Take me over

Take me over
 
Take me over, comforting warmth, 
as the hours grow short, tomorrows dwindle
 
and the nights are ripe with His presence.
The candle has begun to gutter
 
and the world is reduced to two
before the two become One.
 
The old torch in the chest sizzles and glows,
carried here from a distant fire –
 
a Tomb on a hill eight thousand miles away
and thirty years later and I am alone
 
with a peace beyond my circumstances.
Take me over in this delicious solitude
 
that confirms my faith and foretells of union
not to come later but now – the ever-present, eternal now.
 
Take me over and we shall share
these wordless moments before I am no longer me –
 
I, who never was and never has been
and never will be apart from You.
 
O child of God, burn in the glow,
the silence and warmth of His Presence.   

(painting by Joe DiSabatino)

My God, my God

My God, my God
 
There comes a stretch of the path
where the conversation dies down to a whisper
 
then further dissipates into a comfortable silence.
You are a child again, holding the hand of your Father,
 
(perhaps a father you never had),
trying to match His strides,
 
maintaining a delicious intimacy,
a silent communion with the Silent One. 
 
Your lips are sealed, tongue stolen.
Praise is superfluous, any request an affront.
 
You know there will come again a time
when life will crush a plea from you,
 
perhaps a query – (in good company) 
My God, My God why hath Thou forsaken me?
 
but for a brief spell you possess the aplomb,
the humbling insight that life is too much for you,
 
that the truth of it cannot be contained in words
nor in the bone-encased structure
 
of your understanding.  So you forfeit,
in that fleeting quietude, as much resistance
 
as you can afford with the wish
that one day your surrender
 
will be entire, regardless of any past or future
hardship or loss God has ordained for you.
 
O child of God, savor the sweetness, endure the pain
and hold tightly to the hand of your Father.

(drawing by Rich Panico)

         

God being God

 God being God
 
A dog chasing its tail –
such is our search for God.
 
How tenacious is the ignorance
that cloaks the human mind!
 
I was briefly allowed the illusion of liberty,
the illusion of wandering a bit,
 
but in Reality I’ve never left
God’s fenced-in backyard – 
 
never a moment without His eye upon me;
His hand upon my shoulder.
 
He has allowed me a lifespan of explorations –
of my world and my humanity, 
 
of my loneliness, longing and revelations,
of my fragile attachments and fleeting delights,
 
all seemingly essential components of my adventure.
I might guess in my old age the whys and wherefores
 
but in the end it is God’s secret and all I can
insipidly suggest is that it’s merely God being God.
 
O child of God, cease barking up the wrong tree.
Grow mute enough to hear the voice within.   

The dance of the seven veils

 The dance of the seven veils
 
God awoke after a timeless nap,
stretched Himself and (per Meher) asked
 
Who am I? and thus began
our adventure in corporality.
 
But surely the All-knowing One
knew the answer beforehand!
 
Perhaps, existence is merely God’s
thumbing through an old diary
 
reading it through our mortal eyes, ears,
mouth, nose and skin to revive the narrative.   
 
There may be nothing new under the sun,
but there is also nothing new
 
in the darkness of the Void.  God woke up
to shine a light upon Himself
 
with Maya being central to the plot –
its revelation, conflict and resolution.
 
O child, corporality is the dance of the seven veils.
Be not enchanted by the performance.