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Nonduality Highlights: Issue #3605, Sunday, July 26, 2009, Editor: Mark
Ed. note: some poetry from Allspirit:
I Taught Myself to Live Simply
I taught myself to live simply and wisely,
to look at the sky and pray to God,
and to wander long before evening
to tire my superfluous worries.
When the burdocks rustle in the ravine
and the yellow-red rowanberry cluster droops
I compose happy verses
about life's decay, decay and beauty.
I come back. The fluffy cat
licks my palm, purrs so sweetly
and the fire flares bright
on the saw-mill turret by the lake.
Only the cry of a stork landing on the roof
occasionally breaks the silence.
If you knock on my door
I may not even hear.
- Anna Akhmatova
Stillness
Tormented friend, why do you still enquire
And thirst to know the sum of things entire?
The more you strive, the less you will succeed;
The mind cannot fulfil the spirit's need.
Striving too hard begets a troubled mind
And those who strive will always stay confined.
For you are not the body, not the mind
But LIGHT IMMORTAL , mortally enshrined.
So live in bliss - enjoy the simple task;
Seek not to know, and do not dare to ask
Why you are here, or what your fate will be.
Be still and listen to the symphony
Which your surroundings play in unity.
The part cannot exist without the whole;
The whole cannot exist without the part;
And reason has no place in cosmic art.
When stillness reigns, you are the sum of things;
The Nothing and the All that Oneness brings.
When stillness reigns, you are Infinity
And sense the nearness of Divinity.
Just as the pigeon navigates in flight
And homeward speeds before a hint of night;
So too, the soul, will homeward soar one day
Without a mind to guide it on its way.
- Robert Goslin
laughing at the word
two
Only
That Illumined
One
Who keeps
Seducing the formless into form
Had the charm to win my
Heart.
Only a Perfect One
Who is always
Laughing at the word
Two
Can make you know
Of
Love.
- Hafiz, from The Gift - Poems by Hafiz the Great Sufi Master,
translation by Daniel Ladinsky
Is my soul asleep?
Is my soul asleep?
Have those beehives that work
in the night stopped? And the water-
wheel of thought, is it
going around now, cups
empty, carrying only shadows?
No, my soul is not asleep.
It is awake, wide awake.
It neither sleeps nor dreams, but watches,
its eyes wide open
far-off things, and listens
at the shores of the great silence.
- Antonio Machado, from The Soul Is Here For Its Own Joy, edited
by Robert Bly
Eternal Journey
As the crimson flame of life
Breaks slowly
Above the horizon,
The white frosted meadows,
With trees and hedgerows
Of sculptured ice,
Speak loudly
Of your presence.
Once more
Upon this journey,
As another day begins,
Without effort
Or intrusion,
Through the peace
And tranquillity
Of your silent voice,
The moment becomes eternal
And the journey
Begins again.
- Chris Roe