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Nonduality Highlights: Issue #4142, Sunday, January 23, 2011, Editor: Mark
Under heaven all can see beauty as beauty
only because there is ugliness.
All can know good as good only because there is evil.
Therefore having and not having arise together.
Difficult and easy complement each other.
Long and short contrast each other;
High and low rest upon each other;
Voice and sound harmonize each other;
Front and back follow one another.
Therefore the sage goes about doing nothing, teaching no-talking.
The ten thousand things rise and fall without cease.
Creating, yet not possessing.
Working, yet not taking credit.
Work is done, then forgotten.
Therefore it lasts forever.
- Lao-tzu. from Tao Te Ching, translation by Gia-fu Feng and
Jane English, posted to AlongTheWay
The yogin then looketh on, mentally unperturbed, at the
interminable flow of thoughts as though he were tranquilly
resting on the shore of a river watching the water flow past.
Padma-Karpo, from A Treasury of Traditional Wisdom, posted
to SufiMystic
Be thirsty heart,
seek forever without a rest.
Let this soundless longing
hidden deep inside you
be the source
of every word you say.
- Rumi, from Rumi - Whispers of the Beloved, selected and
translated by Azima Melita Kolin and Maryam Mafi, posted to
AlongTheWay
Maybe you can't drink the entire Oxus River
but don't deny you're thirsty!
You want a spirit-drenching?
Dig a hole in this book, the Mathnawi,
this island. Make holes
so the ocean can flow up through.
Dig and make it porous
until it's all seawater.
Wind moves word-leaves off the surface
showing one color, clearness.
Beneath you, coral branches
and ocean-peaches.
When the Mathnawi sinks
with your digging, it loses its words.
Speaker, listener, language,
Bread-giver, bread-taker, bread.
The categories dissolve
into One Water.
- Rumi, version by Coleman Barks, from Like This, posted
to Sunlight
come let's speak
of our souls
let's even hide from
our ears and eyes
like a rose garden
always keep a smile
like imagination
talk without a sound
like the spirit
reigning the world
telling the secrets
uttering no word
let's get away from
all the clever humans
who put words in our mouth
let's only say what our hearts desire
even our hands and feet
sense every inner move
let's keep silence
but make our hearts move
the mystery of destiny
knows the life of
speck after speck of dust
let's tell our story as a particle of dust
- Rumi, Ghazal 1540, translation by Nader Khalili, from Rumi,
Fountain of Fire. posted to Sunlight
... and finally, two old favorites:
The Opening Of Eyes
After R.S Thomas
That day I saw beneath dark clouds
the passing light over the water
and I heard the voice of the world speak out,
I knew then, as I had before
life is no passing memory of what has been
nor the remaining pages in a greater book
waiting to be read.
It is the opening of eyes long closed.
It is the vision of far off things
seen for the silence they hold.
It is the heart after years
of secret conversing
speaking out loud in the clear air.
It is Moses in the desert
fallen to his knees before the lit bush.
It is the man throwing away his shoes
as if to enter heaven
and finding himself astonished,
opened at last,
fallen in love with solid ground.
~
Enough
Enough. These few words are enough.
If not these words, this breath.
If not this breath, this sitting here.
This opening to the life
we have refused
again and again
until now.
Until now.
- David Whyte, posted to The_Now2