Imam al-Ghazali’s deathbed poem

 

 

 Say unto brethren when they see me dead,
And weep for me, lamenting me in sadness:
“Think ye I am this corpse ye are to bury?
I swear by God, this dead one is not I.
I in the Spirit am, and this my body
My dwelling was, my garment for a time.
I am a treasure: hidden I was beneath
This talisman of dust, wherein I suffered.
I am a pearl; a shell imprisoned me,
But leaving it, all trials I have left.
I am a bird, and this was once my cage;
But I have flown, leaving it as a token.
I praise God who hath set me free, and made
For me a dwelling in the heavenly heights.
Ere now I was a dead man in your midst,
But I have come to life, and doffed my shroud.”

 

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Prema Lynn - 'Shhhh....'

 

 Innocently,
without judging or interpreting -
just notice yourself thinking.

Just notice.

Then, without attempting  
to change anything
or make it wrong -

gently,  
as the thinking
is happening,
 
become aware
of what Notices it.

That Noticing Essence
is Who you are, in truth.

It is Free.  
It is One.
It is Changeless and Unaffected.

Now,
quietly, gently,
while letting the thinking 'be',

sink deeper
to this Pure Noticing.
This Pure Awareness.

Don't look at this
so much as a practice,

but as a conscious,
'returning Home'
to what you Are.

To what you know
you want to Feel again:

Your Real Nature.

'Notice yourself thinking,
then become aware
of What notices -

and without trying
to change anything,
bring attention there.'

Do this for as long
as it feels right.

Don't strain.

Trust that some thing
is happening
all on its own,

to bring a
deeper feeling

of quiet and
stillness inside.

Even one drop
of bringing attention

to the
Unwavering Presence

matters more
than words can say.

And eventually you will
know yourself more deeply

as the Pure Awareness...
not its apparent contents.

You can tenderly say within,
if you feel so moved:
'Shhhh....'

You are not your
thoughts or thinking

or the seeming world
born of that.

You are the
ever present One
that all appears in.

 

 

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Alain Joly - A Gathering of Friends

 

pic from Bab'Aziz film

 

 There’s been a gathering of friends lately. All gooey with being. It took place somewhere, in a place unknown, unlocated, kept somehow secret, where they all came to share wildly, and taste of a love supreme. You may want to know that place, to locate it, to find it as being somewhere where you can go and share some of that exquisiteness too. Well, now you have to think twice. For as the dictionary says, unlocated means ‘not surveyed or designated by marks, limits, or boundaries’. It is a place of no location. A place that has no geographical situation other than being here. A place that you cannot find within any noticeable limits but that englobes every known location. That place which you cannot find or reach, which has no known address, and which is kept secret behind the usual, well-trodden frontiers of your everyday experience, is yourself. Not your usual self, which you are well acquainted with. That one you have to be cautious of, or even warned against. No. Not that one. There is more to yourself. There is more than this located entity, with marks, limits, and boundaries. More than where your thoughts and beliefs have placed you in. There is a place in yourself that is not a place, that finds itself in no well-marked location, but that you could never not be in. Would you want to go there, that you would have to notice first that you are already in, already placed at the seat of honour, already warmed by its blazing hearth. This only is the heartfelt, spaceless, timeless location for all gatherings of friends. This is the land of your supreme heart, that you share with all living beings under the sky. There you have lived of all eternity without your knowing it. There you cannot go but only be. This is the event you are already signed in for, a retreat where you share the secret address of your deepest being with other fellow friends, and lit a bonfire of love. It may be a gathering of one or a hundred, in company of the wise or the ignorant, with the lighting of a sumptuous blaze or many a scattered sparkle or glitter, it doesn’t matter — there’s been a gathering of friends here and you as being were its gorgeous venue.

 

 

The Dawn Within 

 

 

Farid ud-Din Attar - The Moths and the Flame

 

 

 Moths gathered in a fluttering throng one night
To learn the truth about the candle light,
And they decided one of them should go
To gather news of the elusive glow.
One flew till in the distance he discerned
A palace window where a candle burned —
And went no nearer: back again he flew
To tell the others what he thought he knew.
The mentor of the moths dismissed his claim,
Remarking: “He knows nothing of the flame.”
A moth more eager than the one before
Set out and passed beyond the palace door.
He hovered in the aura of the fire,
A trembling blur of timorous desire,
Then headed back to say how far he’d been,
And how much he had undergone and seen.
The mentor said: “You do not bear the signs
Of one who’s fathomed how the candle shines.”
Another moth flew out — his dizzy flight
Turned to an ardent wooing of the light;
He dipped and soared, and in his frenzied trance
Both self and fire were mingled by his dance —
The flame engulfed his wing-tips, body, head,
His being glowed a fierce translucent red;
And when the mentor saw that sudden blaze,
The moth’s form lost within the glowing rays,
He said: “He knows, he knows the truth we seek,
That hidden truth of which we cannot speak.”
To go beyond all knowledge is to find
That comprehension which eludes the mind,
And you can never gain the longed-for goal
Until you first outsoar both flesh and soul;
But should one part remain, a single hair
Will drag you back and plunge you in despair —
No creature’s self can be admitted here,
Where all identity must disappear.

 

The Conference of the Birds 

 

 

Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī-Listen to this reed (Persian narrated)