Oh, Rumi...

For more on Rumi, Mr. Amazing Himself, go here. Or here. 

John O'Donohue...Big Celtic Siiiiiiiigh

I stumbled recently into the gorgeousness that is the poetry of John O'Donohue.  I have been reading this poem aloud to all my classes this past week and now, Shanti Town, it's your turn.  As a primer, the title, "Beannacht" means "blessing", and the word "currach" (found in the second stanza) is a kind of hand-made boat (um...I think). 

Enjoy, Shanti-towners, and please know that all of these things he wishes for all of us, I also wish...for all of you.


Beannacht/Blessing
by John O'Donohue

On the day when

the weight deadens
on your shoulders
and you stumble,
may the clay dance
to balance you.
And when your eyes
freeze behind
the grey window
and the ghost of loss
gets in to you,
may a flock of colours,
indigo, red, green,
and azure blue
come to awaken in you
a meadow of delight.

When the canvas frays
in the currach of thought
and a stain of ocean
blackens beneath you,
may there come across the waters
a path of yellow moonlight
to bring you safely home.

May the nourishment of the earth be yours,
may the clarity of light be yours,
may the fluency of the ocean be yours,
may the protection of the ancestors be yours.
And so may a slow
wind work these words
of love around you,
an invisible cloak
to mind your life.

A Little Late Night Rumi...

Gamble everything for love,
if you're a true human being.

If not,
leave this gathering.

Half-heartedness doesn't fetch
into majesty.  You set out
to find God, but then you keep

Stopping for long periods
at mean-spirited roadhouses.

- Rumi

(Get away from the mean-spirited roadhouses, sweet shanti-towners...it's just a lot of mean drinking and name-calling happening there.  Find yourself a love-shack and bunk down there for the night instead.  I will if you will.)

The heart is a balloon.

Class: 2p-3p, "Flower Hour", Katrina.

Some kind of scramble
Some kind of inside out type of game
Shoulders clench
Invisible muscles
Hold together
Push and grip
If I could breathe there
Place a big balloon there
That might pop
Burst in liquid
And like a sigh it might descend
Just a single impulse
Sliding down the spine

If there is a path to grace
And if I might be allowed to travel it,
Trust me,
I would.

And so, if I am to venture there...
How how how?

Look, this is what I know:
My thoughts mean something--and I mean they mean something about the
meaning of the world around me
My breath means something--and I mean it means something about the
construction of my cells and my ability to be open and available in the
world
My body is not separate from my mind
My mind is not separate from my mind, and
It is possible to release and relent...
It is possible, I mean, to work with the mind and the body
It is possible to contact Being,
Which is something larger than body
Or mind

It means a breathing
It means a deep forgiveness
Like so many handfuls of stones
Being thrown into a pool
It means a wide-open heart
And wide-open eyes
And it means stepping straight right onto the juicy footpath of my life
I know all these things

And still my heart is full of questions.

Upside-Down

Inversion Workshop, 2:30-4:30pm, Mary Dana

(written before class)

Something has washed me this morning
and the building opposite also
is washed
in sun squares and winter wind

I fill notebooks and he reads the paper
we are tired
and impatient with each other
I tell him I hate it
when I feel like he's putting up with me
"No, I love it" he says
and we go back to our papers

Across from us I watch a mother
smiling down at her infant daughter
they just sit like that
across from each other
smiling

It has been called the bliss body
it has been called nirvana and samsara
it has been called the flow and the source
it has been called inspiration
and ecstasy and most often, love,
it has been called
and to some it lies at the center of the heart
and to some it lies in the center of the belly
and to some it is Chi and to some
the Holy Spirit and to some just firings
of several neurons and to some,
it is a mystery which needs no naming

I hunt and peck and hunt and peck
I devour texts and dive in
my body twisted into a hundred red shapes
hoping with each one
I will break the surface of the water
and submerge
and not, no, never
need to come up for air again
(where some bubbles rise
and pop
with small squeals of delight)

If I could fill a suitcase, I think,
with every impediment
drop it at a bus station and walk away...
But just the thought of counting
all the weights to be untied
only makes them seem heavier
more solid
and every knot grows infinitely
more knotted

But (bubbles breaking)
there is another way.
It is not to rid of, to fix, to alter, to repair--
not these constant messages
each one spelling:
Something. Is. Awry.

There is another way