Only the mind wants to complicate the natural process.
What arises from emptiness
returns to emptiness.
What is already sacred
cannot be more sacred through prayers or rituals.
Tell me if you can make your gold bowl
more shiny by washing it with soap and water.
* * *
Lotus
if a lotus could grow out of dirt and mud,
if a lotus could rise above the water and blossom,
you too, my dear friend
have the gift to turn your sorrow
into a song;
your pain into a rose garden.
* * *
Herb and Spices
One day
I said to existence:—
There are times,
when you acted like a stepmother to me:
You pinched me in the ears
and threw punches on my head
Like a tennis ball
you bounced me back and forth,
up and down.
You know this is not fairness,
this is not fairness.
Existence looked at me, smiled with her eyes
and whispered:—
Oh my dear! oh beautiful one
Don’t you need some seasonings,
some herbs and spices, some flavors to be fully edible
* * *
The Sun
Why do you grieve, dear one
Why do you grieve
for the candle the wind has blown out?
The wind knows what she is doing.
Step out of your room’s confines and look at
The entire sun shining for you.
* * *
The Road
Remember this:—Journey begins on a road, the road into your heart or the one that takes you to a barber shop. Whichever it is, we need a GPS or a MapQuest or someone to guide us in the beginning. As we grow up and expand, we drop the GPS or the MapQuest because we know where we are going. We become the road or the road becomes us or the road even disappears because we don’t need it any more.
* * *
After We’re Gone
This is life’s highest calling
and deepest purpose and
the most Shining throne:—
To be the beauty, that was here
Before we were born
And the beauty that remains
After we are gone.
* * *
Each Step
Whatever is happening
is happening.
Let not this or that
big or small
bother you, my friend.
Turn your focus to the center . . .
Each step towards the sun
makes you sweet
like the peach kissed by the moon.
* * *
We Walk towards Ourselves
Last night
You said you were out of resources
and had no strength to stay awake.
Dear friend,
How about the thousand moons
You were born with?
How about those brilliant inner suns,
delicious like rosemary bread
Whose fragrance penetrates us
Each day we walk towards ourselves?
* * *
True Lover
He
is a true lover—
who pulls an old thorn
from the heart
and heals the wound
with His sweet song.
* * *
God’s Brilliant Jokes
For uncountable years, Beloved friend,
I have taken myself
very seriously.
I frowned most of the times and
Walked briskly as if from fear.
But ever since I understood God’s brilliant jokes
I forgot everything else and
Started laughing out loud.
* * *
Marry the Mystery
The mind often wants to know
Why this happened the way it happened
and why some lizards are green and some are brown.
But the way the desert speaks to the camels,
The way Oceans shelter crabs,
The way my arms stretch and fold
Is not separate from the language of the universe.
I once had the curiosity to ask
birds how it became possible for them
to fly with such perfection.
They said,
You think so much, my friend
fall in love, marry the mystery itself
and move beyond the laws of the opposites.
The truth is,
Whenever we are not flying
It is the sky that moves within us,
for everything is inside everything.
* * *
Artificial Sweeteners
You are a wild honey
carefully extracted from pure nectar
and the secret of the full moon;
divinely caramelized
with a dense sunlight.
Why do you, then,
crave for artificial sweeteners?
* * *
You and I Are One
beloved
for years, so many years
words have been barriers.
now
i removed the words
and
YOU and I are ONE.
* * *
Start All Over
a thousand suns convened today to sing you, beautiful one.
the song was sublime
enormous was the light.
so enormous that it was almost
impossible to hide even the tiniest
secrets of the heart’s longing.
Who can turn away from this song?
Who can turn away?
the silence was vaster than the sea
and the heart became more beautiful, more shining than ever
where the world awakens to her own essence
like reptiles we take off our old skins
and start all over.
* * *
Combing Love
To be open with you, dear friend, this meeting is magical, this meeting with you is very magical to me. Truth has finally shared herself and I am already sated with the limitation of my own survival skills. Everything I have so far acquired has melted away like salt in a warm water. I can now stand in the storm or walk through a tornado without a protection, I can walk in the torrential rain without the raincoat. Yes. I can now relax and do nothing other than kneading light into your bones, combing love into your hair.
* * *
When You Breathe
most eloquent one:
what is in the words
what is in the silence?
whether you say something
or nothing,
your voice is the light
ripping through light.
Your hands brim with love
and when you touch me
I grow into an ocean-wave.
or a skylark or an oak tree filled with a thousand new birthing.
when you breathe, dear one,
mountains melt and evening breeze
whispers to me:
Dance! Dance my friend without fear!
When you breathe
The desert in me turns into a d
elicious bread,
into a sweet goat milk.
and I awaken into my own fragrance
that has been missing for so many past lives,
when you breathe.
* * *
You Never Say a Word
You move me back and forth back and forth; You make me sing and dance. You touch me and I cry and laugh. I whistle and shout to share your brilliance, to scatter your perfume around. You make me write love poems. When all these happen. You just listen. You never say a word.
