It is the last day of April. National Poetry Month has finally come to an end and so has my poetry series. I’ve heard from many of you about how much these posts have meant to you by giving you a moment’s pause each day to reflect on something beautiful, or new. I’m so glad I was able to do that, but the pace is a little much for me to keep up. I can’t sustain a daily practice, but I will try to throw out a poetry post once in a while.

One of the most difficult tasks of the month was deciding which poems to include and today was no exception. If I can only share one more gem from Hafiz, which should it be? Just know that whatever poem I chose, there were dozens left on the table. If you’ve enjoyed the last several days in particular, go buy The Gift as a gift to yourself.

“We Have Not Come to Take Prisoners”

We have not come here to take prisoners,

But to surrender more deeply

To freedom and joy.

We have not come into this exquisite world

To hold ourselves hostage from love.

Run, my dear,

From anything

That does not strengthen

Your precious budding wings.

Run like hell my dear,

From anyone likely

To put a sharp knife

Into the sacred, tender vision

Of your beautiful heart.

We have a duty to befriend

Those aspects of obedience

That stand outside of our house

And shout to our reason

“O please, O please,

Come out and play!”

For we have not come here to take prisoners

Or to confine our wondrous spirits,

But to experience ever and ever more deeply

Our divine courage, freedom and

Light!

For me, this poem sums up the essence of Hafiz’s mystical vision.  We have a sacred duty and it is first and foremost to recognize the divine Presence within and to act accordingly. This is a radical revisioning of what most of us raised with religion have been taught.  We have been catechized by church and culture to button it up, keep it down, follow the rules, imprison our passion, obey our reason. Hafiz screams at us to “Run!” from those false prophets who would do violence to the nascent Spirit within us, the one that makes it possible for us to be free – free for God to God’s work within us and the world.

And yet, even as it makes me smile, something inside me grimaces and I find some inner resistance to this poem. Do you sense it too? What part of us disapproves of spiritual freedom, play and joy? I don’t think it’s any part of us. I think it’s the “sharp knife” that was stuck in us when we were small and taught the rules of the game. No matter how much we’ve grown, no matter how much larger our vision is, the point is still there, digging in, reminding us to hold something of ourselves back, to be smart and play it safe.

Ultimately, we may never get rid of the knot in our chest, but the poetry of Hafiz empowers us to ignore the discomfort. He also insists that we protect ourselves from anyone who would push that knife deeper, including our scared and shamed selves. We can obey our fear, disguised as “reason,” or we can obey our God. Too often we worship the former and call it the latter. The poetry of Hafiz and other mystics insist there is another way and it’s the way I want to go – the way of Love, joy, freedom, divine courage, connection and cohabitation.

“Come out and play” friends, the poets are calling you!

Dissolving into God is a theme found in Sufi poetry and mysticism over and over again, but every poet takes a different approach. Here is one of my favorite’s from Hafiz.

“The Seed Cracked Open”

It used to be

That when I would wake in the morning

I could with confidence say,

“What am ‘I’ going to

Do?”

That was before the seed

Cracked open.

Now Hafiz is certain:

There are two of us housed

In this body,

Doing the shopping together in the market and

Tickling each other

While fixing the evening’s food.

Now when I awake

All the internal instruments play the same music:

“God, what love-mischief can ‘We’ do

For the world

Today?”

And just for good measure, here’s one more nugget of a poem. Hafiz and God have such a good time together!

“Two Giant Fat People”

God

And I have become

Like two giant fat people

Living in a

Tiny boat.

We

Keep

Bumping into each other and

L

A

U

G

H

I

N

G

.

Union with God is serious business, but once it is taken seriously, it seems like the outcome need not be serious at all. I think we have an image in our mind that when one becomes “at one” with God, then they no longer fully experience life. They are “blissed out,” unattached, or “on another plane,” but Hafiz shakes my conviction about the stereotype of the yogi on their cushion, or the saint on their knees. Hafiz didn’t go anywhere when God moved in – body and soul – he just became a truer version of himself. Maybe we don’t lose ourselves when God comes along. Maybe we find more of ourselves. If God is Love and all good, then maybe being joined by God would mean all the good and all the Love in us would be amplified.

