Poetry Chaikhana Sacred Poetry from Around the World

Secular or Eclectic Muslim / Sufi Contemporary	About Usha Akella Timeline (1967 - )
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Original Language English	The Light within the light
Commentary by Ivan M. Granger Themes   Bower   Light   Lover and Beloved   Tree     Recommended Books En(compass): The Poetry Caravan Anthology, by Usha Akella Kali Dances, So Do I...: Poems, by Usha Akella	I should have known the Light within the light, the Beloved within the beloved, Clever God who reeled me in with the right bait-you! the sly hand that played us along, you the stooge, I the fooled. Go now with the wind, Like cotton unhinged from the cotton tree. The exit of one has left room for the universe to creep back in. How can you know me if you don't know this madness? - from "A face that does not bear the footprints of the world"
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Commentary by Ivan M. Granger

This is such a beautiful evocation of "the Beloved within the beloved," that magical process where we discover the Divine through the world. Human loves, connections, even simple material desires -- what is it we truly seek in them? If we really look, we see it is not so much the person or the thing itself, but that hint, that shimmering of the eternal they reflect back to us. When we pay attention, the earthly beloved becomes a signpost pointing the way to the Divine Beloved. Sometimes we see this most plainly when that beloved stands before us; sometimes we only see when the beloved steps away and heartbreak becomes the "room / for the universe to creep back in." When we use the experience well we might just discover the "Light within the light..."

Ivan M. Granger's original poetry, stories and commentaries are Copyright © 2002 - 2008 by Ivan M. Granger.
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