Poetry Chaikhana Blog Sacred Poetry from Around the World

A chinese lion statue

What is a Chaikhana?

A chaikhana is a teahouse along the legendary Silk Road pilgrimage and trading route linking China to the Middle East and Europe. It is a place of rest along the journey, a place to shake off the dust of the road, to sip tea, and to gather together to sing songs of the Divine...

Pablo Neruda - Too Many Names

Ivan M. Granger July 1st, 2009

Too Many Names
by Pablo Neruda

English version by Anthony Kerrigan

Mondays are meshed with Tuesdays
and the week with the whole year.
Time cannot be cut
with your weary scissors,
and all the names of the day
are washed out by the waters of night.

No one can claim the name of Pedro,
nobody is Rosa or Maria,
all of us are dust or sand,
all of us are rain under rain.
They have spoken to me of Venezuelas,
of Chiles and of Paraguays;
I have no idea what they are saying.
I know only the skin of the earth
and I know it is without a name.

When I lived amongst the roots
they pleased me more than flowers did,
and when I spoke to a stone
it rang like a bell.

It is so long, the spring
which goes on all winter.
Time lost its shoes.
A year is four centuries.

When I sleep every night,
what am I called or not called?
And when I wake, who am I
if I was not while I slept?

This means to say that scarcely
have we landed into life
than we come as if new-born;
let us not fill our mouths
with so many faltering names,
with so many sad formalities,
with so many pompous letters,
with so much of yours and mine,
with so much of signing of papers.

I have a mind to confuse things,
unite them, bring them to birth,
mix them up, undress them,
until the light of the world
has the oneness of the ocean,
a generous, vast wholeness,
a crepitant fragrance.

— from Neruda: Selected Poems, by Pablo Neruda / Translated by Anthony Kerrigan


/ Photo by Swami Stream /

I just received word that my mother is in the hospital with brain cancer. Still a lot of questions about how she’s doing and what the next step is for her in her treatment.

Today I dedicate this poem to my mother, Jan.

…until the light of the world
has the oneness of the ocean,
a generous, vast wholeness…

Pablo Neruda, Pablo Neruda poetry, Secular or Eclectic poetry Pablo Neruda

Chile (1904 - 1973) Timeline
Secular or Eclectic

More poetry by Pablo Neruda

No reach

Ivan M. Granger July 1st, 2009

Ask yourself–
What if reaching enlightenment
was no reach at all?

John of the Cross - I Came Into the Unknown

Ivan M. Granger June 29th, 2009

I Came Into the Unknown
by John of the Cross

English version by Willis Barnstone

I came into the unknown
and stayed there unknowing
rising beyond all science.

I did not know the door
but when I found the way,
unknowing where I was,
I learned enormous things,
but what I felt I cannot say,
for I remained unknowing,
rising beyond all science.

It was the perfect realm
of holiness and peace.
In deepest solitude
I found the narrow way:
a secret giving such release
that I was stunned and stammering,
rising beyond all science.

I was so far inside,
so dazed and far away
my senses were released
from feelings of my own.
My mind had found a surer way:
a knowledge of unknowing,
rising beyond all science.

And he who does arrive
collapses as in sleep,
for all he knew before
now seems a lowly thing,
and so his knowledge grows so deep
that he remains unknowing,
rising beyond all science.

The higher he ascends
the darker is the wood;
it is the shadowy cloud
that clarified the night,
and so the one who understood
remains always unknowing,
rising beyond all science.

This knowledge by unknowing
is such a soaring force
that scholars argue long
but never leave the ground.
Their knowledge always fails the source:
to understand unknowing,
rising beyond all science.

This knowledge is supreme
crossing a blazing height;
though formal reason tries
it crumbles in the dark,
but one who would control the night
by knowledge of unknowing
will rise beyond all science.

And if you wish to hear:
the highest science leads
to an ecstatic feeling
of the most holy Being;
and from his mercy comes his deed:
to let us stay unknowing,
rising beyond all science.

— from To Touch the Sky: Poems of Mystical, Spiritual & Metaphysical Light, Translated by Willis Barnstone


/ Photo by oddsock /

In this poem, St. John of the Cross continually contrasts unknowing with “science.” And he emphasizes that it is the unknowing that is superior.

Don’t misunderstand, he is not advocating ignorance! He is talking about the mystical idea of “unknowing,” the state in which all thoughts and concepts and mental filters have been set aside, the state in which you rise above the elaborate constructions of the logical mind (”formal reason”) and come to rest in pure awareness (”a knowledge of unknowing”). He is contrasting true knowing with the mere accumulation of data.

