Is That My Father?

He wends his way from his room
to us on the balcony, my son, my pride.
"Is that my father?" brings me from my seat.

"Is that my son!" I reply approaching,
kissing him on the neck in Biblical fashion,
as father receives son in a firm embrace.

His mother is no longer, but in now our hearts.
Sweet is his countenance, his stature robust,
he is in my every most tender thought.

My very breath, in word and in stillness,
would lend his spirit all the strength
bespeaking our twenty-two years of trust, of love.

May our Heavenly Father give this father
the wisdom to further guide this son,
even that Father received his mother to the bosom

of His eternal sovereign love and joy.
My boy, my young man, apple of my eye,
song of my soul, should grow

and mature in the robustness of his great heart,
that he may meet and confront his future
with boldness of character and sovereign love.

His father will always have his back,
our Heavenly Father so willing - Whose light so
shine within his heart, even as he shine in mine.

Some prayers of mine...

May all women everywhere find and assert
their inborn sovereign dignity and power.

May all women everywhere find and assert
their inborn sovereign confidence and grace.
Amen, so be it.

May the living spirit of of The Divine Mother be with all children
everywhere at all times.

May Her lovingkindness and intercession prevail mightily on behalf

of their well-Being, in all situations on all levels.
May all children be well, may all children be happy.

Peace, peace, peace

May this prayer be extended and applied with all power and grace

to the entire Animal Kingdom, that all of Nature's creatures great and small

be blessed and sustained, shielded and protected, cherished,
healed and restored through this prayer;

that all of Nature's creatures, as with all children the world over,

be delivered from the hands of human cruelty into the hands

of human compassion and lovingkindness.
May all of Nature's creatures be well, may all of Nature's creatures be happy.
Peace, peace, peace.

Eritrea, Eritrea

(Notwithstanding the severe dictatorship it has since become within two decades since its hard won independence from Ethiopia, this tribute to its victory in 1993 according to my information then,

stands as a dedication at that time,
and in heartfelt memorium now, to my very dear friend, Hanna Ehtiopia Berhane (d. Aug. 1013),
twenty years following that event.)

Mother Africa!    look upon your children,
have they not tasted the blood of their suffering and indignity
and lived?
Have they not responded with grace and more dignity?
Wherefrom, O Mother?

Was it because your very milk runs through their bones,
through those very feet with which they stood their ground,
and they know it?

Was it your love whoch gave their fight such boldness, did they inherit
from your bosom the richness of Being, to show such clemency
toward the aggressor whom they wore out with the enduring power of
their prayers and the sincerity of their faith?

What sort of a people, these lions who trust in the Lamb, this little Israel,
with a name like a beautiful woman?    Eritrea   Eritrea   Eritrea  .  .  .
daughter of Africa, a little jewel in the ear of the Mother Continent,
glistening in the light of the Son, victorious.

Pregnant With Radiance

The period of mid-1973 to late '74 was particularly formative for me and informed and imbued the rest of my life from there. A student at CU-Boulder, and not much of one at that, I followed Mark Twain's lead and never let my schooling interfere with my education.

It was in this period of my life that I discovered the beloved Swami and many others, and the Bhakti path I was to take, and that I began to massage – and to sing, ceaselessly; it was in this period of my life that I would discover the Dances, and the Sufism which so decidedly established my future, from which place I'm now telling this in retrospect; it was at this juncture in time that I discovered in this way, all the Bringers of light, of Dharma, and discovered Christ, and found my own Teacher out of a marketplace full of 'em - the Coach I'd prayed God to vouchsafe me.

I'd longed to be pregnant with radiance, You may love a certain food but you have to eat lots of it to get fat on it. So it is with light. I wanted to be so full of this love I'd discovered, that I could swallow all the world's darkness and shit out light.

Neither drugs nor grass nor booze played a role in my life. I was stoned however, flat-out stoned on love. The only thing lacking was a dime and maturity – and the latter comes with time, no security. I worked at Ticos, washing dishes with joy and some soap – my pupils were sometimes actually dilated. I'd show up giggling but always on time and fit for work, my supervisor on the cook-line, a Pisces named Jeff, looked me straight into those stoned eyes and asked if I were showing up on the job drunk or on weed. I smiled and assured him, I was drunk on love, just love, patting his arm. That was the period of my wearing a wooly, multi-colored Morrocan jalabea everywhere, my hair grown long, first beard, and passing out roses in the park, washing and massaging feet – anyone's. The only beer I got soused on was Bir Hanumana (strength of Hanuman). My beloved Swami embodied that, and he was pregnant with radiance. All Great Ones are, and I revered them - and I wanted to be pregnant with that radiance.

