let this all be baptized in your breath, as you breathe in and then breathe out all the Love you can muster.

You are a sun, can you visualize that magnificent star up close? That is you, burning, producing such heat and such light – do you not feel your gut loosening and expanding even as you breathe in and out of your Heart (like I told you)? You may be an idiot all day long the rest of the week but right here and right now, you are Being Divine: Who loves ya? Who's with ya? Who'dja invite over to breathe with ya? Spirit is here and real – God's own breath is inside your breath.

Having let all the Love into you and, going out from you, circulate and expand, now continue on by refining still finer and drawing likewise into yourself all the Joy you can bring in, and circulate that through and on out, just as you've been doing. Feel it? It is yours, it is youyeah, you're worthy of it, you're worthy of it – it's not about you anyway, and yet it is entirely you giving yourself to its Doing – there's nothing theoretical here. Either you're with it or you're not.

Let this continue for a few breaths, then refine, refine, draw in finer still, all the Peace you can let in to your limitless capacity – you sun of God you! – you are the very space itself, embodied as you, just breathing! Don't blow it by thinking – you're there, now stay there! As this Peace which passeth understanding is real with you, going out from you, see how all this Love, all this Joy, all this Peace is contained as one breath of Compassion which you allow to expand out with every outgoing breath – it's as though you're no longer even there doing it, just it is there doing you.

Head and Heart are not apart – you direct this toward yourself and toward everything and everyone in the room, and on out through that window into your neighborhood, hovering just long enough to feel it take, and radiating and broadcasting out to the area, the district, the city, the country, the world, the earth, people you know and don't know, people you love and those you don't even like (no ifs ands or buts), people you've hurt or who've done you wrong, Nature: the forests, mountains, the waters of the Earth, the animals and critters, let it go out to wherever it is needed, whether to disaster areas, war zones, slums or crime-concentrated areas – or just to any nameless faceless individuals out there who may desperately need the witnessing touch of your Love and your Joy and your Peace, your Lovingkindness, your Compassion, breathing onto them and into them. Now.

Not my words should dictate how far out this goes or how far in – what you feel, feel it, go with it, trust, trust, trust.

And what now? Just breathe and breathe and be with it – feel feel feel: you are All-One but not alone.


(Just to give yourself a kick in the seat to get going on it, here are two unmistakably suitable reads:)



Saturday, November 16, 2013

My “Sura of the Cow” – or, When Did A Muslim

Islam gives us a radiant example
of how a religion – or ideology parading as one –
is like a cow:

The Sufi takes the udders in hand
and brings forth milk,
nourishing all;

the Muslim lifts the tail
and makes loud his proud claim
of authority.

If you plainly tell him
what that end of the cow only brings forth,
he will slit your throat and return to the mosque
with your blood on his hands.

The Sufi takes plain earth,
makes a garden of it,
feeds the world;

the Muslim sees earth,
finds it dirty and unclean, beneath him –
which doesn't mean his head is in the clouds
but up somewhere else.

The Sufi travels, seeks knowledge “unto China,”
befriends and appreciates everywhere
Christians, Jews, Sikhs, Parsis, Hindus, Buddhists.

The Muslim remains provincial though he travel,
knows everything better “unto China” –
and seeks to conquer.

(Driven much by fear and loathing,
obsessed with pork and pious clothing),
he knows his insatiable craving for recognition
will be gratified by dominating “the Other” into submission.

The Sufi has no axe to grind,
no policy or any baggage to sell;
the Sufi is no slave to mind
and wastes no thought on “heaven” or “hell.”

Sufis are not the mystics “of Islam,”
they are the Muslims' own worst nightmare –
if you really know God, they will stone or hang
you in the square!

When did a Muslim last speak to you of Love?
A Sufi speaks of nothing else but.

Friday, November 15, 2013

Bees-m'illah – or, The Dervish Gets The Honey




I once observed a swarm of bees
carrying their traffic in and out of a tree;
for two years running, according to season,
I'd lift my head into their midst, my reason

was to hear them, feel them more nearly
and hum at their timbre, imbibe it more clearly –
and humming was intoning, and this no less singing,
our own space intoning – I still, awash in their winging.

On raising my pitch just so, they flew faster –
when lowered, they slowered; then after
some minutes this humming grown quicker:
the drone manifested as pure Nature-Zikr.

Sufis have a nose for where the pollen's kept,
they've alone gathered Knowledge, while Muslims slept –
Love's own Zikr gathers atoms together, sovereign world!
Out of such was true honey combed, as the Dervish whirled.

When drenched in Love you pant, “There is no God but Reality!”
this is no property of ideology, nor is it the colorless banality
of crawling, supremacist, sado-maso, herd-submissive pork-squeamers –
but rather a Statement of Sovereign Love in Action, in God immersed!