Let's not remain adoring,
Come, let's go to the Friend, my soul.
Let's not die longing, imploring,
Come, let's go to the Friend, my soul.
Let's leave this city and this land:
Let's weep, shedding tears for the Friend,
With the cup of love's wine in hand;
Come, let's go to the Friend, my soul.
From this world we'd better be gone;
Why be duped, it couldn't live on.
Let's not be split while we are one;
Come, let's go to the Friend, my soul.
As I take the road, be my guide;
Let's set out for the Loved One's side.
Let's not look behind or ahead;
Come, let's go to the Friend, my soul.
Before the news of death arrives,
Before my marked soul vainly strives,
Before Gabriel routs our lives,
Come, let's go to the Friend, my soul.
Let's go to the truly sacred;
Let's ask for the news about God,
And taking Yunus on the road;
Come, let's go to the Friend, my soul.
- Yunus Emre (1238-1321) translated from the Turkish by Talat S. Halman
Showing posts with label mysticism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mysticism. Show all posts
Friday, July 15, 2011
Saturday, July 2, 2011
Thursday, June 30, 2011
O MARVEL, by Ibn Arabi
O Marvel! a garden amidst the flames.
My heart has become capable of every form:
it is a pasture for gazelles and a convent for Christian monks,
and a temple for idols and the pilgrim's Kaa'ba,
and the tables of the Torah and the book of the Quran.
I follow the religion of Love: whatever way Love's camels take,
that is my religion and my faith.
ibn al-`Arabi, Tarjuman al-Ashwaq, in The Mystics of Islam, translated by Reynold A Nicholson
My heart has become capable of every form:
it is a pasture for gazelles and a convent for Christian monks,
and a temple for idols and the pilgrim's Kaa'ba,
and the tables of the Torah and the book of the Quran.
I follow the religion of Love: whatever way Love's camels take,
that is my religion and my faith.
ibn al-`Arabi, Tarjuman al-Ashwaq, in The Mystics of Islam, translated by Reynold A Nicholson
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
THE NIGHT, by Henry Vaughan
THROUGH that pure virgin shrine,
That sacred veil drawn o'er Thy glorious noon,
That men might look and live, as glow-worms shine,
And face the moon :
Wise Nicodemus saw such light
As made him know his God by night.
Most blest believer he !
Who in that land of darkness and blind eyes
Thy long-expected healing wings could see
When Thou didst rise !
And, what can never more be done,
Did at midnight speak with the Sun !
O who will tell me, where
He found Thee at that dead and silent hour ?
What hallow'd solitary ground did bear
So rare a flower ;
Within whose sacred leaves did lie
The fulness of the Deity ?
No mercy-seat of gold,
No dead and dusty cherub, nor carv'd stone,
But His own living works did my Lord hold
And lodge alone ;
Where trees and herbs did watch and peep
And wonder, while the Jews did sleep.
Dear Night ! this world's defeat ;
The stop to busy fools ; cares check and curb ;
The day of spirits ; my soul's calm retreat
Which none disturb !
Christ's* progress, and His prayer-time ;
The hours to which high Heaven doth chime.
God's silent, searching flight ;
When my Lord's head is fill'd with dew, and all
His locks are wet with the clear drops of night ;
His still, soft call ;
His knocking-time ; the soul's dumb watch,
When spirits their fair kindred catch.
Were all my loud, evil days
Calm and unhaunted as is thy dark tent,
Whose peace but by some angel's wing or voice
Is seldom rent ;
Then I in Heaven all the long year
Would keep, and never wander here.
But living where the sun
Doth all things wake, and where all mix and tire
Themselves and others, I consent and run
To ev'ry mire ;
And by this world's ill-guiding light,
Err more than I can do by night.
There is in God—some say—
A deep, but dazzling darkness ; as men here
Say it is late and dusky, because they
See not all clear.
O for that Night ! where I in Him
Might live invisible and dim !
That sacred veil drawn o'er Thy glorious noon,
That men might look and live, as glow-worms shine,
And face the moon :
Wise Nicodemus saw such light
As made him know his God by night.
Most blest believer he !
Who in that land of darkness and blind eyes
Thy long-expected healing wings could see
When Thou didst rise !
And, what can never more be done,
Did at midnight speak with the Sun !
O who will tell me, where
He found Thee at that dead and silent hour ?
What hallow'd solitary ground did bear
So rare a flower ;
Within whose sacred leaves did lie
The fulness of the Deity ?
No mercy-seat of gold,
No dead and dusty cherub, nor carv'd stone,
But His own living works did my Lord hold
And lodge alone ;
Where trees and herbs did watch and peep
And wonder, while the Jews did sleep.
Dear Night ! this world's defeat ;
The stop to busy fools ; cares check and curb ;
The day of spirits ; my soul's calm retreat
Which none disturb !
Christ's* progress, and His prayer-time ;
The hours to which high Heaven doth chime.
God's silent, searching flight ;
When my Lord's head is fill'd with dew, and all
His locks are wet with the clear drops of night ;
His still, soft call ;
His knocking-time ; the soul's dumb watch,
When spirits their fair kindred catch.
