The Epic of Sadness

Your love taught me to grieve
and I have been in need, for centuries
a woman to make me grieve
for a woman, to cry upon her arms
like a sparrow
for a woman to gather my pieces
like shards of broken crystal

Your love has taught me, my lady, the worst habits
it has taught me to read my coffee cups
thousands of times a night
to experiment with alchemy,
to visit fortune tellers

It has taught me to leave my house
to comb the sidewalks
and search your face in raindrops
and in car lights
and to peruse your clothes
in the clothes of unknowns
and to search for  your image
even…..even…..
even in the posters of advertisements
your love has taught me
to wander around, for hours
searching for a gypsies hair
that all gypsies women will envy
searching for a face, for a voice
which is all the faces and all the voices…

Your love entered me…my lady
into the cities of sadness
and I before you, never entered
the cities of sadness
I did not know…
that tears are the person
that a person without sadness
is only a shadow of a person…

Your love taught me
to behave like a boy
to draw your face with chalk
upon the wall
upon the sails of fishermen's boats
on the Church bells, on the crucifixes,
your love taught me, how love,
changes the map of time…
Your love taught me, that when I love
the earth stops revolving,
Your love taught me things
that were never accounted for
So I read children's fairytales
I entered the castles of Jennies
and I dreamt that she would marry me
the Sultan's daughter
those eyes..
clearer than the water of a lagoon
those lips…
more desirable than the flower of pomegranates
and I dreamt that I would kidnap her like a knight                                                      

and I dreamt that I would give
her necklaces of pearl and coral
Your love taught me, my lady,
what is insanity
it taught me…how life may pass
without the Sultan's daughter arriving

Your love taught me
How to love you in all things
in a bare winter tree,
in dry yellow leaves
in the rain, in a tempest,
in the smallest cafe, we drank in,
in the evenings…our black coffee

Your love taught me…to seek refuge
to seek refuge in hotels without names
in churches without names…
in cafes without names…

Your love taught me…how the night
swells the sadness of strangers
It taught me…how to see Beirut
as a  woman…a tyrant of temptation
as a woman, wearing every evening
the most beautiful clothing she possesses
and sprinkling upon her breasts perfume
for the fisherman, and the princes
Your love taught me  how to cry without crying
It taught me how sadness sleeps
Like a boy with his feet cut off
in the streets of the Rouche and the Hamra

Your love taught me to grieve
and I have been needing, for centuries
a woman to make me grieve
for a woman, to cry upon her arms
like a sparrow
for a woman to gather my pieces
like shards of broken crystal

Nizar Qabbani, translated by Diaa Hadid

A Mixed-Breed Apple

What colour am I? How does this go with the description? :s
Could someone please explain this for me?

A MIXED BREED APPLE

A little mixed-breed apple,
half red, half yellow,
tells this story.

A lover and beloved get separated
Their being apart was one thing,
but they have opposite responses.

The lover feels pain and grows pale.
The beloved flushes and feels proud.

I am a thorn next to my master's rose.
We seem to be two, but we are not.

[RUMI BRIDGE TO THE SOUL]

Rumi replenishes ...

Now I am sober and there's only the hangover and the memory of love. (Rumi)

Sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment. Cleverness is mere opinion, bewilderment is intuition. (Rumi)

When you do things from your soul you feel a river moving in you, a joy. (Rumi)

Silence is an ocean. Speech is a river. When the ocean is searching for you, don't walk into the language-river. Listen to the ocean, and bring your talky business to an end. (Rumi)

This is love: to fly toward a secret sky, to cause a hundred veils to fall each moment. First to let go of life. Finally, to take a step without feet. (Rumi)

The minute I heard my first love story I started looking for you, not knowing how blind that was. Lovers don't finally meet somewhere. They're in each other all along. (Rumi)

-The Gift of Water

Every object and being in the universe is a jar overflowing with wisdom and beauty, a drop of the Tigris that cannot be contained by any skin. Every jarful spills and makes the earth more shining, as though covered in satin. (Rumi)

What is the body? That shadow of a shadow of your love, that somehow contains the entire universe. (Rumi)

Every tree and plant in the meadow seemed to be dancing, those which average eyes would see as fixed and still. (Rumi)

When I am with you, we stay up all night. When you're not here, I can't go to sleep. Praise God for those two insomnias! And the difference between them. (Rumi)

You are the deep innerness of all things, the last word that can be spoken. To each of us you reveal yourselves differently: to the ship as coastline, to the shore as ship. (Rumi)

This discipline and rough treatment are a furnace to extract the silver from the dross. This testing purifies the gold by boiling the scum away. (Rumi)

My comment:

Now I am sober and there's only the hangover and the memory of love.

