I Want Burning

[Guest guest]

Dear Friends,

 

For a long time i have been listening to the ecstatic, mystical

poetry of Rumi, Hafiz, and Lalla. One particular poem by Rumi is

called, "I Want Burning." Here is a bit of it.

 

I want burning, burning,

I want burning.

Be friends with your burning.

Burn up your thinking and your forms of expression.

 

Another poem is called "This Is Not Imagination." Here is a part.

 

This what we have now is not imagination.

This is not a grief or joy,

not a judging or hate,

or an elation or a sadness.

Those come and go.

This is the presence that doesn't.

It's dawn Hussam,

here in the Splendor of Coral

inside the Friend,

in the Truth of what Alaj said.

What else could human beings want?

When grapes turn to wine they're wanting this.

When the night sky passes by,

it's really a crowd of beggars,

and they all want some of this.

This is what we have now.

 

 

T. S. Eliot, in "Wasteland," says this:

 

My feet are at Moorgate, and my heart

Under my feet. After the event

He wept. He promised 'a new start.'

I made no comment. What should I resent?

 

On Margate Sands,

I can connect

Nothing with nothing.

The broken fingernails of dirty hands,

My people humble people who expect

Nothing.

la la

 

To Carthage then I came

 

Burning burning burning burning

O Lord Thou pluckest me out

O Lord Thou pluckest

 

burning

 

And he says also:

 

What is that sound high in the air

Murmur of maternal lamentation

Who are those hooded hordes swarming

Over endless plains, stumbling in cracked earth

Ringed by the flat horizon only

What is the city over the mountains

Cracks and reforms and bursts in the violet air

Falling towers

Jerusalem Athens Alexandria

Vienna London

Unreal

 

Rumi tells us "this is the new rule:"

 

And the Friend holds up like a goblet,

some anonymous skull.

I'm filled with You;

skin, blood, bone, brain, and soul.

There's no room for lack of trust or trust.

Nothing in this existence,

but That existence.

Break the wineglass,

and fall toward the Glassblower's breath.

 

This is the new rule.

Break the wineglass,

and fall toward the Glassblower's breath.

This is the new rule.

 

LoveAlways,

 

Mazie