That stone, domed room

That stone, domed room

Bring Him to the door by gathering
your hand into a fist; pound until

it sifts right through - proving how
insubstantial is the veneer of existence

as if gaping holes might be
left in it by the next hard rain.

Thinnest I've found is in the Tomb,
hovering between lover and the Beloved

and what fills the gaps is that
(of which I know so little)

to which the word love might apply.
If ever I return to India it will be only

to that stone, domed room,
hoping to leave outside everything else

and rejoice beyond the world's grasp
and power to ever touch me again.

O child of God, be a man without substance
and fall undetected through the cracks.

Dream house

Dream house

Each morning I build my dream house
on a narrow spit in the great blue sea,

a citadel rising and shining
along the length of the day.

Each night, the tide turns, invades the shore -
everything uprooted, pulled asunder

by the flooding waters.  I observe the ruination
and, with canny clarity, the prejudice

and error, the insularity and pride with which
I had stood sure-footed by the light of day.

Curled up and trembling in the dark,
from my heart's incontestable bottom,

I call Your name, Your name, Your name
until a light breaks over the horizon -

Your presence, a bulwark again the blows
of the overwhelming sea.

I arise on Your assurances, for another
morning prayer, another whole-hearted,

arduous day of labor upon the house of my dreams
upon that narrow spit in the great blue sea.

O child of God, doubt yourself and trust Meher.
Dissolution is opportunity; obliteration - absolution.

                         

Baltic Avenue

Baltic Avenue

You took God to be your father
and never grew up.  O child!

You took the phrase sufficient grace
and now operate under the assumption

of getting something for nothing,
though the evidence of a lifetime

points in a different direction.
Offered the jewel of infinite worth

you keep haggling God for a better price.
You parse the ransom note and refuse to pay.

You inhabit an old shoe on Baltic Avenue
while your opponent runs the rest of the board.

Still, you strategize and maneuver.
Maybe you'll make it around again.

You could parlay two hundred dollars
into a vast fortune - you're sure of it -

if only you could pass Go
one more time.

O child of God, the price of salvation is your life.
How much will it be worth lying in your grave?

A vital forfeiture

A vital forfeiture

Gain heaven by losing your faith -
in the brief, the conjectural,

the untrustworthy pursuits
to which you habitually pledge your life.

To reach out to God (the teachings suggest)
you must first cut off your hands.

To embrace Him, you must
sever your arms at the shoulder.

Love and life eternal
entail a vital forfeiture,

a timely, incremental
and unmourned death.

Drown in the river by ceasing
to grab hold of the opportune

flotsam and jetsam you judge
to be exactly what you lack;

which you pray will keep you afloat
until that fabled salvation drifts within arm's length.

O child of God, gain heaven by losing faith
in everything but God.

                         (Unpublished)

The unlit wick

The unlit wick                                                                                           

I search the world for light and warmth

while, apparently, my heart is made of tallow;

no way or will on earth or within to spark the unlit wick,

but You promise over lifetimes

adversities and satiations, acquiescence

and perceptions will scrape away the crust

and expose the whole ball of wax;

its absolute vulnerability to flame and dissolution.

When ignorance comes from accumulated wisdom;

when love cleaves from romance and desire;

when heartache reveals its inherent beauty;

when grief becomes a humble dismantling

of the false, by grace will the interior candle be lighted,

the veils catch, the whole tinderbox house go up in flames.

O child of God, you seek light and warmth.

The Godman is the bearer of the torch.

Down to earth

Down to earth                                                                                  

It’s raining like a steady reminder.

It takes you down a notch –

the dampening, the quieting,

the dimming of the day.

Yesterday you soaked up the sun,

sprinting in its clarity and warmth

unencumbered along the shore.

Now clouds overhead, distant thunder;

it takes rain, each drop a sting, a spur, a tiny fetter,

an eroding of the momentary stature,

to bring you down to earth,

to bring you around to your senses.

Don’t cozy up to this world.   

Fidelity and stability aren’t in its nature.

The best it will do is tease you with glimpses

of immortal beauty, with twinges of love

and then, open up a grave.

The rain will let you in on the secret –

let you listen a while to its pelting

the lid of your casket.

O child of God, hope and despair –

get not soaked to the bone by either one.

The evidence of solitude

The evidence of solitude                                                                         

So much time You spent this advent in strict seclusion,

apparently to end our strict seclusions –   

the evidence of solitude lifelong and (we’re taught) aeons longer;

in the shade and marrow of this house of bones –

‘til You get a foot in the door promising to swing it wide

to the multitudes; to ecstasy and sorrow;

to death and decay; to Self; to God. 

You intervened – constant Companion;

working Yourself into exhaustion to change the equation.

Where once were two – self on one side,

universe on the other – now there’s an indistinct,

yet powerful, volatile third – a method and option opened

to penetrate and redeem the reclusive,

drop soul nature of every human being.

O child of God, all He’s asking

is that you share creation with its Creator.

O wayfarer

O wayfarer                                                                                                         

You ordered aristocratic Norina,

much to her humiliation,

to return, again and again,

to the ship’s Captain posing

the same question each time –

when shall we arrive?

Courteous, at first, annoyed and then irate,

he banned her, at last, from the bridge,

judging the Princess to have, somewhere

along the voyage, lost her mind.

A lesson in humble submission for Norina –

(and for every lover thereafter)

but, also, something more, sinking deeper

into our bones and blood and it’s this –

the Captain commands the ship –

plots the course, schedules the arrival,

knows precisely when and how

the destination should be reached.

Absurdity, sheer lunacy are our fears, inquiries,

gestures, inputs, urgencies and desires.

Lay back, o wayfarer.  Embrace and endure in silence,

the remainder of your lonely voyage home.

O child of God, so many lessons from the One

Who did not come to teach.

The gazelle

The gazelle

God's love for me (the teachings say)
is like the love of a father for his son.

But, also like the love
a lion has for the gazelle.

Timid, vulnerable, harmless, one day
the gazelle will become the lion -

after it has been chased down,
torn limb from limb and devoured.

The teachings advise the gazelle -
stop running; stop evading; stop postponing

the inevitable.  Turn and hurry
towards the dauntless pursuer,

towards those mighty, terrible jaws.
Unless you want to go on and on running -

fragile, quick, easily-spooked gazelle -
from your destined encounter with the king.

O child of God, you speak of love
as if you knew the meaning of the word.

                       

Loophole

Loophole

This constant inquiry is my way of digging in my heels

against the pull of fate, the sweep of time,

the soft corruption of flesh.  It’s my abandonment

of the fleeing, empty-handed moment before it abandons me;

an attempt to stay where I am – in my timeless head –

and not be ushered impassively through the channel

God intends, which looks a whole lot like

(and the teachings confirm) annihilation.

Whatever my claims of noble intentions, fidelity and devotion,

it’s a sad, doomed search for a loophole which will nullify

the whole arrangement, negate the necessity

of my suffering, death and non-existence.

O child of God, to surrender is to step

light-footed toward your own eradication.