* * *
The Burning
A dry tree branch that was flung onto the fire. Itwas popping
And bursting and crackling in great Pain. A tremendous
noise came out of it. When the fire stopped burning
for a while, I asked the tree if it hurts. The tree said:
Burning is not fun at all. It hurts, but what hurts most of all
is the separation from my mother, the source.
* * *
Old Way of Living
when
you are
with the ONE
whose fragrance dismantles
your old way of living,
all you can do is
surrender.
* * *
The One
The one
that fascinates me most
is not who you want to be in the future.
It is who you are
NOW.
* * *
Drum
after so much exposure to the sun and the cold,
after so much expansion and contraction,
beaten and thrashed ruthlessly, Stretched and nailed to the ground
drenched in chemicals,
The raw, moist skin from a sheep, turns into a drum
to make such a sweet sound!
* * *
Tell Me
If I say I am in love,
People won’t understand me.
If I say I am drunk,
The police would suspend my driving license.
If I say I am on fire,
They would call the firefighters.
If I shut up and mind my own business
I don’t have any business
More important than you.
Tell me what to say, dear one.
Tell me.
* * *
Naked
What words can tell this beauty
when you’re in this elegant outfit, dear friend?
What words?
But when you stand naked, fully naked,
the sun herself would envy you.
The moon cannot look at you for
your radiance would dazzle her eyes.
The sky would come down
to spread himself beneath your feet
when you stand fully naked.
* * *
These Eyes
You tell me, most beloved one
What I can do with these eyes.
It matters not if I keep them wide open or shut;
I cannot stop you from entering.
Like rain enters rocks that are cracked
This entrance causes so much ruins.
Superficial borders are dismantled
and boundaries are crushed.
* * *
The Harp
So much happens around me
They shove me
They rock me
They pull and push me.
They scream and shout at me
To get my attention.
Most beautiful one
How can I hear anything else right now
When you play the harp in side me?
* * *
If at All
If at all
I have shared something
that has touched the petals in your heart;
that has brought you to a place of silence
that has reminded you of your own wings
You’ve long forgotten;
It is only inspired by this vastness of light
and grand beauty that
we all breathe every day.
herself through us.
* * *
The Union
While driving on highway 100, homeward last night, I
heard a voice and looked up. The sky was birthing another
full-grown sky. It was too large to see, too large to
reach, too deep to comprehend. The birthing was full
and complete! The Silence was intense. It was not the silence
that comes with a breakdown of a vacuum cleaner.
It was the silence that is born when the sky is wedded to
the earth, when hearts melt in love. Shreds of dark
clouds raced across mindlessly. Stripes of white cloud
sailed freely. Stars blinked, emerged and vanished again
as if playing peek-a-boo. Winds blew rapidly from one
corner to another. These did not bother the silence of
the sky. None of these seemed to worry him at all. He
was just a watcher. He watched all the comings and the
goings without getting involved, without judging or commenting.
As I watched this, something magical happened. The distance
between the sky and
where I stood dissolved. The separation between
the sky and I dissolved. I lost all my senses. The
sky himself disappeared eventually and I disappeared
too. Only this huge space, only this vast silence sang unbroken
and uninterrupted.
* * *
Milk from Cactus Tree
Like milk from cactus tree
Love is pouring around me
And inside me.
All I breathe
All I see
All I touch
All I smell
All I hear
Is That.
How
has this found me, anyway?
I don’t know.
* * *
The Healing Tree Speaks
I have long forgiven the axe as well as the hands that
pushed the axe into my body.
Look at me, my friend. How forgiveness heals fully. Look
deeper at my branches and roots. All the wounds are
gone and what you can see now is only love. Love and
acceptance. Believe me, all my residues are totally gone.
The pain from my grievance and anger is gone. It was
wearing me down and almost killing me more than the
axe has killed parts of me. Yes, that was so tiring. Now I
am totally free because the forgiveness is total. The love
is total. Look how the wound is fully healed. Look how I
am flowering again! Love for everyone. Acceptance for
everyone even for those hurricanes and the axes. Love.
She smiled through her flowers. Tears on her eyes
looked like fresh dews on the grass. Tears of peace and
forgiveness. They rolled down and touched the ground
and turned into diamonds.
* * *
Centipedes and Earthworms
Someone I’ve known
A short while ago said to me that
He is being consmed with a feeling
of worthlessness and guilt and that
the world can do better without him.
I said to him:—
Look how centipedes and earthworms
Insulate the ground in cold seasons,
how the keys on a piano join to make
A great music.
Imagine what you are capable
Of doing. The warmth inside you, if turned on,
Can melt the entire iceberg.
Look how a mint can naturally weave
perfume out of sunlight, waters and soil.
* * *
This Sweetness
This sweetness,
Oh your sweetness, beloved one
Your breath’s sweetness,
your heart’s sweetness . . .
Rises beyond all my understanding
beyond all my sensory experiences.
This sweetness dear one, pulls me away from my bed
In the middle of the night’s wilderness
and leaves me under dark silent heavens