WE TAKE THE GOLDEN ROAD TO SAMARKAND*

[Guest guest]

                       Prologue

 

                       

        Sweet to ride forth at evening from the wells

          When shadows pass gigantic on the sand,

        And softly through the silence beat the bells

          Along the Golden Road to Samarkand.

 

                       

        We travel not for trafficking alone;

          By hotter winds our fiery hearts are fanned:

        For lust of knowing what should not be known,

          We take the Golden Road to Samarkand.

 

         James Elroy Flecker

 

 

We're carted in a cosy caravan of dreams,

Driving fast across vast desert waste.

Nothing we see is exactly as it seems,

From mirage to death we race in reckless haste.

The Master Sheikh cries " wake up you sleeping one,

Within you shines the Great Almighty Sun! " .

 

A boy had need to cross that golden sand,

To find his fond father in Samarkand.

His journey was beset by many trials,

The brave lad trekked for miles and miles.

He trudged on when all seemed sadly lost,

He persisted regardless of all human cost.

 

God's grace came in camel shape, a beast had strayed,

So back to his father, his way was safely made!

 

II

 

The fierce blazing heat of noon-day Sun,

Afflicts each caravan on its lonely way.

The camels yearn for water, but there is none,

Until they reach some oasis, one blessed day.

 

The Sheikh cries " The Sun is like God's will,

Driving your caravan across the golden sand;

Water's like Real Truth, which you need to fill

Your heart, to cut your knot of bondage band! "

 

A traveller traversed across that desert plane,

Soon he became thirsty from the blazing heat,

He prayed for water from a shower of rain,

To save his life, his journey then complete.

He glimpsed an oasis, 'twas a mirage it seems,

Such is our wasted life, a caravan of dreams!

 

III

 

The Sheikh calls " come to my tavern and drink

The ecstatic ruby wine of love divine!

Then enquire into that one who thinks;

Soon you'll find your inner Sun sublime

That lights your mind of wandering dreams,

And makes you see a world that only seems

As Real, when its all a false delusion.

That's the very root of mind's illusion! "

 

A pilgrim knocked hard at the tavern door,

Alas he found it shut and firmly closed.

No answer came although he did implore

The Sheikh to help in what he had proposed.

Then he heard a voice within the tavern cry,

" My son to your false self, you first must die! "

 

IV

 

The One Eternal Sheikh is our blessed Self,

Not treacherous, perverted monkey mind,

Like some diabolic demonic elf,

It flits from each tree to tree it finds.

 

So hearken to the wisdom of oonesMaster Sheikh,

As he teaches freedom and the way to wake.

The Sheikh in the desert on the golden way

Frees us from the jail of every day.

 

A man met his Master one blessed hour,

And enquired, " how to free myself from 'mind'? "

The Master said " if you turn within each hour,

In search of your own false self you'll surely find,

That real freedom you so urgently desire,

And be born again in God's great sacred fire! "

 

 

* A SONNET SEQUENCE COMPOSED AT ARUNACHALA AUTUMN 2010