Your Character and You

hubpages.com/hub/Your-Character-and-You

Man looks in the abyss, there’s nothing staring back at him. At that moment, man finds his character. And that is what keeps him out of the abyss.u201D; — Hal Holbrook, Wall Street

What is the abyss but a dark hole in existence in which nothing is and nothing escapes. This would be an equivalent to a black hole yet this black hole exists in our minds. A more real version of the abyss is something physical called a mirror. Many times someone looks into a mirror and does not recognize what they see or like the image they see. We often look into the abyss when we may be lost in a situation or even in ourselves.

We are forced to become someone. We are forced to do something about it. We are forced to develop character. Character is what we are defined by and who we appear to be in the eyes of others and of ourselves.

All too often we attempt to be someone else in order to make other happy with the character they perceive to be you. This will lead you down a path to utter and total confusion and unhappiness. There is a voice in your head. Some rarely listen to it and others have never even heard it. This voice speaks to you each day, helping you along your way and determining the right decisions which ultimately make up the idea of who you are in the eyes of others and of yourself. This voice is always correct as opposed to you wanting to do everything on your own.

Listen to this voice, learn from this voice, and you will always stay out of the abyss.

Happy New Year All

The transition of 31st December to 1st January is merely a change of the calender, the entire novelty of a New Year being in its metaphorical change. Lets pray that the Change is for the better, and lets aim to ensure that betterment in our own lives! A very Happy New Year to all of you! :)

Lets tango

It's amazing how you can speak right to my heart
Without saying a word, you can light up the dark
Try as I may I could never explain
What I hear when you don't say a thing.

The smile on your face lets me know that you need me
There's a truth in your eyes saying you'll never leave me
The touch of your hand says you'll catch me whenever I fall
You say it best... when you say nothing at all.

All day long I can hear people talking out loud
But when you hold me near, you drown out the crowd (the crowd)
Try as they may they could never define
What's been said between your heart and mine.

CHORUS X 2

(You say it best when you say nothing at all
You say it best when you say nothing at all...)

oh...
The smile on your face
The truth in your eyes
The touch of your hand
Let's me know that you need me...

CHORUS

(You say it best when you say nothing at all
You say it best when you say nothing at all...)
The smile on your face
The truth in your eyes
The touch of your hand
Let's me know that you need me...
(You say it best when you say nothing at all
You say it best when you say nothing at all...) 

Its time like this, when the soul begins to sway with steps that float over those clouds that enclose torrents of emotions; when the eyes gleam brighter than stars, when the lips curl more naturally than the rainbow, when the voice brings with it faint traces of dew, when the senses get so engrossed in that delicate touch of the fingers that the only life seems to exist through that touch.

Its time like this, when I immerse in those eyes yet again, that belong to a different world of different space time coordinates altogether.......

Ramblings ....

Its just a random flow of thoughts and I jot it down as it is. Please don't look for any coherence, for life doesn't usually follow thematic patterns  :p

• wearing one's dreams is the best fashion statement! ;)
• we all need to keep our mental spaces tidy, so its always a good idea to let the unused icons disappear off the screen :)
• and a pure heart alone can identify a pure heart .....
• Waiting allows you to deeply sink into a vast spaciousness where you can taste the beauty of your infinite soul. Waiting is really just a form of meditation. Doing nothing means your mind and heart are completely in the now, and not focused on the past or future, and receiving the divine blessings of existence. Be patient and all the goodies you desire will spring forth into existence. (annon)
• when in love, your only victory is BEING in love.
• True love always leads to the Greater Love. 
• I can not loose the fight, for I know my strength: my love.
• and I just wish my sword wouldn't weigh as heavy in my hands as it does at times ........ ah! :)
• to be in communion with the Divine, to be able to listen to the inner voice, one must be able to shun out the mental noise. Blessed are those, able to do that.
• and yes, I LOVE sunny mornings and starry nights :D

ciao :)

