Things that are real

Things that are real                                                                            

We are forever exchanging words,

my companions and I –    

but, no one has dared

to exchange silences with me;

to look me in the eye and enter the realm

where Real things are given and received.

I’ve been reluctant as well, all of a solitary life,

to trust a human heart – to court that suffering.

That’s what I love about You. 

You live in that realm of the Real. 

Even when You stepped down to this turbulent planet,

You brought the beauty of silence with You.

You brought humanity to its gate.

You flooded our souls with its fragrance.

You meet us there yet,

whoever might take Your arm,

to exchange with Your lovers

the Reality for which there are no words.

O child of God, His advent is an invitation

to join Him in the realm of silence.

               

A torch for You

A torch for You                                                                                

Become hopeless, You say. 

I’ve invested all the hope I have

in the One whose shoulders

bear the weight of multitudes;

the One entrusted with the Mandali’s souls –

Mani’s guileless adoration, for example;

Mehera’s unworldly devotion;

Eruch’s plea:  Don’t let me down!

Love makes no demands

but promises invoke certain expectations.

Faith is blind in the end,

but there are flares along the way.

I look to those burned-out, love-ravaged souls

who carried to their graves, a torch for You

and the silent assurance and authority with which

You accepted their immeasurable sacrifice.

O child of God, you are a lover of Meher Baba!

What wondrous company you keep!

                        (from A Jewel in the Dust)

                                       

Song link --He's waiting

He’s waiting                                                                     April 2012

Dm                   C                          Gm                   C

True love is beyond me ... will it always be that way?

Bb                                 F            Gm                 C

suffering through the darkness waiting on the day

      Bb                      F                           Dm                      C

but, my Lord waits with me     and He hears the words I pray

         Bb        C                              F

He’s waiting     ...  waiting on the day

(1^st Chorus)        

         C         Bb                 F                            Dm         C                   F

He’s waiting  O ....... He’s waiting       on the day true love turns the key     

         C          Bb                 F                                     Bb   C              Dm   C

He’s waiting, O .......   He’s waiting          for me to love Him,     to love Him

       Bb   C                    F                           (C Gm C Bb C F)

the way         He loves me

Dm                           C             Gm                   C

Roads that lead me nowhere and all the games I play

Bb                                 F             Gm                  C

suffering through the darkness waiting on the day

Bb                     F                     Dm                     C

He endures it with me and He hears the words I pray

         Bb         C                        F

He’s waiting ... waiting on the day    (Repeat 1^st chorus)

Dm                          C                         Gm                          C

I pray my Lord will show me how to love Him more and more

    Gm                          C                   Bb                               C

to love Him more and more, ‘til the veils between us fall away

    C         F     

until that day     (1^st Chorus, then 2^nd Chorus)

(2^nd Chorus)                   C          Bb                                    F

He’s waiting, O don’t you know, He’s waiting

                       Dm           C                    F

with a love long-suffering and true

                      C          Bb                F                                          Bb   C

He’s waiting, O........ He’s waiting               for you to love Him,

                                         Dm  C                   Bb   C                       F

when will you to love Him         the way           He loves you?  

He's waiting

Precarious

Precarious                                                                                         

Women from the well in perfect balance,

water jars spilling not a drop –

so I place my Beloved above my head,

conducting this world’s affairs.

How precarious it seems,

juggling my faith, here and there,

often weighty and absurd – a pain in the neck, really, 

but I never think of dumping it.

I’d rather be wrong about my Beloved,

than right about atheism.

Other religions have snapped under me,

their bones diseased to the marrow,

but the burden of my faith

in the Beloved has lifted me –

at times, my whole being

threatening to fly away.

O child of God, you have no choice in the matter.

The Ancient One has knocked upon your door.

                        (from A Jewel in the Dust)

Wring and pare

Wring and pare                                                                                

Narrow it down, pilgrim,

to enter the funnel’s neck.

Wring and pare, squeeze through 

the long sliding descent into Ocean.

Your Beloved’s hand can only be grasped

this palpable moment

as you sniff the clean scent of Him,

witness His heavenly form.

Climb the path to His humble abode.

He’s not there, of course, unless you bring Him.

Why not let Him lead you every step from here on out?

(The only sure means of reaching your goal.)

O child of God, pride sustains your insularity. 

Companionship is a necessity and an incalculable blessing.