The data of the logical mind is always dependent on the validation of the senses, but John of the Cross declares, “I was so far inside… my senses were released…” This state of supreme “unknowing” isn’t so much a state of perception, which is the drawing in and sorting of exterior awareness; instead, it is the completely internalized awareness of Being that has nothing to do with the senses. This is a “surer way” of recognizing the fundamental Reality.

“Rising beyond all science” ultimately leads “to an ecstatic feeling / of the most holy Being.” This is “the perfect realm / of holiness and peace,” free from the conceptual filters we normally place on our awareness. “In deepest solitude / I found the narrow way: / a secret giving such release…” In this state, one experiences “solitude” or supreme unity, requiring nothing outside itself to be whole and itself. And this solitude reveals the “narrow way;” the solitude is itself the way — “narrow” in that it is difficult to achieve when lost in the normal busyness of the chattering mind, and a “way” because it draws the scattered awareness to “rise” upward and ultimately settle, unified, into the heart.

A delightful poem that confounds the intellect while inviting the wider awareness to reach beyond self-imposed boundaries, “rising beyond all science” to discover the ever-present “perfect realm / of holiness and peace…”

John of the Cross, John of the Cross poetry, Christian poetry John of the Cross

Spain (1542 - 1591) Timeline
Christian : Catholic

More poetry by John of the Cross

Stephen Levine - In the realm of the passing away (Michael Jackson Tribute)

Ivan M. Granger June 26th, 2009

In the realm of the passing away
by Stephen Levine

This is the realm of the passing away. All that
exists does not for long.
      Whatever comes into this world never stops sliding
toward the edge of eternity.
      Form arises from formlessness and passes back,
arising and dissolving in a few dance steps between
creation and destruction.
      We are born passing away.
      Seedlings and deadfall all face forward.
      Earthworms eat what remains.
      We sing not for that which dies but for that which
never dies.

— from Breaking the Drought: Visions of Grace, by Stephen Levine


/ Photo by tipoyock /

Whatever comes into this world never stops sliding
toward the edge of eternity.

Yesterday was a strange day of famous deaths. I woke up and found out that Ed McMahon had died the day before. Then I heard about Farrah Fawcett’s passing. In the afternoon, checking out friends’ comments on Facebook, I started to see messages about “Michael” and “Thriller.” Were they saying that Michael Jackson had died too? A few searches on the Internet, and I found out that, yes, Michael Jackson had unexpectedly died. To add to that, I then was told that the actor Jeff Goldblum had died by falling off a cliff, only to find out later that he had been injured but did not die.

Now, I can’t say I felt a really strong personal connection to these famous figures, but by the end of the day I could feel the world’s shock, especially over Michael Jackson’s death. It would seem strange not to mention such a significant death in today’s email.

In his personal life, Michael Jackson seemed eccentric and haunted, and accusations raised troubling questions. But frankly I don’t know enough about the private man to comment or pass judgment. His genius as a singer and dancer can’t be denied, however. I remember his performance at the Motown awards, singing “Billie Jean” wearing a single sequined glove, and sliding a smooth moonwalk across the stage. A revolution exploded in music and dance at that very moment, the repercussions of which are still reverberating through pop culture today.

Michael Jackson is one of those rare figures, like Bob Marley, Elvis, John Lennon, a defining figure for the entire world. There is a reason that we call the ultra famous “stars.” They are like the planets in astrology; they embody for the world a certain archetypal energy. But that makes normal human relationships next to impossible for these people. We relate to the archetypal aura and not the person. Culture bearers are adored by millions and intimate with none.

This archetypal role they play is also why their deaths are so traumatic to the world. Archetypes are, by their nature, eternal energies of the soul. So when a person embodying a particular archetype dies, the world feels a rupture, the planetary psyche feels disoriented and fragmented. How can that which we instinctively know to be eternal disappear from our midst? But what really happens is that the archetypal energy is released, returned back to each of us. Having seen it enacted outside of ourselves, we are again reminded to look within ourselves for those same qualities.

So, today, sing! Hooo! And dance! Maybe try a moonwalk in socks across the kitchen floor…

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Whole and undivided

Ivan M. Granger June 26th, 2009

Mental concepts are an attempt to slice reality into
neat parcels, giving an artificial sense of control.
God is that whole reality, undivided.

