Poetry Chaikhana Blog

Ivan M. Granger July 4th, 2008

The lamp once out
by Natsume Soseki

English version by Soiku Shigematsu

The lamp once out
Cool stars enter
The window frame.

— from Zen Haiku: Poems and Letters of Natsume Soseki, by Natsume Soseki / Translated by Soiku Shigematsu

/ Photo by George Lu /

It’s the Fourth of July, Independence Day here in the US. I loved fireworks and firecrackers as a child. Anything with fire and sparks and explosions, well that was just fine by me. The bigger the bang the better!

This haiku, however, is one that leaves me in silence. It makes me think a little more about what independence and freedom are really about…

On the most literal level, Natsume Soseki is giving us the image of a lamp going out. When that strong, close light is no longer there, our eyes can then see the stars in the night sky through the window. Just three lines is enough to give us that beautiful moment.

But, of course, the meaning expands, with several possible meanings. One way to read it is that the lamp light could suggest the ego. That is the familiar light we normally live by. It is useful in that it allows us to interact effectively with the immediate environment. But we forget that it also affects our focus and limits our full vision. It is only when it finally goes out, that we can see vastness of the night sky and its glistening, heavenly stars…

Natsume Soseki Japan (1867 - 1916) Timeline Buddhist : Zen / Chan

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Ivan M. Granger July 2nd, 2008

As the man and the woman in me
by Lalan

English version by Deben Bhattacharya

As the man and the woman in me
Unite in love,
The brilliance of beauty
Balanced on the bi-petalled
Lotus bloom in me
Dazzles my eyes.
The rays
Outshine the moon
And the jewels
Glowing on the hoods of snakes.

A single drop of water
Has grown into a sea,
Unnavigable…

— from The Mirror of the Sky: Songs of the Bauls of Bengal, Translated by Deben Bhattacharya

/ Photo by Per Ola Wiberg..(PO…or Powi) /

These few lines are packed with the encoded alchemical language of Bengali Tantric Yoga. Let’s have some fun exploring its inner meaning.

As the man and the woman in me
Unite in love…

The man and woman that unite are “in me;” they are internal principles. It is the uniting of the masculine and feminine energies within the individual. This union in love, is the harmonizing of the solar and lunar energetic pathways that run parallel to the spine, called the ida and the pingala in Yoga.

When these masculine and feminine energies are brought into stable balance, the central energetic channel, called the shushumna, opens, allowing the primary life force, the Kundalini, to rise to the brow, to the two-petalled chakra, sometimes referred to as the third eye:

The brilliance of beauty
Balanced on the bi-petalled
Lotus bloom in me
Dazzles my eyes.

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Ivan M. Granger June 27th, 2008

Every man who is aware of his secret
by Sarmad

English version by Dr. Zahurul Hasan Sharib

Every man who is aware of his secret
He becomes concealed even from the skies.
The mullah says that Ahmad went to the heavens
Sarmad says that the heavens were inside Ahmad!

/ Photo by beggs /

Every man who is aware of his secret
He becomes concealed even from the skies.

Isn’t that a great opening half to this quatrain? When we become aware of the secret contained within us, the ego self disappears. What most people think of when they call you a person becomes “concealed… even from the skies.”

The mullah says that Ahmad went to the heavens
Sarmad says that the heavens were inside Ahmad!

These closing lines are saying something interesting too. Islamic religious tradition (taught by the mullahs or spiritual leaders) tells of the Mi’raj when the Prophet Mohammed (Ahmad) journeys to the Dome of the Rock / Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, and from there ascends into the heavens, where he converses with other prophets and, ultimately, God.

Sarmad, with the mystic’s instinct, turns this inward, declaring that the Mi’raj was not an external journey, but a journey within, for “the heavens were inside Ahmad!” This declaration makes the journey to heaven available to us all; we may not all be prophets, but we all can discover the same heavenly core within ourselves.

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Ivan M. Granger June 25th, 2008

Love
by Thomas Traherne

      O nectar! O delicious stream!
O ravishing and only pleasure! Where
      Shall such another theme
Inspire my tongue with joys or please mine ear!
      Abridgement of delights!
      And Queen of sights!
O mine of rarities! O Kingdom wide!
O more! O cause of all! O glorious Bride!
      O God! O Bride of God! O King!
      O soul and crown of everything!

      To Danae’s pleasing fruitful womb.
      His Ganymede! His life! His joy!
Or He comes down to me, or takes me up
      That I might be His boy,
And fill, and taste, and give, and drink the cup.
      But those (tho’ great) are all
      Too short and small,
Too weak and feeble pictures to express
The true mysterious depths of Blessedness.
      I am His image, and His friend,
      His son, bride, glory, temple, end.

— from Poetry for the Spirit: Poems of Universal Wisdom and Beauty, Edited by Alan Jacobs

/ Photo by alicepopkorn /

This poem by Traherne is almost breathless in its ecstatic exclamations. Though highly structured in meter and rhyme, he just barely seems to be able to get the words onto the page.

The first verse is an overwhelm of bliss and images: nectar, a stream, a kingdom, a king, a bride, a crown.

Why does Traherne start his poem with descriptions of “nectar,” a “delicious steam” that more than anything else can “inspire my tongue with joys”? The ecstatic state is often interpreted by the sense-mind as a beautiful, rich sweetness on the upper palette and at the back of the throat, accompanied by a warmth in the belly. Because there is also a humming in the inner ear and often a visual awareness of a glowing gold or white color (”golden rain”), this experience is often compared to honey or a heavenly ambrosia. The experience is also accompanied by a blissful giddiness and, sometimes, a trembling or other body movements that can mimic drunkenness, so mystics also refer to this subtle liquid as wine: “And fill, and taste, and give, and drink the cup.”

