The illusion of autonomy

The illusion of autonomy                                                                             
 
Along with saying, forgive me, Lord,
why not add, thank You, thank You?
 
Not only for the pointed-out errors
but for the standing apart from them,
 
the by-His-grace opening of the eyes,
mind and heart, at least in retrospect,
 
to the sins that doom; that once went
undetected and unchallenged;
 
that once were deemed necessary,
even taken to be virtues.
 
Thank You, Lord, for the ripening –
the slow gentle pull of the pure soul
 
up from the muck of illusion;
the ageless apparent journey
 
from stone hardness to fruition to dissolution.
And thank You, Lord, thank You,
 
for being the one witness to my battle,
my only gauge, my helpmate,
 
my guide, my only companion;
my one source of encouragement.
 
O child of God, let go of everything
by letting go the illusion of autonomy. 

Content with God

Content with God                                                                      
 
God bless the lover who takes
his Beloved for granted;
 
who no longer seeks because he has found
and once found never again reaches
 
for that which is always at his fingertips.
Who finds God beside him everywhere –
 
no more probing, testing out of fear
the false comforts of understanding –
 
knowledge instead of faith;
some cheap assurance rather than submission.
 
God bless the lover who shares his path
all along, every moment,
 
content with God as Companion
not as the Goal of the New Life road,
 
who is as disinterested in immediate liberation
as he is in his inevitable destiny.
 
O child of God, the journey is Baba’s business;
your business is to be with Him every moment of that journey.

The ring of truth

The ring of truth                                        
 
Thank You for all You have given me
and all You have taken away;
 
for remembering me
and for allowing me to remember You.
 
Thank You for wisdom’s ripening;
for the dust of the grave;
 
the shards of my poverty; for the rasp
of the world which has sharpened my longing.
 
Thank You for Your name
and the knowledge of Its significance;
 
for the soul’s dogged progression;
the inevitability of the goal;
 
for the human joy and affliction,
the revelation and mystification
 
which leads ultimately to dissolution,
to the unveiling of the indwelling Self and Union.
 
O child of God, the gratitude you’ve expressed
for years has begun to bear the ring of truth.

The only game in town

The only game in town                                                                      
 
Side with the virtuous; battle the others.
Fight the good fight.
 
It’s all part of the game
and it’s the only game in town.
 
Shake your fist; speak truth to power. 
It’s all part of the game
 
and it’s the only game in town.
But when you see the game has you in its grasp,
 
when you see through it, when you give up on it,
when you want desperately out – turn away;
 
cease your resistance – and your participation. 
Turn to the only chance there is
 
(for you and humankind)
and in your deepest humility and helplessness,
 
surrender yourself to the one endeavor worth pursuing,
the one freedom, the one treasure worth the quest.
 
O child of God, this is the game
and it’s the only game in town. 

The whetstone

The whetstone                                                                                 
 
I sought from my Lord daily relief
from the persistent disquiet and shame; 
 
sought absolution and allowance
for my chronic failures,
 
my miserable inadequacy,
until one day my Lord said to me:
 
It was I who hobbled you –
to keep you from straying too far.
 
I cuffed your wrists to keep your hands
out of mischief and folded in prayer.
 
I placed the blinders on – to train your vision
in the one direction you need to go.
 
I plugged your ears to reveal the inner voice.
I built you strange-tongued, odd and solitary
 
to separate you from the seductive crowd
because you belong to no one else but Me.   
 
O child of God, to properly sharpen the blade,
rough and fine-grained must be the whetstone. 

The mercy of His court

The mercy of His court                                                                    
 
If you’re sure of anything in this world,
o child, be sure you are mistaken.
 
When you feel yourself hardening
into one position, take the necessary steps
 
to remove yourself from that easy overlook.
Talk yourself down from the heights
 
to the dust-view of God –
God being not up in heaven
 
but in the field doing His spade-and-hoe work,
seeing everything in His omnipresence
 
at every moment from everywhere.  
To draw nearer to that Truth, o child, and to Him,
 
concede in every judgment,
your ignorance and incapacity;
 
throw yourself and everyone in your ken
upon the celebrated mercy of His court.
 
O child of God, the least, proud thought,
Meher says, veils you from Reality.

(painting by Mark Hodges)

The ancient discrepancy

The ancient discrepancy                                                                    
 
The sun rises, it seems, from the heart,
spilling onto a sky bright sails of hope,
 
invariably to founder upon the day’s living reefs;
tired old bindings to be sure, but ever-new tendrils
 
and the spellbound inertia, the snug-enough shroud.
Evident in the distance between
 
lightning’s flare and the thunder’s roar,
the ancient discrepancy,
 
as I hurtle toward yet another failure –
everyday and the lifetime, the ages-old –
 
the slowly-becoming awareness of how
thoroughly deep go the erected barriers,
 
an integral part, alas, of the structure itself.
The sun rising every morning from the heart
 
to shine upon my impotence and light
beyond me the fair, faraway face of my Savior.
 
O child of God, hopelessness in the New Life
has nothing to do with failure or despair.

Leading with my chin

Leading with my chin                                                                          
 
As an old man now, I aspire
to be somebody who can take a punch –
 
not a speed bag’s wobbly pummeling,
mind you, but a stolid heavy bag full of grit,
 
eye-bolted solidly through a ceiling beam
and not in some gymnasium for anyone
 
to try but maybe a garage or cellar,
collecting dust in the corner but still intact.
 
Somebody who can take a punch if need be
and absorb the blow from any angle,
 
any adversary and not be moved
more than an inch or two off dead center,
 
returning swiftly to a perfect plumbness.
I’d be going through life then leading with my chin,
 
not from haughtiness or spunk
but with poise and a quiet faith,
 
bearing the blows of whatever
rough-housing opponents may cross my path. 
 
To be somebody who can take a punch,
take a punch, take a punch and not hit back.
 
O child of God, aspire to the love that allows
an innocent man to turn his cheek for just one more blow.

Diaphaneity

Diaphaneity                                                                                        
 
There’s no choice, He said.
I’m all you’ve got. 
 
Forgo the negotiations –
you’ve no collateral.
 
Forgo the calculations. 
You’re in over your head.
 
There are no inducements
to any sort of compromise.
 
It’s the falsity of yourself or the truth of no self;
this apparent, ephemeral insubstantiality
 
or the resolute putting of it to a stop.
Grab hold of Me, He said, or go around
 
(around and around) trying to stuff
into your empty pockets fistfuls of diaphaneity. 
 
O child of God, the dream can’t be grasped.
All you have to hold on to is Meher Baba.