Good news

Good news

                                                                                              

The good news is God supplies our every need.

The bad news is sometimes, we need deprivation,

heartache, grief, failure, pain.  O lovers!  

I don’t know what I am talking about!

But, I keep talking because somebody

is putting words into my mouth

and if I can’t trust that somebody

then, who can I trust?

So ... I let it ride – all or nothing –

the spinning wheel and the bouncing ball

and this is my path –

sure of nothing, steeped in the lore,

living off the tantalizing possibilities

and the blessed assurance

the goal has already been won,

in fact, the journey has never begun

and here we are again –

playing God’s game.

O child of God, rejoice –

playing your role in God’s game.

                    

The cross is always waiting

The cross is always waiting                                                         

                              

People say he’s a dead ringer for Jesus of Nazareth

but, like Mary’s spouse, he’s just a regular Joe,

God taking him aside one day

and laying the Truth on him – 

You must bear the cross all the way to Golgotha; 

lie naked on the timbers; endure the spikes 

and thorns, the spear’s thrust, the bitter gall. 

You may tarry and stray along the way;

lay down your cross, at times;

wander wherever you will,

but know the cross is always waiting

to be taken up, fitting snugly onto your shoulder.

The cross will not be done with you

until you are done with it –

riding it high on a hill,

angel-accompanied,

pell-mell into the cloud-concealed

and far-flung regions of heaven.

O child of God, open yourself to the terrible

mystery of annihilation and surrender.

Pilgrimage awaits

Pilgrimage awaits                                                                            

Pilgrimage awaits and begins

but, you’d rather linger over the back fence

gossiping with neighbors and, after nightfall,

study the erotic silhouettes

on the pulled-down shades, taking note

of the local comings and goings

and the garden needs tending 

and the daily paper, the shrubs sculpted,

the lawn trimmed.  Pilgrimage awaits

and begins just down the road

but, your house is crowded with characters

and plot devices of your own choosing,

your footsteps heavy on the well-worn boards

as you move from room to room

in a vacant house crowded with characters

behind the curtains, window to window,

door to breezeway, pillar to post with your number

pasted on it as the traffic drifts by out front

in the street which leads to the open road

where pilgrimage awaits and begins if ever

you are moved to vacate the premises

of countless distractions and entertainments.

O child of God, take up arms against yourself.

Surrender has nothing to do with passivity.

                           

Whatever truth or ruse

Whatever truth or ruse  
                                                                  

You once placated the mast Mohammed

with a ruse – the posing of a village woman

as his long-abandoned wife –

to salvage his faith in You,

saying of the mast afterward,

“He’s like a child.  Unless you

become like a child,

you cannot enter the Path.”

O Father of Mercy, I am Your child, 

ready to accept whatever truth or ruse

You offer to prod and goad,

undermine and coerce,

reward and punish – to channel me

through the gate without a quiver,

equivocation or turning back.

Whatever truth or ruse will do the trick,

peeling me away from the false self,

this entrancing realm of Illusion;

entering with me into that holistic region

for which You are a living witness, an example of,

where nothing is false;

where everything is true.

O child of God, believe in the One Who spent

every moment of His life leading you toward the goal.

                              

Song link -- Love is not for the fainthearted (4) (click on title)

Love is not for the fainthearted (4)

Love is Not for the Faint-hearted                                         capo 5

C                  F        Am                      G

A kiss and a stone right between the eyes   

infinite suffering, infinite bliss

silent for a lifetime, serving all mankind   

C               Am            F              C

no greater love hath a man than this

C              F               Am        G

working alone at the top of a hill

carrying the burden of the world around

in the blaze of the sun, in the midnight’s chill

C                         Am                 F             C

and the rivers of mercy come a tumblin’ down                (Chorus)

          F           C               Dm7  C                

Love is not for the faint-hearted

     F           C                Dm7           F

its born of strength and true understanding

C          F       Am                 G    F                          C

Love is not       for the faint-hearted   its born of strength

                 Dm7       F                C         F     C    G       

and true, oh, true understanding

C               F       Am       G

My sweet Jesus was crucified   

Hallaj was hanged from a scaffold high

they stoned poor Stephan ‘cause he loved his Lord

C                Am                      F                C

many’s the martyr who have met their reward       (Chorus)

 C          F        Am               G

Love is gentle as a morning breeze 

sooner or later it’ll bring you to your knees

it’ll make you weep, oh-oh, it’ll make you moan              

C                       Am                      F           C

and it won’t let you up until your pride is gone

C                        F              Am                               G

when somebody hurts you, have to turn the other cheek                            

return love for hate and learn to forgive

It’s not sentimental, pretty words to speak;

C                 Am              F          C

it’s the only honest, true way to live                     (Chorus)

Bowing down

Bowing down                                                                                   

When a saint shuts and opens his eyes,

it’s an involuntary bowing down

to the Lord of his heart;

his every breath a prayer;

his heartbeat a drumbeat,

his pulsing blood a trumpeting

of the Spirit’s emergence

from the tangle of muscle,

blood and bone of brain and body.

Involuntary, because a saint

has foregone

determinations and judgments,

left behind faith itself, grasping

the hem of Reality and responding

the only way allowed him – annihilation  

and – while in the body -- servitude;

bound by vows no longer

made in ignorance but, bound

deep in the body no longer his own,

to obeisance and praise,

to obeisance and praise, to obeisance

and praise to the boundless One.

O child of God, bow until bowing becomes

involuntary, intrinsic to your being.