Mahmud Shabistari - The Beloved Guest

Ivan M. Granger June 24th, 2009

The Beloved Guest (from The Secret Rose Garden)
by Mahmud Shabistari

English version by Florence Lederer

Cast away your existence entirely,
for it is nothing but weeds and refuse.
Go, clear out your heart’s chamber;
arrange it as the abiding-place of the Beloved.
When you go forth, He will come in,
and to you, with self discarded,
He will unveil His beauty.

— from The Secret Rose Garden: Mahmud Shabistari, Translated by Florence Lederer / Edited by David Fideler


/ Photo by Powderruns /

Again and again the great mystics and saints remind us to “cast away your existence entirely.” This is expressed in many ways in the various world traditions: to die in order to live, to lose yourself in order to be found.

Why all this morbid insistence in every tradition on self-negation? It is important to understand which “self” is being negated. The self that must be “cast away,” “discarded” is the false self, the little self, the ego .

Until the ego self is truly dropped, it rules your perception of reality like a miser. That ego has a secret it desperately must hide from your everyday awareness: it doesn’t really exist. At best you could say the ego is like a tension in the psyche, but it isn’t a real thing in and of itself.

So long as a person believes in the reality of that phantom ego, so long as he or she identifies with that nagging cramp of the “me”-sense, then seeing its inherent unreality is inconceivable, terrifying. The absence of ego is mistakenly assumed to be the death of self. Recoiling in fear, the psyche reflexively limits your perception of everything around you, crippling the consciousness, all in order to perpetuate the illusion of the ego and so protect you against “death.” The result, however, is that the simple truth remains hidden: The ego does not exist, and you are not the ego; you will survive the loss of ego.

The way out of this trap is to — with deep love, infinite patience, elegant balance, and unshakable determination — loosen the ego’s bindings until it falls away naturally.

When you accomplish that, you’ll stand in mute amazement. For, when the ego “you” has left, “when you go forth,” the Divine One “will come in,” and “unveil His beauty” to you. And, although that radiant beauty reveals itself to be everywhere, it is also recognized as contentedly abiding in the “heart’s chamber.”

Mahmud Shabistari

Iran/Per (1250? - 1340) Timeline
Muslim / Sufi

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Inhabit each step

Ivan M. Granger June 24th, 2009

Dream big! Journey far!
But inhabit each step
…with joy!

Civivakkiyar - Silence

Ivan M. Granger June 22nd, 2009

Silence, unmoved and rising
by Civivakkiyar

English version by Kamil V. Zvelebil

Silence, unmoved and rising,
Silence, unmoved and sheltering,
Silence, unmoved and permanent,
Silence, unmoved and brilliant,
Silence, broad and immense like the Ganga,
Silence, unmoved and increasing,
Silence, white and shining like the Moon,
Silence, the Essence of Siva.

— from The Poets of the Powers: Freedom, Magic, and Renewal, Translated by Kamil V. Zvelebil


/ Photo by Prabhu B /

This poem has a wonderful rhythm and repetition. A chant. Sound evoking silence. Silence, broad and immense…

Civivakkiyar

India (9th Century) Timeline
Yoga / Hindu : Shaivite (Shiva)

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Music: Tabla & Taiko

Ivan M. Granger June 22nd, 2009

The great tabla player, Zakir Hussain, accompanied by Japanese taiko drums. Hope you enjoy.

Masks

Ivan M. Granger June 22nd, 2009

Even our masks reveal us.

Li-Young Lee - From Blossoms

Ivan M. Granger June 19th, 2009

From Blossoms
by Li-Young Lee

From blossoms comes
this brown paper bag of peaches
we bought from the boy
at the bend in the road where we turned toward
signs painted Peaches.

From laden boughs, from hands,
from sweet fellowship in the bins,
comes nectar at the roadside, succulent
peaches we devour, dusty skin and all,
comes the familiar dust of summer, dust we eat.

O, to take what we love inside,
to carry within us an orchard, to eat
not only the skin, but the shade,
not only the sugar, but the days, to hold
the fruit in our hands, adore it, then bite into
the round jubilance of peach.

There are days we live
as if death were nowhere
in the background; from joy
to joy to joy, from wing to wing,
from blossom to blossom to
impossible blossom, to sweet impossible blossom.

— from Rose, by Li-Young Lee


/ Photo by ellievanhoutte /

The slow, circling dance of the year… and this weekend is the summer solstice, the day we catch the sun’s most brilliant smile.

