Birdsong from Inside the Egg

There is an excess

in spiritual searching

that is profound ignorance.

Let that ignorance be our teacher.

The Friend breathes into one

who has no breath.

A deep silence revives the listening

and the speaking of those two

who meet on the riverbank.

Like the ground turning green in a spring wind,

like birdsong beginning inside the egg.

Like this universe coming into existence,

the lover wakes, and whirls

in a dancing joy,

then kneels down

in praise.

Emptiness

Now I return to the text,

And He is with you,

wherever you are.

(Qur'an 57:4)

But when have I ever left it?

Ignorance is God's prison.

Knowing is God's palace.

We sleep in God's unconsciousness.

We wake in God's open hand.

We weep God's rain.

We laugh God's lightning.

Fighting and peacefulness

both take place within God.

Who are we then

in this complicated world-tangle,

that is really just the single straight line

down at the beginning of ALLAH?

Nothing.

We are emptiness.

The Tree of Awe

How does part of the world leave the world?

How can wetness leave water?

Don't try to put out a fire by throwing on

more fire. Don't wash a wound with blood.

No matter how fast you run, your shadow

more than keeps up. Sometimes it's in front.

Only full, overhead sun diminishes your shadow.

But that shadow has been serving you.

What hurts you blesses you.

Darkness is your candle.

Your boundaries are your quest.

I can explain this, but it would break the glass cover

on your heart, and there is no fixing that.

You must have shadow and light source both.

Listen, and lay your head under the tree of awe.

When from that tree, feathers and wings

sprout on your soul, be quieter than a dove.

Don't open your mouth for even a cooooo.

One Song

Every war and every conflict

between human beings has happened

because of some disagreement about names.

It is such an unnecessary foolishness,

because just beyond the arguing

there is a long table of companionship

set and waiting for us to sit down.

What is praised is one, so the praise is one too,

many jugs being poured into a huge basin.

All religions, all this singing, one song.

The differences are just illusion and vanity.

Sunlight looks a little different

on this wall than it does on that wall

and a lot different on this other one,

but it is still one light.

We have borrowed these clothes,

these time-and-space personalities,

from a light, and when we praise,

we are pouring them back in.

Surrender

Joseph is back.

And if you don't feel in yourself

the freshness of Joseph,

be Jacob.

Weep, and then smile.

Do not pretend to know something

you have not experienced.

There is a necessary dying,

and then Jesus is breathing again.

Very little grows on jagged rock.

Be ground. Be crumbled,

so wildflowers will come up

where you are.

You have been stony for too many years.

Try something different. Surrender.

The Treasure's Nearness

A man searching for spirit-treasure

cannot find it, so he is praying.

A voice inside says, You were given

the intuition to shoot an arrow

and then to dig where it landed,

but you shot with all your archery skill.

You were told to draw the bow

with only a fraction of your ability.

What you are looking for

is nearer than the big vein

on your neck. Let the arrow drop.

Do not exhaust yourself

like the philosophers who strain to shoot

the high arcs of their thought-arrows.

The more skill you use,

the farther you will be

from what your deepest love wants.

Stingy Aloeswood

Fear and hurt are lassoes

drawing you through a door.

Lord, Lord, you say weeping.

Green herbs sprout where those tears fall.

Dawn comes; blindness drains away.

Each day is eternity.

Do not avoid your suffering.

Plunge it into the Nile.

Purify your stubbornness.

Drown it. Burn it.

Your body is a stingy piece of aloeswood

that will not let go its healing power

until you put it in the fire.

Now Shams leans near to remind me,

That's enough sourness. No more vinegar.