Listen, O dearly beloved!
I am the reality of the world, the center of the circumference,
I am the parts and the whole.
I am the will established between Heaven and Earth,
I have created perception in you only in order to be the
object of my perception.
If then you perceive me, you perceive yourself.
But you cannot perceive me through yourself,
It is through my eyes that you see me and see yourself,
Through your eyes you cannot see me.
Dearly beloved!
I have called you so often and you have not heard me
I have shown myself to you so often and you have not
seen me.
I have made myself fragrance so often, and you have
not smelled me.
I am the savor of food, and you have not tasted me.
Why can you not reach me through the object you touch
Or breathe me through sweet perfumes?
Why do you not see me? Why do you not hear me?
Why? Why? Why?
Note: The above is not really a poem as originally written in Arabic, but part of a chapter from ibn Arabi’s Kitab al-Tajalliyat (The Book of Theophanies). However, since it was translated in the form of a poem by Henry Corbin inCreative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn ‘Arabi, it has become justly famous.
My second reading of poetry on YouTube, a recital of a Love Poem – Gladly Then Did the World Arise. The poem is also posted below the video.
Love Poem
Gladly then did the world arise
By that one mighty word of power… Love!
From any other word quite apart
It rejoices in the willing heart
And binds the planets to their skies
And shines in You the brighter to my eyes
Night, come bring the dippers and Orion’s belt
To gird the firmament and bind us to His boundless will
That my heart, which has never felt such sentiment
May feel it then the deeper still
Give it not to chance then, nor say instead ’twas fate
That we have met in time who might have met too late
In the understanding of two hearts that may for earlier years amend
As our time flows like a river, unfelt til journeys end
Teacher
Like the silver trail of the snail
I found the path you had made for me
I almost missed it in my urgency
thought its thread of light a chimera
… But it was my vision that was narrow
allowing only a glimpse of what could be
Unlike the trail of a snail the way broadens
its sparkle unfolding into a blanket of magic
I foresee it widening until there is no trail
and everywhere I walk will be with you.
This daydream of Existence
fills itself continuously
with the needy
like a rain-barrel
in the monsoon season-
while all the while-
the barrel bobs
upon an Ocean!
That is the great puzzle
of the human heart
that even our Saints
have given up trying
to solve.
Shun Yuan, the author of the lovely poem above, is a student of the Tao (also called the Way), an Adept of Taiji martial arts, and the primary subject of Robert Shaeffer’s truly remarkable forthcoming book, 10 Methods of the Heavenly Dragon. I asked him to enhance the experience of the poem with his commentary, which is below:
My Journey
As a novice I was convinced that I was living in darkness. I was “looking” everywhere for “enlightenment”. I knew intellectually that I was “in the forest of the Tao” and might even have had a vague sensation of the forest all around me, but this was drowned out by the insistent urge to “keep looking”, caused by the notion that “I haven’t found it yet”. Even while making progress forwards I berated myself for the fact that it was “stumbling” and blamed my own “blindness” for the state of darkness I was living in. If only I could “see” the truth!
It was through an entirely unexpected avenue that the first hint of awareness came. As far from my preconceived notions as my foot is from my eyes. So strange and unexpected it was that it felt as if it had happened by “pure luck”. I did not then have the understanding that my every step and my stumbling gait were intimately part of my foot meeting that root. Even less did I understand the significance of a seed falling in a certain place ages ago and the effect on the growth of the tree that the passage of the seasons ever since had had. Nor did I have the experience of long years of reliance on the Tao to recognize that these moments of magnificent good fortune are all around and demonstrate the abundance of the Tao.
Stopped in my tracks, stillness came to me then at that perfect moment. I still name it a magnificent gift!
Penetrating deep into me in that quiet state, yet another blossoming of awareness, yet again through an entirely unexpected but intoxicating way. Then suddenly the life of the forest is revealed all around me and in that same instant I gaze upon the shining star which had always been there for the eye to see, had my head not been lowered to the dirt looking for “something precious”.
The Methods
In the physical methods of my Order, one talks of three “levels” or perhaps more correctly “modes” of work. The tree represents the first mode called the “fixed way”. Novices spend a lot of time working on their physical structure. The exercises are strictly defined and “feeling wooden” is a very common statement to hear from them.
After some time, the body learns to relax into the new form which it is taking on. The movements become much looser and more fluid. This “living way” is represented by the leaping stag.
Ultimately, one sheds any notion of a predetermined form and allows the energy to flow freely. This “changing way” is represented by the light of the star.
Posted by darvish 
The Poetry of Life
March 5, 2013Love is the poetry of life
Gratitude its prose
Kindness the sentences
In patience composed
Prayer is the syntax
As Heaven knows
Be silent then, or
Speak truly
As the moon does
As the river flows
As each breath
Of our life goes
And each day
Of loving kindness
Is better than
The one before
And life itself
Becomes a poem
Until our last breath
And the farther shore
- Irving Karchmar, Copyright 2013