A day of light. A day of fullness. A day of ripeness… and of sweet peaches still dusty from the orchard.

Li-Young Lee, Li-Young Lee poetry, Secular or Eclectic poetry Li-Young Lee

US (1957 - )
Secular or Eclectic

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Hand everything over

Ivan M. Granger June 19th, 2009

Enough deals and half-measures!

Hand everything over
to that divine ember
burning in your chest!

Constantine P. Cavafy - Ithaca

Ivan M. Granger June 17th, 2009

Ithaca
by Constantine P. Cavafy

When you set out on your journey to Ithaca,
pray that the road is long,
full of adventure, full of knowledge.
The Lestrygonians and the Cyclops,
the angry Poseidon — do not fear them:
You will never find such as these on your path,
if your thoughts remain lofty, if a fine
emotion touches your spirit and your body.
The Lestrygonians and the Cyclops,
the fierce Poseidon you will never encounter,
if you do not carry them within your soul,
if your soul does not set them up before you.

Pray that the road is long.
That the summer mornings are many, when,
with such pleasure, with such joy
you will enter ports seen for the first time;
stop at Phoenician markets,
and purchase fine merchandise,
mother-of-pearl and coral, amber, and ebony,
and sensual perfumes of all kinds,
as many sensual perfumes as you can;
visit many Egyptian cities,
to learn and learn from scholars.

Always keep Ithaca on your mind.
To arrive there is your ultimate goal.
But do not hurry the voyage at all.
It is better to let it last for many years;
and to anchor at the island when you are old,
rich with all you have gained on the way,
not expecting that Ithaca will offer you riches.

Ithaca has given you the beautiful voyage.
Without her you would have never set out on the road.
She has nothing more to give you.

And if you find her poor, Ithaca has not deceived you.
Wise as you have become, with so much experience,
you must already have understood what these Ithacas mean.

— from C. P. Cavafy: Collected Poems, by Constantine P. Cavafy / Translated by Edmund Keely


/ Photo by Wolfgang Staudt /

A little motivation to take down that old copy of the Odyssey, dust it off, and crack it open once again. It was a favorite of mine when I was a teenager, with gods, monsters, heroes, adventure… and a reminder of my Greek heritage (my father’s father was from the Greek island of Chios).

Cavafy’s poem reminds us of the Odyssey’s hidden truth, that the hero’s journey to Ithaca is the soul’s journey home.

Ancient tradition says that Homer’s epics, the Illiad and the Odyssey, combine into a grand mystery tale, understood by initiates as describing the stages and struggles of the soul’s inner journey.

pray that the road is long,
full of adventure, full of knowledge…

Too often seekers decry the road, its bumps and turns, impatient for the destination.

To arrive there is your ultimate goal.
But do not hurry the voyage at all.

But the stops along the journey are not roadblocks, they are stepping stones. Actually, even that’s not true. Seen clearly, the journey and the destination are a single continuum. The river pours into the sea, and they are one. Seated on the slow-moving river, we already touch the sea.

…and purchase fine merchandise,
mother-of-pearl and coral, amber, and ebony,
and sensual perfumes of all kinds,
as many sensual perfumes as you can…

Cavafy suggests that worldly experience, the senses, a certain amount of materialism, these too are part of the journey. The physical world is the realm through which the soul journeys. Encountering marvels and terrors the soul strengthens and comes to know itself. Knowing itself in victory and adversity, the soul is finally ready to return. But to navigate through such bewildering, overwhelming experiences, the destination must never be forgotten:

Always keep Ithaca on your mind.

Don’t rush through the journey, impatient only for its end. The adventure is your soul’s story.

Wise as you have become, with so much experience,
you must already have understood what these Ithacas mean.

The wisdom you attain with each step reveals the destination’s true meaning.

And it is just as true to say that the destination’s gift is contained in the journey itself:

Ithaca has given you the beautiful voyage.

Constantine P. Cavafy, Constantine P. Cavafy poetry, Secular or Eclectic poetry Constantine P. Cavafy

Egypt (1863 - 1933) Timeline
Secular or Eclectic

More poetry by Constantine P. Cavafy

Come to a stop

Ivan M. Granger June 17th, 2009

Seek those moments
when you gently come to a stop.
Stay there.

Yunus Emre - A Full Grasp of Knowledge

Ivan M. Granger June 15th, 2009

Knowledge should mean a full grasp of knowledge:
by Yunus Emre

English version by Namık Kemal Zeybek

Knowledge should mean a full grasp of knowledge:
Knowledge means to know yourself, heart and soul.
If you have failed to understand yourself,
Then all of your reading has missed its call.