                             

Digging our own graves

Digging our own graves                                                                  

Everyone requested an official undertaking.

We were issued shovels -- Dig your own graves.

I set diligently about my work, surprised

at the number who ignored the edict.

Or, who abandoned their shovels

at the first backache or blister;

who now pass their days idly.

Some organize workshops and lectures

on the necessity of discernment and the art

of grave-digging.  Others dutifully attend.

Distracted by perturbations, desires and moods,

I haven’t the suitable discipline for the task

and the ground thick with roots and stones,

but, my shovel seldom lies idle –

that edict is the only instruction I’ve been given

and I mean to take advantage of it.

I’ve selected a gravesite far from the commons.

There are others near me, laboring steadily –

graves tidily dug.

We are the eccentrics, our neighbors not quite

grasping the necessity and intensity of our efforts.

O child of God, work for the night is coming.

What’s left undone will be added to the morrow.

                             

The down payment

The down payment                                                                         

If you become a world leader,

the eyes of the multitude will be upon you.

If you follow God, few will notice . . .

as you slip from the paved road

onto the rough shoulder and into the woods.

You’ll go in alone and deep

and no one will follow.  This poem

is not for the multitude,

who do not care to hear it. 

And if it reaches no one,

my reward will be none the less. 

The down payment is sufficient –

an affirmation and a re-phrasing of the promise;  

an affirmation ... and a reiteration of the promise.

O child of God, prepare for a lonely journey.

Whoever goes to God goes alone.

                          

The heart's sovereignty

The heart’s sovereignty                                                                 

Mary of Bethany broke the alabaster box

and with spikenard anointed Jesus,

some of His disciples grumbling at the expense

but, Jesus said, She hath wrought a good work.

O child, an imperfection of character

is the desire to be perfect

and a detriment to the path of surrender. 

To covet virtue is a sin – for covetousness is a sin.

Desire, instead, to be obedient and humble.

Non-attachment is the back road to perfection.

Desire for perfection leads through a labyrinth

of pride, shame and self-involvement

while acceptance of imperfection

constitutes a stirring turn toward surrender.

O lover, spill innocently, like Mary,

the precious oil; anoint the head of Jesus

and be marked forever as a lover

and loyal subject of the heart’s holy sovereignty.

Song link -- Chasing the Thief -- (click on title)

Chasing the Thief                                                         capo 2

C                                                                 F

God only knows where this path may lead     I’m not from around these parts

tracking a handsome stranger down              Who once stole my heart  

might’ve made a wrong turn somewhere,           I can’t see that far ahead

C                                             F                                      C   F          C        

but I believe every holy word my Beloved One, never said, never said.

F                       G                      Am                                   F

so I’m out here    on the trail        stumbling around in the dark

                   C                          G   C                           F

chasing after the Thief       Who stole my heart

C                          G                         C     

chasing after the Thief Who stole my heart

C                                                     F

there’s a danger in this hopelessness    Truth can bring on despair

the path of love is suffering               not one soul gets spared

If you ventured near my room last night you might have heard me crying

C                                                       F                                   

when my Beloved whispered to me – I know how much it hurts

                                 C        F                                  C

and how hard you’re trying             how hard you’re trying

F                              G                                     Am                                       F

I got lost on the     road to glory,      every arrow seems to miss the mark  

C                          G       C                       F

chasing after the Thief       Who stole my heart

C                          G                          C     

chasing after the Thief Who stole my heart

C                                             F

Quaking in my unworthiness         His light revealing every scar

when my Beloved whispered to me      I take you the way you are

and I can’t tell you what good it’s done    impaled upon my broken vows

C                                                         F                                                 

whatever difference love might make       that’s the difference of me now,

   C        F                                C     

the difference of me now      the difference of me now

F                            G               Am                                         F

So break open that     holy wine       this is where the new life starts

C                          G   C                           F

chasing after the Thief       Who stole my heart

C                          G                          C     

chasing after the Thief Who stole my heart

Chasing the Thief (take 2)

The gum of zikr

The gum of zikr                                                                                

Erase yourself or help out

by letting go the string

that conducts the tinny voice

of childhood and your subsequent stages,

accumulated impressions, moods

and prejudices to the living moment,

constituting the pernicious illusion

of who you were, are and will be;

sever the continuity of personal history

from the objective present, (turning

towards the image and/or

name of the Beloved), refusing to enable,

from moment to moment,

that ghost of a mischief-maker,

letting it drift away like a lost kite,

evanesce into an ethereal sky,

amounting to the nothingness

it always was and always is,

letting go of the string,

letting go of the string,

letting go again and again

and still yet again of the string.

O child of God, take up the gum of zikr

and rub yourself out. 

                         
                     

The transparency of silence

The transparency of silence                                                           

The other night, I attended a play. 

The emcee asked everyone to please

turn off their cell phones.  It took me

fifteen minutes to race home and turn off mine. 

By the time I got back I had missed

the entire first act.  O child of God!

Beware of words!  They have a tendency

to become misshapen and entangling,

especially when followed

to their razor-sharp extremes.

Blindly obedient be to the Master, but

not to His words.  Perhaps, that distinction

is one reason He did not speak, offering instead

the wholeness and transparency of His silence.

 

Words are for this weighty realm, the known

and the tried.  They lose their way entering

the regions of the ethereal and the divine.

Silence – His silence -- is an opportunity

for the heart to exert its authority over words

and over the tireless chattering of the mind.

O child of God, never betray your heart’s wisdom

for even the most sacred accumulations of words.