heartsteps » reflection

The Hurt We Embrace

admin — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 18:43:17 +0000

That hurt we embrace becomes joy.
Call it to your arms where it can change.
A silkworm eating leaves makes a cocoon. Each of us weaves a chamber
of leaves and sticks.
Like silkworms, we begin to exist
as we disappear
inside that room.

Without legs, we fly.
When I stop speaking, this poem
will close in silence more magnificent…

I don’t regret how much I love,
and I avoid those who repent their passion.

Hundreds of sweethearts!
I am the lover and the one
lovers long for. Blue, and a cure
for blues, sky in a small cage,

badly hurt but flying.
Everybody’s scandalous flaw is mine.

Rumi

Growing Older

admin — Tue, 03 Aug 2010 05:45:18 +0000

Beautiful are the youth
whose rich emotions flash and burn,
whose lithe bodies filled with energy and grace
sway in their happy dance of life;
and beautiful likewise are the mature
who have learned compassion and patience, charity and wisdom, though they
be rarer far than beautiful youth.
But most beautiful and most rare is a gracious old age
which has drawn from life the skill to take ts varied strands: the harsh advance of age, the pang of grief,
the passing of dear friends, the loss of strength,
and with fresh insight weave them
into a rich and gracious pattern all its own.
This is the greatest skill of all,
to take the bitter with the sweet and make it beautiful,
to take the whole of life in all its moods,
its strengths and weaknesses,
and of the whole make one great and celestial harmony.

Robert Terry Weston

The Peace of Wild Things

admin — Sat, 31 Jul 2010 19:04:11 +0000

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light.
For a time I rest in the grace of the world,
and am free.

Wendell Berry

More Traffic Than You Think

admin — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 17:53:09 +0000

God stood at the shore of Himself and dove in.
How can He do things like that?
Anything goes with
the Big Guy, I
guess.

A divine splash happened,
billions of drops were propelled into space.

I said to a drop shooting past me one night,
“Where ya going, what’s the hurry,
slow down.”

It did, and we talked for a while, that drop and I;
some angels too
came by.

There is more traffic than you think -
cruising.

Teresa of Avila

The Buddhist Sufi

admin — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 16:00:26 +0000

Last night my soul asked a question of existence.
Why are you upsidedown with flames in your belly?
Happy, unhappy, indigo-orange like the sky?

Why are you an off-balance wobbling millstone,
like the Buddhist Sufi, Ibrahim Balkhi,
who was king, beggar, buddha and dervish?

Existence answers, All this was made
by the one who hides inside you.

You are like a beautiful new bride,
quick to anger, stubborn,
hot, naked, but still veiled.

Rumi

A River Runs Through It

admin — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 15:56:02 +0000

I awoke to the confusion of a new day.

The scraps of dreams, memories of yesterday, and new cravings creeping into awareness,

The sun spilling its light over all but the shadows and a cacaphony of sound

From outside and in.

What to make order of? What to let go?

And who makes the choice?

I think I will go down to the river and just watch it flow.

It’s been a long time since I have done something really important.

David Sluyter

Success

admin — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 05:19:16 +0000

The world will tell you that success is achieving what you set out to do. It will tell you that success is winning, that finding recognition and/or prosperity are essential ingredients in any success. All or some of the above are usually by-products of success. The conventional notion of success is concerned with the outcome of what you do. Some say that success is the result of a combination of hard work and luck, or determination and talent, or being in the right place at the right time. While any of these may be determinants of success, they are not its essence. What the world doesn’t tell you – because it doesn’t know – is that you cannot become successful. You can only be successful. Don’t let a mad world tell you that success is anything other than a successful present moment. And what is that? There is a sense of quality in what you do, even the most simple actioon. Quality implies care and attention, which come with awareness. Quality requires your Presence.

Eckhart Tolle

God Would Kneel Down

admin — Fri, 29 May 2009 16:06:05 +0000

I think God might be a little prejudiced.
For once He asked me to join Him on a walk
through this world,

and we gazed into every heart on this earth,
and I noticed He lingered a bit longer
before any face that was weeping,

and before any eyes that were
laughing.

And sometimes when we passed
a soul in worship

God too would kneel down.

I have come to learn: God
adores His
creation.

Francis of Assisi

Taste of Freedom

admin — Fri, 22 May 2009 18:41:48 +0000

"The Wire" by Noel Counihan

On the acorn side of surrender, freedom almost always means what Thomas Merton calls “choice freedom.” It’s about having the means to do what I want, go where I want, say what I want, buy what I want. What the acorn usually doesn’t see is how much these apparently “free” choices are actually dictated by cultural conditioning and the hidden agendas of the lower self, with its compulsive wanting and needing.

Real freedom, according to spiritual teaching, does not mean “choice freedom” but rather “spontaneity freedom,” in Merton’s words. A modern Sufi master, Sara Sviri, cuts to the heart of this with powerful words: “When the heart surrenders willingly to the Divine hold, it becomes free of the manipulations of the lower self. Paradoxically, such freedom is reflected by a letting go of choices.” Quoting an 11th Century Sufi master, she summarizes the classic spiritual teaching: “Man does not become a true servant until he becomes free of all but God.”

Cynthia Bourgeault

The Ocean

admin — Sun, 10 May 2009 15:34:47 +0000

Late by myself, in the
boat of myself,
no light and no land
anywhere,
cloudcover thick.
I try to stay
just above the surface,

Yet I’m already under
and living

within

the Ocean.

Rumi