Donna Ashworth - 'This Rock'

 

art :Julia Arnt

We exist on a 4.5 billion year old rock

floating in an unfathomable expanse 

of nothing-ness

you and I

we are magnetically held in place

by an invisible force

along with 8 billion other people. 

every single thing that exists on this rock

is without doubt a work of art

so intricately crafted 

we will never truly discover the scope of wonder within

we are made of the same elements 

as everything that naturally surrounds us

just shaken up differently

and oh so magnificently

look at us, my friends. 

we are breathtaking

our breath alone

the power in that act 

is breathtaking

everything you are doing right now 

reading, feeling, understanding 

is fascinatingly complex

and yet we spend our days worrying about things

that are of no significance at all 

big-picture

walk around your world today 

with awe in your eyes 

and really see what you are living.

every aspect of this life

is nothing short of astonishing

and this rock we are clinging to with ease

is astounding.

eyes open, reach out, breathe deep

take it all in

this rock, our home, 

will know each of us

for only a heartbeat in its timeline. 

leave only love

live with only gratitude

look with only wonder.

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https://donnaashworth.com/

Nancy Neithercut - An all encompassing love

 

How long did we wait for our lives to begin? Believing that everything had to be 'just right', so we could finally relax

When you least expect it, when all hope is gone, when you realize that tale will never get pinned on the donkey, when you realize that all the ladders in the world will never reach the moon, when you're tired of trying to catch the wind, kiss your reflection in the moonlit pond, that it was simply a misconception that you were in charge of the stage door, and had to turn the crank on the merry-go- round,

you find infinite permutations of a butterfly kiss, and a beautiful intimacy of life slipping through your fingers as you slip through the lines, losing yourself and finding yourself awash in iridescent awe.

and in the end there is no doubt nor place for it to arise..........

all the secret corners of your being have been undone

there is nothing left to hide nor anywhere to hide it

nor anyone to hide...

there is nothing in the bottom of the cup

not even emptiness

or nothingness

or thinglessness

the suck as the tide goes out

water shimmering in the afternoon sun as it percolates into the sands of this shoreless sea

just an empty sublime vastness

suspended as awe

in the dance of love

What is going on is magnificently wondrously unknowable

It has no qualities or characteristics whatsoever

It is shared learned words which create a conceptual mentally fabricated world of separate things and events and time...

And this imaginary “known” world is not separate from the unknown because the ideas of “known” and “unknown” are also made up.

I could say that what is going on is fluid and ungraspable but actually it is neither moving nor nonmoving. As it has no dimension and it is not dimension less.

Has no time nor non time...

It has no things nor non-things...

It is not one big thing like wholeness or emptiness...

It has no space nor emptiness...

And it is not even an it.

This is it

And not even that....

When the story is no longer believed, that is also the story...

And the story takes on a somewhat surreal feeling... yet simultaneously real-er than real more vibrant more alive....

it’s as if the most delicious dream of unknowing has subsumed the dream of knowing...

It’s like an all encompassing love.

https://substack.com/@nancyneithercut

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Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī - Inner Sunrise

 

If I were the plaything of every thought

I’d be a fool, not a wise man.

If the Sun of Love was not my own

I’d be mournful like Saturn,

rising and falling in the night sky.

If I were not guided by the fragrance of Love’s City

I’d have followed dark spirits

into the endless desert of greed.

If the soul’s light had to stay inside its house

I’d open every door and window!

If the garden of the soul

did not comfort those in pain

I could not carry Love’s message

on the east wind.

If lovers were not addicted to music and dancing

why would I sing all day and night

like a wailing flute?

If the Saaqi’s weight-giving wine

had been kept from my mouth

I’d be like the thin lip of a cup!

If the Garden had no leaves or shade

I’d be rootless

like the fortune-trees of deceitful men.

If God’s servants were not upon the earth

I’d have fallen into the sin

and folly of this world.

If there was no way from the grave to paradise

I could not behold the joyful heavens

in this body.

If there was no road from East to West

I would not be dancing through the garden

with the North and South winds!

If the Abundant Garden did not grow

my soul would never blossom.

If God’s grace were not with me

I’d be a babbling fool!

Go within.

Hear the story of sunrise from the Sun itself.

If there were no sunrise within

I would have set long ago!

Alain Joly - Of Dimitry’s Prayer

 

‘A Quiet Monastery’ – Isaac Levitan, 1890 – Wikimedia

“Open, O doors and bolts of my heart,
that Christ the King of Glory may enter!”
~ Dimitry of Rostov

Read this excellent post by Alain Joly

HERE

Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī - The Ashes of Union

 

 

 O Soul,
You are the Phoenix
rising up from the ashes of Union.
Why don’t you fly?—
No one knows you on the ground.

You are the heart’s sweetness
And by some magical power
your form ravishes a thousand hearts.

For a time you took form in the body.
For a time you passed beyond the heavens
and the bonds of both worlds.

Why can’t the spirit find you?—
You are its wings and its feathers.

Why can’t the eye see you?—
You are the source of its sight.

What will happen to your copper soul
when the Alchemist arrives?—
Will it not become gold?

What will become of your little seed
when the Springtime arrives?—
Will it not become a towering tree?

What will happen to brushwood
when it falls into fire?—
Will it not change into sparks and rise to heaven?

Reason and intellect
Are like the dim light of distant stars.
You are the bright Sun
that shines through every veil.

The world is nothing but snow and ice.
You are the burning heat of Summer.
O King, no trace of this world remains
the moment you arrive!

Who can sit by your side?
Everyone would vanish with one glance of yours.

O blessed eyes!
I have seen something beyond imagination,
unreachable by fortune or human effort—
I have seen the perfect face
of Shams-e Tabriz.

 

 

 

In the arms of the Beloved 

 

Baraka Blue - Dervish

 

Dervish

Right hand to the heavens
Left hand to the earth
White garment the spirit
Black cloak is the dirt

Gravestone for a turban
Ascending up from its perch
The kiss of death from the master
Bowing for the rebirth

A rose tied in its coffin
Slow a petal unfurls
The planets down to the atoms
All orbit in turns

All things are in cycles
Each being returns
Love, the fruit of the spirit
The body, food for the worms

Invoking every rotation
And find what the master affirms
You are just here to remember
There is nothing to learn

Mankind in his glory
A clot that was brought to term
The righteous and the the deniers
All emerged from a sperm

They continue the whirling
Present at every stage
The breath was blown into Adam
The secret flows in your veins

The reed that receives the breath
The Perfect Man is the ney
The higher that one ascends
The more he becomes a slave

Each turn is “make me a vessel
...your mercy enters this plane”
For you have not become a dervish
Until your will is all beings are saved

Illusion of separation
When it dies then you have attained
Then there is no self to speak of
Like the ocean meeting the rain

When a drop falls to its surface
What drop is there that remains?
Those who pass in this matter
Say not that they have been slain

The martyrs yearn for this station
All descriptions in vain
Green birds in the garden
Chirping the greatest name

The fuqara are the wealthy
The sultans they are the slaves
Dust on the path of the Prophet
We raise our hands and we pray

Ya Hazrat Mawlana
Our Master, show us the way

Right hand to the heaven
Left hand to the earth
White garment the spirit
Black cloak is the dirt. 

 

http://www.barakablue.com/