One fine early Spring mid-morning in '75 I guess, on The Hill just off campus, I walked by Chuck's Grill, which was nearly empty. I only wanted to use Chuck's restroom, which back then was the norm without making a purchase. I just had to do a quick number-one and leave.

On my way to that restroom I noticed this young woman of very unremarkable form and features – let's be honest here, you would have walked right by her. She was neutral and apathetic, also rather dumpy, and that turned out to be because she slouched in the booth where she sat alone, the only customer in the joint.

Because of this slouch, and her pullover sweater, it crossed my Lucy-in-the-sky-with-diamonds optical-perception, that: she might be pregnant. To this day, I don't know what took hold of me - but after I'd left the restroom instead of heading straight for the door leading out, I swung by her booth and with my right hand gently on her shoulder and my left gently on the hump of her belly, on the pullover of course, I asked her with sincere elation and warmth, “When?...“

As in, "when's the date, O mother-to-be?" She did not call the cops, she did not make a scene, she did not say, "WTF – you some kinda goddam smart-ass? Get away from me you freak!" She did not react angrily or even look hurt or burst into tears at this otherwise seemingly insensitive cruelty. The fact was, she was not remotely in the family way, she was just frumpy. She had a gut on her. So?

Not a word passed between us, her eyes registered bewilderment, to which my eyes registered "Oh shit, you're not pregnant?" then, "OMGdess, I fucked up, am I a schlemiel!" I muttered a genuine "sorry, I thought..." but outside of that it went all without words. And then something happened. She got it, and her face brightened up at the idea, and my face brightened up again and for that moment gazing at each other, she had the radiance of someone pregnant with life inside her. So she was in that moment pregnant with radiance.

Then we both laughed, just a sweet, tender, ever so human laugh, shared in love between two total strangers under quite comical circumstances. I collected myself and nodded goodbye, headed for the door. One last look over my shoulder and a wave: that woman watched me from her booth, still smiling and still glowing, sitting a tad straighter there, and I have no recollection of her voice, as not a word had been shared, it was all through the eyes.

These drunken eyes, pregnant with radiance.

Reflection

I speak to my impatient, righteous indignation
as to an anguished mother:
You are not here to make the world better.
You are an agent of kindness, of light,
of ineffable joy, of God's Pleasure,
a witness to the day here and now, and hereafter.

You are an agent of awakening consciousness,
of surrender.
Don't be the pray-er, be the prayer!
Be what you would have, and you are that.

You are here to love without hope, giving hope;
without recognition, giving succor.
Be the light from which you came,
and the world will be better for it.

Source

To a trickle of water I spoke,
a droplet thereof I addressed:
behold the vast ocean, great river – and sea!
That all is there, in you, you're wet with That:
lifetimes and generations, form after form,
in all that you've weathered, your Father/Mother - and whether
you grasp this or not, it Matters not:
in every atom reeling, molecule, and cell is the genetic image
of your very Source -
(O Human, being – try seeing yourSelf in this droplet)
...so be great, or don't, it's alright,
a wave – a rave, a steam – esteem, a body Mass or a pearly drop:
you came from There, you return There, you are There -
so water you thinking?

A Candle for a Farthing

I usually will rather be found writing than quoting, but three occur to me as I do so.  There's an old saying, that "God hath no power over a mother's prayer" - or something like that.  Well I think I am a mother, at least some have called me "you muthuh"...  Among other reasons that I have candles lit in my place, one candle remains ever lit, a long burning oil candle I try to replace just before it goes out.  This candle has but one purpose:  anywhere, at any one time, any given moment, somewhere someone is suffering at the hands of another, right this moment, and I won't know about it till I read it in tomorrow's or next week's paper, or through any other media, or never.  I don't obsess over it, but it disturbs me, because we really are powerless to do much of anything about it.  It might pertain to a woman, a girl or a boy, a defenseless man or a defenseless child, it may apply to an animal, large or small.  But out there someone is certainly the target of mistreatment, of cruelty, of sadism, or in some way tragically, unjustly left to his or her or its fate.  And quite alone wth it at that.

