ShivAllahSita sutra 109: for Linda Stewart...Happy Birthday

[Guest guest]

Dearest Beloved Linda, Happy Birthday!

Some say the stars are our home.Some tell a different story about

original goo.Some brothers remember Adam and the way of desire.Some

children of the Light love the Beautiful Dark One.Some still the

rising of thoughts and abide in the Self.As for me, I have a flat in

the Pleiades, and a cot in the crab's claw.I once pulsed as liquid

ooze. I oozed along as You; You Goo. You Laugh?Many lives I've lived

as the heat in sexual urgency, a call to create.I have shone in the

eyes of millions who gazed into the Heart of Hari.From the Abundance

of Nothing, this I will subside and leave no trace.Twelve separations

of persona, four corners to call from, only One #.Capricorn climbs

from mud into light. Gemini splits the atom's heart.Every yodeler

calls across the canyon for "Yoooooouuuu...Yoooooouuuu."God knows how

much I love to sing in each pomegranate seed of rubyfruit.Rubylight

heartbeats into silverbowls of cradledessence of Lovenotes.Grasses

spring from my lips before the words make their way onto paper.Rumi

called forth gardens of flowers whenever he opened his mouth!We've

become that garden that Rumi swore we were when we're together.I see

nothing but rainbirds and lightwords sprouting color inside us.O! The

dissolution of each colored fountain offered from our JoyFriend!Call

from this riverbottom and the moon will answer with love

splashes.Freedom from falling worlds, broken lives, and shattered

bodies is Now.There are no tyrants in this flowing joyriver that we

live beneath.We have learned to breathe Inside this Water of His

Presence. It drowns.I have become a floating bag of happy buzzard

treats, for the taking.You and I have learned to play It their way

with no thought for returns.This spinning world of planets is

circling inside us Alone! No Other!Every heaven and world and hell

that's ever been imagined is my own.Time to clean out the closets and

donate those old clothes to charity.My wordworld wants only skeletons

to wear to parties, now that we Dance.I'll show up at the nest with

sticks, fluff and cosmoses to soothe you.I'll feed you black holes

and quarks, and stuff your gizzard with Light.O! My heart! Let's stop

kidding around and just swallow up the World.You are my astrology, and

my compass, and every direction I sail in.Your eye is the beacon

lighthouse which calls me to come Home, to You.I've fallen off the

Edge of Love and I'm spinning out of control now.Someone get a

straightjacket, maybe a butterfly net; I need catching.All the

friends who breathe through the Beloved One are One Disease.We've all

become contagious with the Love-Itch of Stardust on our soul.Time to

end all this starchatter and moonblubbering right now. NNNNow.Now is

the time for all good men to come to the aid of their One Tree.Blow

up my building, set off explosives. We All Fall Down Now. Timber!One

thing only matters in all this empty lovetalk amongst our kin. Love

one another like the revolution loves circling, like circling in.Love

one another like the heartbeat. It only knows to follow its sound.Love

til love has no meaning…

1

Chain You to My Body

All

These words

Are just a front.

What I would really like to do is

Chain you to my body,

Then sing for days

And days and

Days

About

God.

~Hafiz

1

The love of God, unutterable and perfect,flows into a pure soul the

way that light rushes into a transparent object.

The more love that it finds, the more it givesitself; so that, as we

grow clear and open,the more complete the joy of heaven is.

And the more souls who resonate together,the greater the intensity of

their love,and, mirror-like, each soul reflects the other.

~Dante

1

Art as Flirtation and Surrender

In your light I learn how to love.

In your beauty, how to make poems.

You dance inside my chest,

where no one sees you,

but sometimes I do,

and that sight becomes this art.

~Rumi

1

For as verily as we shall be in the bliss of God without end, Him

praising and thanking, so verily we have been in the foresight of

God, loved and known in His endless purpose from without beginning.

In which unbegun love He made us: and in the same love He keepeth us

and never suffereth us to be hurt (in manner) by which our bliss

might be lost...

And fifteen years after, and more, I was answered in ghostly

understandning, saying thus: Wouldst thou learn thy Lord's meaning in

this thing? Learn it well: Love was His meaning. Who showed it to me?

Love. What showed He me? Love. Wherefore showed it He? For Love...In

our making we had beginnings; but love wherein He made us was in Him

from without beginning: in which love we have our beginning. And all

this shall we see in God, without end.