Love Dogs by Rumi

Other than the sheer beauty that Rumi is, posting of this poem is solely triggered by the comment on the post underneath.
For dear IYM, when longing is the bridge that connects:




One night a man was crying Allah! Allah!
His lips grew sweet with praising,
until a cynic said, “So!
I’ve heard you calling our, but have you ever
gotten any response?”
The man had no answer to that.
He quit praying and fell into a confused sleep.
He dreamed he saw Khidr, the guide of souls,
in a thick, green foliage.
“Why did you stop praising?” “Because
I’ve never heard anything back.”
“This longing you express
is the return message.”
The grief you cry out from
draws you toward union.
Your pure sadness
that wants help
is the secret cup.
Listen to the moan of a dog for its master.
That whining is the connection.
There are love dogs
no one knows the names of.
Give your life
to be one of them."

Devona Shaw!

What follows underneath is not a translation of this amazing Persian kalaam. The musical piece, however was so much in tune with the frequency within: Devona shaw!
The words come on their own, and I cease to mould them into forms ...


 And there are times when the only way to retain your senses is by losing them.

The only way to keep your head is by letting your hair down; the only way to dance is by losing your feet; the only way to break free is by tightening the chains around; the sole way to maintain that charming form of yours is to melt in that absorbing kiss of the Beloved; the only words that are spoken to your Love are that of silence; and the only harp that plays does so in your bosom.

I want to keep my head, so I let my hair down and whirl in a spiral. There is beginning to an end naught.

I want to dance to the symphony of the Love, so I let my heart guide my moves and the ground embraces my steps naught.

I want to break free from the ordains of the self, so I let me lose on the gallows of Hallaj. Beyond the Self, the self naught.

I want to relish the beauty that is mine, so the vision of me more than in Your eyes, exists naught.

I want to tell You all the pains that my heart endures, so I let myself be the bleeding heart. The words were the sounds, the feel naught.

I want to play all the tunes of my ecstasy, so I beat with my heart. Love brings my melody, the harp naught.

You see, I want to retain my senses, so I stick to my senses, naught.

Since I want to remain sane, so I let myself get crazy.

Perhaps, there is nothing that I do since I so will. Perhaps, its just that I have any choice naught!

Unwinding Self

At times we feel so desolate from the entire universe around us that everything seizes to make any sense. When the sky and the earth knit themselves together so that all the compass needles go berserk and one is left clueless, directionless, like a lost ship now returning to Atlantis.

Nothing makes sense, and sense makes nothing ...

The power to analyze seems to be consumed by the haze of uncertainty, and the ability to rationalize retreats in the face of that sheer void that seems to surround anything and everything. Its smog, everywhere and all around. And my compass needle is crazy. I don't trust it. I don't trust the path. I don't trust my ability to find a path. I don't trust the idea that a path does exist. And I don't trust me.

Whenever I am as lost, as I feel now, in the murkiness of daunting doubts, I return to my point 0 - origin point. Point of total surrender. I align my crazy compass to the One up there and let myself make a camp there, at point 0. I call all my fighting faculties back to myself, I forget the paths and I forget the battles. I just camp there, in a world which is more spiritual than physical. I let myself the luxury of just being a no one in the realm of the Absolute One, and I relish the freedom that shunning all authority brings. I become a lover of the One who needs no lover, and I feel loved. All my wounds heal, my energies build and my faculties nourish, just by that mere act of realigning my compass back to Him.

But this time it has been strange. It seems as if the first thing I lost in the battle is the very compass that had gone berserk. Its a familiar yet unfamiliar land, my steps do not catch up with the changing pace of the landscape and my eyes can not see across this grey sea of haze. The deafening noise of the silent void is devouring all that was left of a lost spirit. I can not reach my point 0, despite the fact that I never had to Reach it! As the poet puts it

دل کے آئینے میں ہے تصویر یار

جب زرا گردن جھکائ’ دیکھ لیا

Dil kay aa'eenay mein hai tasveer e yar

jab zara girdan jhukai, daih lia

(My heart mirrors the image of my Beloved

Its just a bend of neck, that grants me a view)

No compass, nothing to align. Where am I?