Okay, that's life.  Yet as Christ said, in his best King James, "You can purchase a sparrow for a farthing, but know: that not a sparrow falleth to the ground, but the heavenly Father knoweth."  Now that Father is a Mother if that's the case, because I can rant myself ragged over the ignorance, the arrogance, the hypocrisies and the deals, the ideological or just plain illogical inhumanities, the anonymous hurt, the anonymous slow-death of victims of perpetrators.  What can I do for the victims, what can I do about the perpetrators?  There's an old saw which we've all heard too often, but who does it?  "Better to light one candle than to curse the darkness."

Never mind who said it, who does it?  Whatever else I do or don't do or cannot – there is a Mother's prayer ceaselessly intoning in my heart, going out from there and joining with that candle in knowing, in partnership with our heavenly Father, that there is a sparrow fallen.  That one might be reached or not, might be rescued or not, might be comforted or not, but one thing in my seeming powerlessness that I do know:  that one shall no longer be alone; somewhere in the city, somewhere in the world, somewhere in my living room – someone is listening, is breathing with that one, is sending out beams of love, of compassion, of succor, of joy.

There may be no ego in this, no helper-syndrome, no self-comforting.  Where there is ego there will never be peace.  Where the ego is overcome for the sake of the real Self, that already is peace, and that is power.

Everyone has an ego, it has a purpose and must be developed.  Imagine though, what your work place would be like if everyone were egoless – not flat, not dull, not boring, not alike, this is what egolessness ain't.  I mean, creative, active, giving, cooperating, achieving together or alone – but it's all no longer "about me".  No bullshitting or griping or whining, no proselytizing, no ideologies.  Just in-joying an ego-free environment.  As our old friend Paul Reps said, "Until it's fun better left undone."

So when I so much as glance at that candle, I wrap someone anonymous to me in the warmest wings of love, and project out joy, unabashed joy.

Join me if this moves you.

A Candle for a Farthing

For Mevlana (I)

(March 1977, Boulder)

 

The lover knows why he is born:
When pierced for blood
   milk flows from the heart of the lover,
   nourishing even the one who adminsters the wound;
      that one is blessed by the lover,
      who now holds the dagger
         firmly rooted in his heart,
         withdrawing it and replanting it

            again and again,

        as a constant reminder.
The lover carries no fear
   for he carries his manhood in his heart.
       Therefore he is tender like a petal,
           while protected like the pomegranite.
He is veiled and allows himself to be unveiled
   when in the presence of the beloved.
       The lover may be shattered


           over and over again,


       but his pieces will always fall scattered
   to the soil to regenerate as an army of lovers!
Only the lover knows the meaning of constancy.

                 Love has made a fanatic of me;
                 and to the Source of all this
                 I gladly offer my head
                 again and again.
                 Pain rends the veil
                 which hid the cup of ecstasy.


                 Friend, cover yourself
                 with the mantle of secrecy
                 and go naked into the night.
                 There you will find a brilliance
                 which no eye can perceive.

Without the cup of sobriety,
how shall I contain this ecstasy?


It runs over the edge anyway,
and spills on the one whose lips
parted to taste.

                 Beloved Mother, teach me
                 the secret of the spring rain,
                 how it nourishes the earth
                 and makes all life fertile with its weeping.

My heart is with the Brotherhood,
the lovers whose eyes are brilliant with desire
   to serve the One who made them feel this.


   Their feet never leave the ground
   until the Turn is complete.
Their pride is in the One who causes this Turning,
their dignity is testimony of their surrender. 

Khadija

Mother of orphans, refuge of women denied their nobility,

had Mary herself been dressed in Arab finery

she'd not have been more merciful.

A widow's wealth more measured in heart than coin or cravans -

God's grace in her! she slept with the troubles of others

in the confort of her house mending broken lives.

Noble Khadija, jewel of Mecca! in your arms

you cradled even him your spouse,

the master of a great legacy.

Bearing the unbearable for his sake, at his side, mirror of his soul -

he carried in himself the destiny of a great people

as you carried in yourself the weight of his own.

Khadija!  I hear you within,

Kha . . . rising straight and forceful, piller of strength;

Dij . . . diving into the very depths of love;

and Ah . . . bearing up joy and favor for those who have none.

Khadija!  Mother of potential wealth, satisfier of need,

God's gift to a man who was a gift to the world.

Khadija the Great, rarely heard of,

But known, known well in the hearts of those who recognize

what a miracle is womankind.

S. Inayat-Chisti, July 1986