~Revelations of Divine Love, Julian of Norwich

1

Quatrain 27

It is time to put up a love-swing!Tie the body and then tie the mind

so that theyswing between the arms of the Secret One you love,Bring

the water that falls from the clouds to youreyes,and cover yourself

inside entirely with the shadow ofnight.Bring your face up close to

his ear,and then talk only about what you want deeply tohappen.Kabir

says: Listen to me, brother, bring the shape,face, and odor of the

Holy One inside you.

Quatrain 9

Knowing nothing shuts the iron gates; the newlove opens them.

The sound of the gates opening wakes the beautifulwoman asleep.

Kabir says: Fantastic! Don't let a chance like this go by!

~Kabir

1

The Imitation of Christ

Love is a great thing, a great good in every way; it alone lightens

what is heavy, and leads smoothly over all roughness. For it carries

a burden without being burdened, and makes every bitter thing sweet

and tasty. Love wants to be lifted up, not held back by anything low.

Love wants to be free, and far from all worldly desires, so that its

inner vision may not be dimmed and good fortune bind it or misfortune

cast it down. Nothing is sweeter than love; nothing stronger, nothing

higher, nothing wider; nothing happier, nothing fuller, nothing

better in heaven and earth; for love is born of God...

Love keeps watch and is never unaware, even when it sleeps; tired, it

is never exhausted; hindered, it is never defeated; alarmed, it is

never afraid; but like a living flame and a burning torch it bursts

upward and blazes forth…

Love is quick, sincere, dutiful, joyous, and pleasant; brave, patient,

faithful, prudent, serene, and vigorous; and it never seeks itself.

For whenever we seek ourselves, we fall away from Love. Love is

watchful, humble and upright; not weak, or frivolous, or directed

toward vain things; temperate, pure, steady, calm, and alert in all

the senses. Love is devoted and thankful to God, always trusting and

hoping in him, even when it doesn’t taste his sweetness, for without

pain no one can live in love. - trans. Stephen Mitchell

~Thomas A Kempis

1

Effortlessly,Love flows from God into man,Like a birdWho rivers the

airWithout moving her wings.Thus we move in His worldOne in body and

soul,Though outwardly separate in form.As the Source strikes the

note,Humanity sings-The Holy Spirit is our harpist,And all the

stringsWhich are touched in LoveMust sound.

~trans. by Jane Hirshfield , Mechthild of Magdeburg

1

I don't love you as if you were the salt-rose, topazor arrow of

carnations that propagate fire:I love you as certain dark things are

loved,secretly, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that doesn't bloom and carrieshidden within

itself the light of those flowers,and thanks to your love, darkly in

my bodylives the dense fragrance that rises from the earth.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where,I love you

simply, without problems or pride:I love you in this way simply

because I don't know any other way of loving

but this, in which there is no I or you,so intimate that your hand

upon my chest is my hand,so intimate that when I fall asleep it is

your eyes that close.

~Pablo Neruda, trans. Stephen Mitchell

1

This marriage be wine with halvah, honey dissolving in milk.This

marriage be the leaves and fruit of a date tree.This marraige be

women laughing together for days on end.This marriage, a sign for us

to study.This marriage, beauty.This marriage, a moon in a light-blue

sky.This marriage, this silence fully mixed with spirit.

~Rumi, Written for his son's wedding, trans. by Coleman Barks with A.J. Arberry

1

When it's cold and raining,You are more beautiful.

And the snow brings meeven closer to Your Lips.

The Inner Secret, that which was never born,You are That Freshness, and I am with You now.

I can't explain the goings,or the comings. You enter suddenly,

and I am nowhere again.Inside the majesty.

Quatrain 1246

The minute I heard my first love storyI started looking for you, not knowinghow blind that was.

Lovers don't finally meet somewhere.They're in each other all along.

Someone Digging in the Ground

An eye is meant to see things.The soul is here for its own joy.A head

has one use: For loving a true love.Legs: To run after.

Love is for vanishing into the sky. The mind,for learning what men

have done and tried to do.Mysteries are not to be solved. The eye

goes blindwhen it only wants to see why.

A lover is always accused of something.But when he finds love,

whatever was lostin the looking comes back completely changed.On the

way to Mecca, many dangers: Thieves,the blowing sand, only camel's

milk to drink.Still, each pilgrim kisses the black stone therewith

pure longing, feeling in the surfacethe taste of the lips he wants.

