The business of love
I love you more, said Meher Baba,
than you could ever love
yourself.
My self not in the
business of love –
neither payments nor
debts;
my self – the absence of
love
and love – the absence of
self.
Not finding love within
ourselves, we look to other selves –
who look to us across the
great divide.
The love of which my Lord
speaks
offers neither barter nor
bargain –
love not because of what
we might give
(or receive) but what
might empty us,
what might make room, make
room –
make room for Love; make
room for God.
O child of God, what is
this business of love?
Meher says it’s the
essence of your being.
Wrens and sparrows
I write my poetry on a
crust of bread
I found in the bottom of
my pouch,
dropping crumbs along the
path
for the wrens and
sparrows.
I won’t be coming back
this way and no one will
follow
into this particular plot
of trees.
The woods are deep. I’ll write
as long as the light
holds out.
God illumines the path
only one step at a time
and my own torch has been
thrown down.
It’s like a crust of
bread –
the moon above the
horizon.
My mortal existence is a
crust of bread.
This poem is dedicated
to the wrens and
sparrows.
I wish I had more to
give.
O child of God, venture
where there is blitheness
in dissolution; unalloyed
bliss in obliteration.
Too much like death
You lived in
silence. I can’t abide it.
Too much like death. Even while
lying motionless and mute
in the casket
You’ve so lovingly
fashioned for me,
my mind is stubbornly
asking questions,
roaming the known
parameters.
I climbed in willingly
enough.
Made myself
comfortable.
I don’t regret it. But this protracted interment
is as stylized and boring
as any funeral ever was
and still I haven’t the
courage
to clamp down the lid
long enough
for You to sink the
nails.
You came not to teach but
to awaken.
Lucky for me – because I
never seem to learn.
And, instead of holding
onto Your damaan,
being dragged pell-mell
into the Infinite-Eternal,
I hold tightly to the ragged shirttail
of this wanton, roaring
world; the sad
and flustered illusion of
my false self.
O child of God, hold your
tongue and let
Meher’s silence become
your last triumphant shout.
The powers that be
My house is lonely
tonight.
I step into the backyard
–
fenced in, sub-divided;
stars fixed above the
trees,
the moon turning its cold
shoulder.
I feel small,
over-looked, left behind
in the vastness. After a time, I notice
the moon shadows crossing
the lawn –
I am getting
somewhere –
in spite of myself.
The earth turning me,
hurtling me
around the sun, also, on
a journey
toward its ultimate
destiny.
I might seem inert,
broken down,
stuck in an ineffectual
rut but,
eternal forces are ever
rushing me,
in their own sweet time,
toward a rendezvous.
My choice – to have faith
in the benevolence
of the powers that be
or, lack faith and
despair
as I languish behind the
high, sturdy fence
I have erected for
myself.
O child of God, don’t
worry, be happy.
Despair, in any case,
will gain you nothing.
(drawing by Rich Panico)
Enter the desert
Enter the desert a
wanderer,
uncharted among the
dunes,
under the stars; shaped
by pressures
only hinted at,
half-guessed,
gestured toward; suitable
to your nature,
without respite, witness
or glamour –
to be a lover is to go it
alone.
Swaying upon the bridge,
the temptress sings;
the sculptor at the
monolith, hewing away.
Caught up in a terrible
game of words,
the poet grapples for
whatever
endurable term might bare
a slice of the loneliness
that constitutes a human
heart.
Hewing away at it alone –
that’s what we are
and the truth of that
is the truth of God
to be elaborated upon,
the one and only Truth –
God alone exists.
O child of God, brave the
lonely perils;
seek the truth of the One
and Only.
Make good
All my words hang on a
promise I cannot make
and cannot keep – a
vanity of imagination,
breath and blood, if the
promise has no maker;
if the promise has no
keeper.
Shall I continue, o Lord,
to tap out
Your timeworn promise on
my alphabet board?
Grace, love, salvation –
fine sentiments!
but, paper-thin words,
and – through my throat –
without substance or
luminosity;
indistinct stirrings in
the half-light,
the nether-world, the
darkness
of ignorance mixed with
the darkness of faith;
yet, my poems praise the
promise
and the
Promise-keeper! Lord, don’t leave me
twisting wordlessly in
the wind
at world’s end but,
gather me sweetly
in Your arms and make
good, make good,
make good Your
ancient-given promise.
O child of God, what the
Beloved requires of you
is faith, forbearance,
obedience and attempted artistry.
Spoken for
Love, You say, asks no
questions.
My heart’s not yet
speechless
but, my mind’s onto the
truth
that all questions lose
their validity
this side of the veil. To
ask is to break
the silent bond. It’s not
about believing
or not believing,
but about love . . .
or, not loving and the
longing
that’s always there
and the despair that
inhabits
every laugh and stride
and smile,
every social nuance, as
we bide our time,
do what we must, granting
solace,
here and there, to
ourselves and the world
far from the Avatar and
the key.
Though, we are lost, we
are in His hands,
and that is all
the difference . . .
and that is all
the difference.
O child of God, why keep
speaking?
You are already spoken
for.
God’s long shadow
Another journey awaits
us, o pilgrim,
through the broken gate,
the unkempt garden.
Death walks this fine
morning in God’s
long shadow – efficient,
indefatigable servant.
Even Jesus died and those
He detached
from Death’s arm soon
returned
dutifully to resume their
coupled trailing
through the lily-rucked
garden,
the rank and dew-drenched
garden.
The body of Jamshed
arranged in the Tower of
Silence
and the Master distributing
sweet laddoos –
Do not make the dead
unhappy,
Baba scolded, by your
weeping and wailing.
Jamshed was my brother, Meher averred,
but I am Jam Sheth – Death’s Master.
Death has brought Jamshed
to Me.
O child of God, living is
dying by loving.
Only the truly dead are
beyond Death’s grasp.
A hint of why
The Ocean has come again
to tell us we are not
adrift;
(more like a river running,
towards
and away, of urgency and
purpose).
The Ocean has come again,
with embracing, sighs and
gazes,
the wiping away of tears,
to tell us we are not
islands.
The Ocean, Its labyrinths
of Love and endeavor,
vast, breathless depths,
come again
to tell us we have no
shore,
strongest evidence to the
contrary;
no beginning nor end;
enemies
and companions – all are
our very own Self.
The Ocean has come again
to tell us our loneliness
is but a bitter-tinged
drop
in the immeasurable
loneliness of God.
O child of God, such an
import offers a hint
of why Meher lived in
silence.
