Glasshouse

April 15, 2007 in Poems of Love, Poems of Travel, The Poet's Eyes, The Poet's Tongue...

Peace, one and all…

I’ve been rather busy this week, so I’ve not had time to post anything.  Well, here I am now to correct that oversight!  This evening’s offerings all explore themes of life and love.  Enjoy and may the Beloved grant me purity of intention and strength of love.

Glasshouse

I am afraid.

Afraid to let go,
Afraid to grow beyond the narrow glasshouse
I have built around my Self.

And, because I am afraid,
The light of the Beloved Sun
Is thrown into strange fragments
Upon the mirror of my heart.

Sometimes I see the sun,
And like all plants,
I sprout forth shoots,
Green and pleasant.

Sometimes, clouds of narrow breadth
Turn me away from that sun,
And those green shoots shrivel
In sickened dilemma.

The mistake comes in not seeing things aright.
Here then is a heart’s truth:
The weather is not mine to order.

I am charged merely with husbandry –
To till the waiting earth of my soul,
That I might gently coax maturity
From its tender bosom;

That I might one day grow beyond my borders
And leave all need for glasshouses behind me.

I Know Why

Beloved, I know now why
You have robbed me of sleep.

I have been wakened to face my shadow-self,
That me-ness in half-light
That I have built through these long years.

That is why my nights have been lengthened
And my days made grey.

This ego of mine,
Frightened and alone in life’s silent corridor
Must at last hear
Of death and resurrection,
Of fear and hope.

That is why, Beloved,
You show me graveyards
Amidst these waking hours;
for I must taste a thing to know it,

and in tasting,
theses conventions of me
must drain that hoary cup to the last drop.

Only then
Once the grave’s peace has laid itself
Upon this outward face in stillness,
Can Love’s resurrection
At last begin
And I can sleep contentedly once more.

Linking Hands across the Table

We link hands across the table
You and I,
And worlds collide,
Universes touch.

My friend, in truth,
Meeting others is always like this.

I am born,
A world entire,
A realm called forth from the void.
And so it is with you.

Each heart has its own sacred centre,
Its own pilgrims’ kaaba.

Thus, my friend,
If you truly seek ‘the Lord of this House’,
Do not count lightly
Even the least of His signs.

Let each be their own Jerusalem,
Their own Ganges –

And when you seek communion
With the living heart of another,
Speak to that centre,
Reach out towards that masjid al-aqsa,
Lest the Beloved find you
In anything other than Love

Whilst my son slept

I look at my son sleeping
And Love stirs in my heart,
As all my hopes and dreams
Spill forth in effervescence.

I am so quickened by the thought of him,
And all the bright potential of his young soul,
That I transported entirely
Elsewhere.

Beloved, this is how You see us,
As children sleeping,
Tossing and turning towards wakefulness.

Sometimes our dreams are bright
And the light of hope shines forth upon our faces,
Like dreams of a garden in sunlight.

Sometimes our dreams are dark,
And fretfully we turn
This way and that,
Seeking the soothing presence
Of Your hand upon our brows.

O Beloved, call me by my right name,
As You wake me gently from sleep,
And let us walk together in the bright morning sun.

Ma’as salama,
Abdur Rahman