I was caught in this endless whirlpool of nothingness, when yesterday I got a few words to which I am hanging on for dear life. These words resonate in this bleak time with the same frequency that had I not lost it, my compass needle would have responded well.

So, here's what I learnt. I hope I did!

When launching into a battle, one should always know where is the EXIT marked, and where is the emergency medical relief camp! This is as important for the soul as is for the body. In this very case, before exhausting my last reservoirs of strength, I should have known where is the refill station: my compass needle.

Hence job ONE: Find your aligning spiritual compass, so that nowhere begins to belong somewhere.

When a self falls prey to doubts; doubts that shatter, and doubts that mar everything that binds one's faith, its never alone a battle of Spirit. Its a battle that soul fights, only when aided by a body which can endure that battle.

Hence job TWO: Focus on revitalizing your health.

When there is no direction to follow and no route to take, when the dreams are forsaken and the realities are stark, when the words ring hollow and when the actions speak naught, just remain sure of one thing and that will make all this abyss fizzle out: your own personal uprighteousness. That uprighteousness comes by cleansing one's system of all the negativities of thought and of action; and this requires harmony - Spiritual as well as physical!

Hence job THREE: Cleanse your system of toxins.

I have stopped fighting and have called my troops back. I spent today, the whole day trying to relocate myself. And I think I have inched somewhere close to my compass.

I hope and pray that all the lost souls find their route maps. Amen

Good night all.

To Be, or Not to Be!

To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action. - Soft you now!
The fair Ophelia! Nymph, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remember'd.


Shakespeare (from Hamlet 3/1)

Kaaba - The Golden Ratio

Being a student of pure maths, I can't just stop marveling. For a greater understanding of the above, one may wish to read more about the Golden Ration, or PHI as it is called, denoted by (φ).
Amongst others, some very interesting reads could also be found at http://library.thinkquest.org/trio/TTQ05063/index.html as well as http://goldennumber.net/

Tango

Isn't it lovely....

Don't quit, believe in yourself and follow that dream, in Elvis style ;)

Life is Learning!

I have just discovered that each difficulty comes with an opportunity to learn. More often than not, we are just so focussed upon combating the problem that we let the opportunity slip through our fingers. Such opportunities, if grasped timely, can open many new avenues into undiscovered dimensions of our own selves.

At the end of the day they can truly be a reason for you to be a grateful individual for having encountered such a difficult patch in your life, that left your experiences and self more rich than before.

After all, what is life if not learning? :)

No song unsung, No wine untasted!

He stayed up. 

And he dreamt. 

Of all the things he wanted from life. Of all the pleasures he wanted to immerse himself in. 

He dreamt of how the Lady luck would arrive in all her glory and kiss him soft on his very lips; when the zenith would carpet under his steps as he would stride towards his destiny. And how that blazing sun,that some said centered their Solar system, would turn dusky when sought by his sparkling eyes. 

He slept naught, and he dreamt long.

He dreamt of her caressing touch, of some melodious whispering of sweet nothings. 

He dreamt of breathing through that scented cascade of flowing tresses, and of that sheer pleasure that made his heart beat in his chest.

With eyes open, his mind wandered into some unsung dimension of time, where his steps traced the route. 

So he traveled short and stopped at where he pleased. For it was he who was the Architect, the Guide, as well as the Explorer. 

Now, what only mattered was what he pleased, so he chose a line beyond the horizon to be his post. 

And he smiled at his triumph. A triumph that had so by now stopped even amusing him anymore. 

Victory had become a synonym of being alive. 

Alive, like he was!

Alive! 

Alive?

His dream suddenly came to an abrupt end. 

Alive like he was did not permit any dreams. His eyes welled up and his heart suddenly filled with gratitude. 

He had lived his Life in those few moments of a sleepless dream!

Lost in Plain Sight!

