Oh Meher, I was soaring to new heights and novel places
When You pulled the thread and unraveled the carpet of my existence.
Now the design of my life is all in pieces.
The pattern is fading even beyond memory.I was sitting secure in Your love,
Snug as a bug in a rug,
When You suddenly pulled the rug out from under me,
And left me hanging by a thread over an abyss
littered with discarded carpets that no one wants.Now I am lying in the dust at Your doorstep —
Your lovers are using me as a mat as they cross
back and forth over Your threshold.
Bring out Your divine vacuum cleaner
And sweep away the dust obscuring
the pattern You have woven of my life.The tears weeping from my eyes
Are spoiling the colors of the carpet of love
You have made for me.
All the shades and forms are merging together
Into one shapeless mass without any meaning.Who could stand on such a rug as You've made of my life,
Stained and stinking of wine and smoke,
The pattern shredded beyond recognition?
Only a fool or God would even think of owning
such a ragged cloth.Oh Tony, never sell such a rug as this for any price,
But throw it at the feet of the beggar standing at His door.
Give it away to anyone who glances at it even once,
For the image of His Face has been woven into it
from every direction.-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
For Tony
from David
1-10-96(inspired by a visit to Tony Griss's carpet store)
2
Tears are falling in the garden of Your love.
The rose with its thorns is shooting up
through the soil.
Drunk with the wine of a lover's tears,
Its red blossoms seek the sunbeams
showering from Your face.Clouds gather and rain sweeps over the garden,
The flowers hide their faces
And the lover's heart, pierced with thorns,
Withdraws into its shadowy realm
And is cradled deeply in the arms of Your Silence.Oh Meher, You are in the sigh of each flower
caressed by the wind's fingers ...
Why have You left my heart to wither in this desert?
Its blood is turning into a spray of amber drops,
burning up under Your fierce sun,
Turning into dust and blowing away forever,
carried off into oblivion by the song of the wind.All that's left is the melody of dust blowing away.
The birds have heard that melody and they
sing it out in Your Garden day and night,
from the depths of their hearts.
The lover hears but does not understand
the meaning of this melody.Drawn by its sweet sad notes I linger in
the garden awhile,
Admiring a rose, and, ignorant of the thorns,
I reach forward to touch,
just once,
one of its blood-red petals.Oh Meher, don't deny me a drink
of Your water of life.
I am a weed growing in Your garden
among the roses.
I am pierced by thorns wherever I turn,
searching for Your Light.Oh David, this Garden is a place of wonders,
but never forget that the Gardener Himself
is leading you by the hand
Lovingly, from flower to flower to flower.
The rain is falling on Him as well.
Why not turn to see His beautiful Face —
the Sun
which the garden,
like a mirror,
is reflecting
the Sun
whose Face is the face of every flower
even the flower that is you.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1-31-96
(wandering on the Meher Center during Amartithi)
3
How can I ignore You
You're always on my mind
I cannot eat, I cannot sleep
Without thinking of You.Your inevitable presence
– or shall I say absence –
Spoils every private pleasure.
How I ever got caught up with You,
heaven only knows
But now I can't even breathe
without some part of each breath
echoing Your name.The pain of longing for You
is choking the life out of me.
In truth, I have no life left –
Just scattered remnants of existence
falling away
From the edges of the indelible image
of Your perfect Beauty.For me, You are the Sun that draws
my body, my thoughts, my actions,
and my feelings
Out of their wandering orbits
wherever they are
Through time and space,
toward You,
To be lit up,
radiant, glowing...
And then consumed
in the terrible Fire of Your Indifference.Even now I cannot see where I am going,
But my straying thoughts form a pattern
that always leads me back to You.
What kind of life is this? What kind of love is this?
When will I finally dare to see You
face to face?I am searching for You in this one and that one
And all I catch are momentary glimpses of You,
And the fleeting scent
Of Your intoxicating Wine.I am burning up in my robe of hypocrisy:
I say "You", but I mean "you".
If I cannot talk clearly to You, oh Meher,
How can I speak to anyone in the world?I have worshipped my friends as God
While hiding my face and my actions
from the all-seeing nazar of Your Love.
How could I have been so foolish as to confuse
The part for the whole, the visible for the invisible?Oh David, remember that the Beloved
expresses Himself through every creature,
through every situation.
Your role in this theater of Illusion –
this game of Maya –
Is to find the One behind the many,
the eyes from amidst the outline of the body,
the soul behind the eyes,
the heart hiding behind the screen of the mind,
the Wine hidden in the cup of folly
that God is spilling all over you,
as He raises His glass
in Love
to your soul.----------------------------------------------------------------
2-7-96
(a visitor to the Meher Center has stolen my heart...)