Were all my loud, evil days
Calm and unhaunted as is thy dark tent,
Whose peace but by some angel's wing or voice
Is seldom rent ;
Then I in Heaven all the long year
Would keep, and never wander here.
But living where the sun
Doth all things wake, and where all mix and tire
Themselves and others, I consent and run
To ev'ry mire ;
And by this world's ill-guiding light,
Err more than I can do by night.
There is in God—some say—
A deep, but dazzling darkness ; as men here
Say it is late and dusky, because they
See not all clear.
O for that Night ! where I in Him
Might live invisible and dim !
Thursday, June 23, 2011
THE COMMISSION
Her ample solitude
no trespasser profane;
no artifice infringe
the glory of Her sun.
An ocean of gray doves
burns in Her opened eyes,
whose wisdom's word compels
the science of the breeze.
Wherefore, this slender hand
shall track the thieving night,
fetter absconding death,
pillage the hunter's spoils;
Commissioned to retrieve
lost pledge of timeworn love.
-by Wayward Disciple
no trespasser profane;
no artifice infringe
the glory of Her sun.
An ocean of gray doves
burns in Her opened eyes,
whose wisdom's word compels
the science of the breeze.
Wherefore, this slender hand
shall track the thieving night,
fetter absconding death,
pillage the hunter's spoils;
Commissioned to retrieve
lost pledge of timeworn love.
-by Wayward Disciple
THE TRIAL
No one would drop her sleep,
No one her dream unveil;
My love would tear her milk,
Unleash her bare desire.
Her smallest breath undone,
Celestial fires uproot;
The running of Spring's sun
Wind down into the earth.
Until this leaf display
The emblem of her peace,
I never rest my soul,
Consider no release;
Request not, nor require,
That which would make me whole.
-by Wayward Disciple
No one her dream unveil;
My love would tear her milk,
Unleash her bare desire.
Her smallest breath undone,
Celestial fires uproot;
The running of Spring's sun
Wind down into the earth.
Until this leaf display
The emblem of her peace,
I never rest my soul,
Consider no release;
Request not, nor require,
That which would make me whole.
-by Wayward Disciple
DIVINE GENERATION, by Anne Francois Louis Janmot
-from her stunning series of paintings entitled, Poem of the Soul.
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Prayer (1)
Prayer the Church's banquet, Angels' age,
God's breath in man returning to his birth,
The soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage,
The Christian plummet sounding heav'n and earth;
Engine against th' Almighty, sinners' tower,
Reversed thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear,
The six-days world-transposing in an hour,
A kind of tune, which all things hear and fear;
Softness and peace, and joy, and love, and bliss,
Exalted Manna, gladness of the best,
Heaven in ordinary, man well dressed,
The milky way, the bird of Paradise,
Church-bells beyond the stars heard, the soul's blood,
The land of spices; something understood.
by George Herbert (1593-1633)
God's breath in man returning to his birth,
The soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage,
The Christian plummet sounding heav'n and earth;
Engine against th' Almighty, sinners' tower,
Reversed thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear,
The six-days world-transposing in an hour,
A kind of tune, which all things hear and fear;
Softness and peace, and joy, and love, and bliss,
Exalted Manna, gladness of the best,
Heaven in ordinary, man well dressed,
The milky way, the bird of Paradise,
Church-bells beyond the stars heard, the soul's blood,
The land of spices; something understood.
by George Herbert (1593-1633)
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Sunday, June 19, 2011
Saturday, June 18, 2011
Friday, June 17, 2011
I DRINK WINE FROM THE CUP-BEARER
I drink wine from the cup-bearer
At an inn higher than the sky.
Our souls are goblets in His hands,
Deep in His ecstasy we lie.
At our private place of meeting,
Where our hearts are scorched with yearning
Like moths, the Sun and Moon ring
Our candle whose flames are high.
Yunnus, don't tell these words of trance
To those steeped in dark ignorance.
Can't you see how swiftly the chance
Of ignorant men's lives goes by?
- Yunus Emre, 1238-1321 (translated from the Turkish by Talat S. Halman)
At an inn higher than the sky.
Our souls are goblets in His hands,
Deep in His ecstasy we lie.
At our private place of meeting,
Where our hearts are scorched with yearning
Like moths, the Sun and Moon ring
Our candle whose flames are high.
Yunnus, don't tell these words of trance
To those steeped in dark ignorance.
Can't you see how swiftly the chance
Of ignorant men's lives goes by?
- Yunus Emre, 1238-1321 (translated from the Turkish by Talat S. Halman)
Saturday, October 30, 2010
Saturday, August 28, 2010
Monday, August 16, 2010
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Kayhan Kalhor & Shujaat Husain Khan - Beshno Az Nay!
This music breathes some sort of divine ardor! Beautiful!
Friday, July 9, 2010
Carolyn Forche Reads Her Poem, "The Museum Of Stones"
What a stunning beauty is this poem! It brought tears to my eyes.
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