Just stumbled upon this web portal of Maisie Crow, a photojournalist.

http://www.maisiecrow.com/photos/LOST%20IN%20PLAIN%20SIGHT/

The album is just unusual and awesome, and I fear to ruin its impression by describing it in words here, but the copyright thing wouldn't let me post the pictures otherwise. If I were to post, I wouldn't have posted the entire album, but a few pics, because the idea conveyed could be taken for a bit too blue, however, what remains the undeniable beauty of all these real life pictures is the true colour of resilience of human soul, the toughness that comes at work only when the times get too tough to be lived.

Please notice the handwritings in the manuscripts accompanying each image. Broken letters, shattered times, but a fighting human!

Life can be tough and brutal. Sometimes more than we can actually handle. But there are people, somewhere, at sometime, who bear that brutality and toughness with that true tenaciousness that only belong to a strong human soul!

a sweet scented drizzle...

a mellow song

of soft feel
like the sweet fragrance
of yester years,
that greets you
like the 9 am drizzle,
touching your face
with a delicate
brush of the gentle
droplets,
bringing a curl
onto your lips
as it melts on them
while caressing

She didn't give him anything!

She was 'smile', he was 'lonesome'
she had charisma, he had poise
years later someone said,
have you ever noticed
you dismal damsel
how inapt are you,
for that social a guy,
with that gorgeous smile!

Frank Sinatara fills my cup again!

I wish I were ......

Frank Sinatara, as usual, awesome!!!

Mirror Mirror on the wall...

Some times people don't learn. No, they learn not a single lesson! But how can one learn, if what one puts to use is only some incomplete and biased perceptions, and a raging tongue to vent them out?

Learning requires, first of all a set of receptive organs, and then an understanding mind (not heart cause everyone is not lucky enough to possess one!), and even then, some degree of compassion to provide a room for an error of understanding.

But no Sire! People here KNOW what you understand from what they say. They TELL you what you understand from what they say. And they CONDEMN you for what you understand from what they say. And when you try to put the picture into perspective by voicing what YOU actually understood from what they say, they refuse it altogether and PITY you for this obvious lack of morals for taking a shield behind lies!!!

Paradox of Choices

Psychologist Barry Schwartz takes aim at a central tenet of western societies: freedom of choice. In Schwartz's estimation, choice has made us not freer but more paralyzed, not happier but more dissatisfied.

An interesting approach to why we always find things in the past better! and why tv with hunreds of channels today is less entertaining!

Stage of Age ...

Surrendering Souls

He was a word weaver and she a lover of intricate knitting of beautiful phrases. It was not surprising that he was taken in by her cheery self and she was swept away by his charisma. The spark was spontaneous and the chemistry absolute. Everyone around could predict that once in a life time, they actually were witnessing two soul mates. 
They were aware of it, too. 
But the problem was that they both were held hostages within the barriers of some sentinels: He, caged within his impression, and she, a prisoner of her pride in modesty. Both wouldn’t confess the actual barrier to be that of ego. 
However, their souls were stronger than their fears, so after a while, destiny smiled as their souls danced in the jubilation of their union.

The jubilations couldn’t go on for long though. 
Life had its callings and they had to be answered. Each reverted back to the real life; he turned his back to words and she got lost in the intricacies of what never made any sense to her. The flame wavered but the chemistry wouldn’t help. Changed life had different requirements, which asked for different elements. 
Their compositions had altered. 
The souls winced as they witnessed the silent decay and this but worsened it. They had obligations to fulfill and the wincing souls just added to the misery of the situation. Each was so wounded in the battle to surface above that marshland of responsibilities that none had either the time or the energy to listen to the other’s SOS call. 


Each grew unhappy. 


Have you ever seen an unhappy person? No, not the man unhappy over the boss’s behaviour, or the woman unhappy over the kitchen stove not working. 
A truly unhappy person is the one whose gloom reaches the others like the heat of a burning candle wick. 


Both of them became like that, slowly being consumed by the gnawing beast of their mutual disappointments. Nothing could help. The fears returned, rested and much stronger. The battle was not a fight, it was a torment. Torment to the already battered souls that had since their last victory been losing everything they owned. 
This time what was to be lost was the last thing they had. They tried to reason, plead in the end even fight, but they had had their share of victory and this time it wasn't their turn. So they lost. This time surrendering the right to own each other.