What is the purpose of reading those books?
So that Man can know the All-Powerful.
If you have read, but failed to understand,
Then your efforts are just a barren toil.

Don’t boast of reading, mastering science
Or of all your prayers and obeisance.
If you don’t identify Man as God,
All your learning is of no use at all.

The true meaning of the four holy books
Is found in the alphabet’s first letter.
You talk about that first letter, preacher;
What is the meaning of that-could you tell?

Yunus Emre says to you, Pharisee,
Make the holy pilgrimage if need be
A hundred times — but if you ask me,
A visit to the heart is best of all.


/ Photo by whatmegsaid /

Knowledge should mean a full grasp of knowledge:
Knowledge means to know yourself, heart and soul.
If you have failed to understand yourself,
Then all of your reading has missed its call.

Sages of all lands keep reminding us that the spiritual journey is a journey of awareness, and specifically self-awareness. It is not a journey of acquisition. Or intellect. Or adherence to rules.

It is not a matter of how many books we’ve read. Or how many times we’ve read them. The only question of any value is whether we’ve yet recognized their truths… within ourselves.

It is not a matter of how often you pray. Or how perfectly you enunciate each prescribed word. The question is, have you discovered how the prayer wells up within you on its own.

Make the holy pilgrimage if need be
A hundred times — but if you ask me,
A visit to the heart is best of all.

Follow each prescribed step of the journey, and bring your books, but what you seek is found only and always in the heart of the heart.

Yunus Emre, Yunus Emre poetry, Muslim / Sufi poetry Yunus Emre

Turkey (1238 - 1320) Timeline
Muslim / Sufi

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Magic in the moment

Ivan M. Granger June 15th, 2009

Find the magic
in the moment.

Hallaj - If They Only Knew

Ivan M. Granger June 12th, 2009

If They Only Knew
by Hallaj (Mansur al-Hallaj)

English version by Michael A. Sells

What earth is this
      so in want of you
they rise up on high
      to seek you in heaven?

            Look at them staring
                  at you
            right before their eyes,
                  unseeing, unseeing, blind.
. . .

            I was patient,
                  but can the heart
be patient of
      its heart?

                  My spirit and yours
            blend together
                  whether we are near one another
            or far away.

            I am you,
you,
      my being,
            end of my desire.

      The most intimate of secret thoughts
            enveloped
and fixed along the horizon
      in folds of light.

                  How? The “how” is known
            along the outside,
                  while the interior of beyond
      to and for the heart of being.

      Creatures perish
            in the darkened
blind of quest,
      knowing intimations.

                        Guessing and dreaming
            they pursue the real,
                  faces turned toward the sky
      whispering secrets to the heavens.

            While the lord remains among them
                  in every turn of time
abiding in their every condition
      every instant.

                  Never without him, they,
            not for the blink of an eye –
                  if only they knew!
            nor he for a moment without them.

— from Early Islamic Mysticism: Sufi, Quran, Miraj, Poetic and Theological Writings (Classics of Western Spirituality), by Michael A. Sells


/ Photo by millicent bystander /

This is a great poem by the Sufi mystic and martyr, al-Hallaj.

A reminder to us all that, wherever we look, we are always staring at the face of God, “right before [our] eyes.” Everyone, knowingly or unknowingly, is always searching for the Eternal, but too easily we become lost in our search. The idea of a search is already to be lost — “a blind quest.” We imagine that the Goal will be found elsewhere, somewhere that we are not, and so we rush about looking, looking. “Guessing and dreaming,” looking for God in some distant heaven instead of beneath our feet and between the span of our arms, we blindly have our “faces turned toward the sky.” But doing that, we never recognize that “the lord remains among [us]” in our “every condition / every instant.” We are never without the Divine Presence, “not for the blink of an eye!”

Hallaj says it very simply, speaking to God as the Beloved who is everywhere and, at the same time, the heart of the heart:

                  My spirit and yours
            blend together
                  whether we are near one another
            or far away.

            I am you,
you,
      my being,
            end of my desire.

Hallaj (Mansur al-Hallaj), Hallaj (Mansur al-Hallaj) poetry, Muslim / Sufi poetry Hallaj (Mansur al-Hallaj)

Iran/Per (9th Century) Timeline
Muslim / Sufi

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