                           

The bruising rose

The bruising rose                                                                          

You told the story of an innocent woman

accused of adultery –

tied to a post in the marketplace,

everyone who passed required by law

to cast a stone or some filth upon her ...

which she endured with a noble dignity;

her daughter was brought forth, throwing

not a stone nor filth but, a simple rose ...

and the mother shrieking in agony

as it brushed her cheek.

Let he who is without sin cast the first stone,

You told the crowd in another marketplace.

You, of course, could have cast that stone,

but You have come down, bound Yourself

among the stones and filth

of our marketplaces to endure unjustly

the fateful punishments of being human

and to weigh in Your innocent hands

the culpability of each stone-and-rose-wielding

patron, each laboring, fearful heart.

O child of God, the Beloved is ever merciful.

Protect Him from the bruising rose of your infidelity.

                          (Unpublished)

Kindness

Kindness                                                                                         

I asked for guidance;

You offered silence –

a path not chosen for me,

but walked with me.

The bread of companionship. 

The wine of oneness.

Your Word – so ardently shaped by Your Silence –

how, in good faith, should I now

prefer one to the other?

‘Move toward kindness,’ Rumi said.

The Mandali were kind enough

to accept me as a fellow lover of God

and, years later, daring to hear

the root meaning of that word:  ilk, sort, type –

a kindred spirit to those valiant souls

and, ultimately – improbably – to You.  

O child of God – you, the Christ and the Father are One.

Salvation depends upon the kindness of God.

                                                                                     

                              

I choose angels

I choose angels                                                                            

I began to hear a silvery, tinkling sound

occasionally in my left ear – tiny bells

delicate as if they grace

the anklets and bracelets

of angels hovering near my shoulder.

Their music makes me smile.

Tinnitus – the audiologist diagnosed.

What does he know? 

I choose angels.  
Sent by You to awaken
                                                          

and remind me of Your holy Presence. 

The commonplace mistaken for Your handiwork?  

If I could mistake everything for You,

I’d be that much nearer the Truth.

If I could hear angels everywhere –

I would discover You where You always are.

Haven’t we repeated it endlessly? 

Everywhere . . . and in everything . . . .

O child of God, the worth of anything is determined

by how much closer it brings you to the Beloved.

                           

Sweetheart deal

Sweetheart deal                                                       

You spoke of a hidden treasure.

I began ransacking my house.

Neighbors witnessed the obsessive lunacy –                               

turning convenient arrangements into utter chaos.

Thieves enter my dwelling now,

have a good laugh and go home.

Underneath, we must all be great beings–

else our suffering has no meaning.

Perhaps you’ve found a soul mate

who’s come by a different route

but who has evolved in a similar way. 

Meher Baba is the soul mate of the world,

the Great Strider, flag-bearer,

breaker of the ribbon strung across infinity. 

His journey is your journey.

His journey is your journey.

This Avatar business is a sweetheart deal –

how did I ever sneak into the movie house

and find a seat on the third row?

O child of God, allow Meher Baba to simplify your life –

turning your ten thousand desires into One.

  

                          (from A Jewel in the Dust)

Finding grace

Finding grace                                                                                   

Mehera asked, years ago, why You chose

so barren a place for Your ashram

(and Your Tomb) ... landscape of dust 
and thorns; scorpions, cobras and kraits.

Then, My lovers, You said,

will come only for Me ... nothing else.

These days, You’ve turned

much of my world into dust and thorns --

a bleak, prickly terrain

devoid of sustenance and satiation,

rife with scrapes, stings and venom,  

so that each day, I show up ... only for You

and when side-tracked, return ... only to You,

as the friendly ground shrivels

and the periphery grows wilder,

more and more, finding grace

in the isolation and disparity,

in eccentricity, disillusionment and despair.

O child of God, rejoice when your life becomes a Tomb

in the desolate region of a strange land.

                       (Unpublished)

The tending of the fire

The tending of the fire                                                                     

There’s a fire in the flesh

that must be tended to

and a fire in the wine and a glint of fire

in the ruby of the heart.

Wine’s fire enough, in time,

will sodden and subdue the fiery flesh;

the heart’s ruby steady the drunken gait

and become a lamp unto the path.

But, o child, when the glint in the heart’s stone,

(by the Master’s grace), flares and flames,

honor and nurture this fire –

anything you are called upon to do,

anything that can be done.

This fire is the beginning of revelation

and the path home,

the ancient, scattered remnant

lighting our way inward

towards the Source and the Goal.

O child of God, the appearance of fire is grace

and, also, grace – the tending of the fire.