[Poetry Chaikhana] Bibi Hayati - Before there was a hint of civilization

August 28, 2009

--- On Fri, 28/8/09, Poetry Chaikhana <ivan wrote:

A week end poem from friend Ivan

from the Poetry Chaikhana --

Before there was a hint of civilization

By Bibi Hayati(19th Century)

English version by Aliki Barnstone

Before there was a hint of civilizationI carried a memory of your loose strand of hair,Oblivious, I carried inside me your pointed tip of hair.In its invisible realm,Your face of sun yearned for epiphany,Until each distinct thing was thrown into sight.From the first instant time took a breath,Your love lay in the soul,A treasure in the secret chest in the heart.Before the first seed shot up out of the rose bed of the possible,The soul's lark took wing high above your meadow,Flying home to you.I thank you one hundred times! In the altarOf Hayati's eyes, your face shinesForever present and beautiful.

-- from The Shambhala Anthology of Women's Spiritual Poetry, Edited by Aliki Barnstone

Amazon.com / Photo by ninjanell902 /

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Thought for the Day:

Love everyone and everythingwith the last ounce of your being.Love all until you are shatteredby loveand only love remains.

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Hi Alan -Bibi Hayati was born into a Sufi family in the early 1800's in Persia (Iran). She was raised by her brother, who guided her in the early stages of her spiritual life. She was later formally initiated into the Sufi path, studying the great Sufi saints and philosophers of the past, including Rumi and al-Arabi. Hayati married the Sufi master Nur 'ali Shah and, at his request, she composed her divan (collection) of poetry.---What is it that Bibi Hayati is telling us here? Before there was a hint of civilization...From the first instant time took a breath...Before the first seed shot up...These all take us back not to the beginning, but to a time before beginnings.And it is there that she discovers divine awareness, of the soul's love for the Beloved.From the first instant time took a breath,Your love

lay in the soul,A treasure in the secret chest in the heart.Most seekers secretly fear that their yearning for the Divine is too anemic, and so they drive themselves into extreme practices and Herculean efforts of prayer and meditation. Bibi Hayati's truth cuts through all that: When we dig into the core of awareness, we discover a love too immense to describe. That love is the "memory," the connection to the Eternal.And that love-memory is primordial. It is not something that is built through actions and effort. It is not dependent on one's history. It exists "before there was a hint of civilization." It is the soul's very nature.(Those of a universalist bent might see in this parallels with Buddhist teachings on original nature or one's "original face.")We don't have to train ourselves to that divine love, we simply uncover it within ourselves.This then tells us the real purpose of spiritual practice:

Not so much to develop qualities we lack, but to stop obstructing the soul's true nature, to uncover it and let it take wing.Ultimately, we don't find God's shining face where it was not before, we discover that blissful radiance is always and has always been "forever present and beautiful."Have a beautiful weekend!Ivan

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Ivan M. Granger's original poetry, stories and commentaries are 2002 - 2008 by Ivan M. Granger.All other material is copyrighted by the respective authors, translators and/or publishers.

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