This talk is like stamping new coins. They pile up,while the real work

is done outsideby someone digging in the ground.

~Rumi

1

I want to be your friendfor ever and ever.When the hills are all

flatand the rivers are all dry,when the trees blossom in winterand

the snow falls in summer,when heaven and earth mix-not till then will

I part from you.

~ The Yueh-Fu from trans. Arthur Waley. In the country of Yueh, when

two people became friends they set up an alter of earth, made

sacrifices on it and recited this oath.

1

Abanaki Song

Come, my beloved, let us go up the shining mountain, and sit

together;we will watch the sun go down in beauty from that shining

place.We will sit there till the Night Traveler rises in beauty above

the shiningmountain; we will watch him as he climbs to the skies.We

will watch also the little stars following their chief.We will watch

the northern lights playing their game of ball in theircold,

glistening country.We will sit there on the beautiful mountain while

the thunder beats his drum.We will see the flashes from the lit pipe

of the lightning.We will see the great whirlwind race with the

squall.We will sit there until all creatures drowse.There we will

hear the great owl sing his usual song: "Go to sleep, go to

sleep,"and see all animals obey his call.We will sit there in beauty

on the mountain, and watch the small stars in their sleepless

flight.They do not mind the song "Go to sleep’; we will not mind it

either,but sit more closely together, and think of nothing but

ourselveson the beautiful mountain.Again it will be heard: "Go to

sleep, go to sleep," and the Night Traveler will come closer to warn

us that everything is sleeping except ourselves and the little

stars.They and their chief are coursing along, and our minds go with

them.Then the owl sleeps; and his call to sleep sleeps; and the

lightnings flash from a long way off; the great pipe is going out;

and the thunder ceases to beat his drum; and though our bodies urge

us to sleep, we sit in beauty, very still, upon the shining mountain.

~trans. John Reade, adapted by Robert Hass

1

MAULANA'S LAST LETTER TO SHAMS

Sometimes I wonder, sweetest love, if youWere a mere dream in along

winter night,A dream of spring-days, and of golden lightWhich sheds

its rays upon a frozen heart;A dream of wine that fills the drunken

eye.

And so I wonder, sweetest love, if I Should drink this ruby wine, or

rather weep;Each tear a bezel with your face engraved,A rosary to

memorize your name...

There are so many ways to call you back-Yes, even if you only were a dream.

~Rumi, translated by Annemarie Schimmel, 'Nightingale Under The Snow'

1

A twin-twining, a soul-skin slipping in and out of one another.

We do this with such ease. Such informality

is ours in our entering in the Heart of one another.

I look up and see you standing, open-palmed,

holding a lotus in one hand and fire

in the other upturned hand, held offered out to me.

I take the bloom of Lotus-You, and taste it.

I lift the fire and whirl it like arati,

like some ancient temple ritual I feed on Your Fire.

We two are the last breath of Huuu, of you and I,

of something so much greater than us, of two.

This night shall never come again. No.

This time was cradled from eternity,

hand-picked by the Friend just for us.

Somewhere in some far-off memory, Inside,

there are two Lions lying near a still pool.

One is black-maned, roaring Passion.

The love-interest, the infinite need of She,

is yellow-eyed and hungry for Your Love-Mauling.

Somewhere on some distant slip of moonlight,

we stood and saw God in one another's eyes.

We sipped transience through each other's souls.

We became the Mighty Kindness being Kind!

I knew the very first time I saw that sweet,

that utterly, oh that utterly definitive stroke

of your name, It was You, Only You. Always Only You.

We will be the Lilt in every lover's song,

the Fragrance found in Christ's Passion and Parinda's Pleasure,

the last gasp into Love's Bliss Embrace.

We are the Love we seek. We are one another.

My soul is lying like a smooth wine inside,

deeply flowing like a Love-river of mysticism

inside your sweet soul, inside your bloodbeat,

inside your mouth and eyes I am the sight and taste.

I taste Beloved in every thought of You!

I am Beloved tasting You!

Two twin-twined souls seeking shelter, and so,

we are moving along, side by side, mind in mind,

nearing the final destination of This Love.

We are that last shout of Joy,

the last yip of Being!

I have become you, and thou, I.

Rejoicing angels, clapping cherubs!

God dancing all around like a child!

The whole Cosmos is alive in us!

 

Happiest of Birthdays, Beloved Heart of Mine, LindaLove,

I Love You Always,

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