Have you ever been so deliciously in love that you’ve walked around with a silly grin on your face for no reason at all? Have you ever been so exceedingly happy that you just want to sing out loud and dance down the street?  (Or run. I’m a dancer, but some people are runners.)  Have you ever laughed so hard you could not stop, even though you couldn’t say what in the world was so funny? Maybe sharing the boat of our bodies with God is like that. Maybe letting the seed of ourselves crack open allows all the joy to spill out.

I hope Hafiz inspires you to make a little bit of “love-mischief” with God today.

A Sunday reminder about the abundance of God

“So Many Gifts”

There are so many gifts

Still unopened from your birthday.

There are so many hand-crafted presents

That have been sent to you by God.

The Beloved does not mind repeating,

“Everything I have is also yours.”

Please forgive Hafiz and the Friend

If we break into a sweet laughter

When your heart complains of being thirsty

When ages ago

Every cell in your soul

Captured forever

Into this golden sea.

Indeed,

A lover’s pain is like holding one’s breath

Too long

In the middle of a vital performance,

In the middle of one of Creation’s favorite Songs.

Indeed a lover’s pain is this sleeping,

This sleeping,

When God just rolled over and gave you

Such a big good morning kiss!

There are so many gifts, my dear,

Still unopened from your birthday.

O, there are so many hand-crafted presents

That have been sent into to your life

From God.

I could use this reminder almost daily: There is nothing I need this day. It’s all been given; everything is available to me.

If I am feeling underwhelmed with how some aspect of my life is going, it’s because the gift remains “unopened.”  Maybe I haven’t found the time to unwrap it yet; maybe I lack the wisdom or perspective. Maybe it’s actually a lack of desire. Sometimes, frustration, and self-pity are more powerful and comfortable than agency. So go ahead and giggle God, and I’ll try to open my eyes, not hold my breath, and turn towards your kiss, so You, Hafiz and I can all start laughing together.

Today Hafiz teaches us about mindfulness.

“Buttering the Sky”

Slipping

On my shoes,

Boiling water,

Toasting bread,

Buttering the sky:

That should be enough contact

With God in one day

To make anyone

Crazy.

“I Want Both of Us”

I want both of us

To start talking about this great love

As if you, I, and the Sun were all married

And living in a tiny room,

Helping each other to cook,

Do the wash,

Weave and sew,

Care for our beautiful

Animals.

We all leave each morning

To labor on the earth’s field.

No one does not lift a great pack.

I want both of us to start singing like two

Traveling minstrels

About this extraordinary existence

We share.

As if

You, I, and God were all married

And living in

A tiny

Room.

I love these verses, but as I type them up, I wonder what you will think.

Are they too simple? Too silly to be worth noticing? 

I understand the impulse to dismiss poems like these, but just because something is simple, doesn’t mean it’s easy.  To live mindfully is perhaps the greatest challenge of all.

We think our everyday lives are somehow separate from our spiritual path, but Hafiz is inviting us to see them as one and the same. Have you ever thought of God as your roommate? Your office partner? Your sous chef and dishwasher? Why not? Wouldn’t every moment be richer in possibility, bathed in companionship, steeped in meaning? It costs us nothing to try it and we might find that we are getting a much better value for our mortgage.

A few years back, right after I finished at The Living School, I thought I might find some kind of “holy” work to do, but what arose instead was an opportunity to put in more hours at Wavelines, our surf shop.  And so I began what I jokingly referred to as “mindful bikini hanging.” Tim and I would be at the shop in the early hours before the store opened and I would be hanging delicate, expensive nylon triangles on plastic hangars. At first, my ego railed against the smallness of the task before me, but eventually, it stopped. “Mindful bikini hanging” wasn’t a joke any more; it really was a spiritual practice. One day, as I was smoothing out the wrinkles on crop top, Hafiz’s perspective prevailed. The backroom was filled with a soft glow. I looked over at Tim and I thought, “If I never do anything more than this, it is enough. I have everything I need right here.” I had learned to butter the sky and it was “enough contact/ With God in one day” to make me crazy, not every day, of course, but enough to keep me singing.