In Christian symbolic language, the King, of course, is Christ, or more generically the personal aspect of God. The Bride is the purified individual soul that joins with the Divine and discovers ecstasy in holy union.

In the second verse, Traherne lists what he had been seeking all his life, what he imagined God to be: endless power, love, glory, beauty… the source of everything. But the next verse moves out of the conceptual to a revelation of what he has actually experienced. And he is flabbergasted to discover that as rich as his mental concepts of the Divine had been, the direct experience is greater still. “Did my ambition ever dream / Of such a Lord, of such love!” Love, true divine love that rejects nothing and embraces everything is just a philosophical idea until it is actually felt — and then you realize the idea hardly hinted at the reality. This is accompanied by a sense of wholeness and bliss that descends upon the awareness, “Joys down from Heaven on my head do shower.”

The final verse is the most personal. Traherne sees himself as Danae impregnated by the divine golden shower, as Ganymede the beloved cupbearer of heaven. God has descended to him, or has lifted him up; he can’t tell, he doesn’t care. The divine living source of everything has, in the most intimate way, touched and claimed him.

But even these descriptions “tho’ great” can’t do justice to the reality. There are no satisfactory words for “The true mysterious depths of Blessedness.” The best he can do to put this relationship into words is to suggest that he now recognizes himself as a reflection of the Divine, an intimate, a vessel, a completed work: “I am His image, and His friend, / His son, bride, glory, temple, end.”

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Ivan M. Granger June 23rd, 2008

If one His praise of me would learn,
by Saadi

English version by Edward B. Eastwick

If one His praise of me would learn,
      What of the traceless can the tongueless tell?
      Lovers are killed by those they love so well;
No voices from the slain return.

— from The Gulistan of Sadi: The Rose Garden, Translated by Edward B. Eastwick

/ Photo by HAMED MASOUMI /

I love that line, “What of the traceless can the toungeless tell?”

There is actually a lot being said in these few lines, all circling around the wordlessness of true lovers of God. Why is it that lovers are “tongueless”? Why is it that lovers are “killed,” and the voices of the “slain” don’t return?

Sacred poetry often portrays death from an upside-down perspective in which death is sought with an enthusiasm that can, at times, sound almost suicidal. Without understanding of this imagery, it can sound as if every mystic and saint has some strange death wish.

In deep ecstasy, the sense of individuality, the sense of “I” thins and can completely disappear. Though you may still walk and breathe and talk, there is no “you” performing these actions. The separate identity, the ego, disappears, to be replaced by a vast, borderless sense of reality — the “traceless.” Suddenly, who you have always thought yourself to be vanishes and, in its place, stands a radiant presence whose boundaries are no longer perceived in terms of flesh or space.

It is this experience, this complete shedding of the limited body of the ego, that is the death so eagerly sought by mystics throughout time. This is what Saadi means by his statement, “Lovers are killed by those they love so well.”

This same death of the ego leads to a space beyond words. With the small self no longer in the way of true perception, reality is finally perceived as a unified wholeness. The mind ceases to cut its perception of reality into manageable little pieces. Everything, absolutely everything is recognized as part of that single wholeness. And that’s where words fail. Words can only ever apply to fragments of reality, particles of meaning. But in the lover’s vision of Oneness, words are no longer big enough to contain what is witnessed.

What then can one say? Lover’s fall silent. They are toungeless. In this sacred ‘death,’ one has no voice. Some mystics literally fall silent and cease to speak in awe of such Unity, while others may speak and write and sing… but inwardly they too are spacious, clear, silent. The use of words becomes at most a game, incapable of truly conveying the lover’s awe and praise. One can only hope that this game of words and incomplete meanings will point the way for others, that they too may one day find themselves toungeless.

Nuff said…

Saadi Iran/Per (1207? - 1291) Timeline Muslim / Sufi

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Ivan M. Granger June 20th, 2008

[1056] There is a Zone whose even Years
by Emily Dickinson

There is a Zone whose even Years
No Solstice interrupt –
Whose Sun constructs perpetual Noon
Whose perfect Seasons wait –

Whose Summer set in Summer, till
The Centuries of June
And Centuries of August cease
And Consciousness — is Noon.

— from The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson, Edited by Thomas H. Johnson

/ Photo by Bohman /

I know we just had a poem by Emily Dickinson last week, but I couldn’t pass up this poem on the summer solstice.

Light is one of the primary metaphors in sacred poetry, suggesting the Divine not framed within a mental concept. But for genuine mystics, this light is not a mere concept; it is directly experienced.

This sense of light is more than a brightness one might experience on a sunny afternoon. This light is perceived as being a living radiance that permeates everything, everywhere, always. This light is immediately understood to be the true source of all things, the foundation on which the physicality of the material world is built.

And Consciousness — is Noon.

This is the light of the true mystics.

Have a beautiful solstice — the time of year to celebrate the fulness of the light which sustains all life.

Emily Dickinson US (1830 - 1886) Timeline Secular or Eclectic Christian : Protestant

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Ivan M. Granger June 18th, 2008

Millennium blessing
by Stephen Levine

There is a grace approaching
that we shun as much as death,
it is the completion of our birth.

And that is what we sing about.

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

/ Photo by Stoker Studios /

There is a grace approaching
that we shun as much as death,
it is the completion of our birth.

The lines of this poem are deceptively simple. It’s one of those poems that is easy to read and then move on with the rest of the day…

It does not come in time,
      but in timelessness
when the mind sinks into the heart
and we remember.

…But the words trail after you, quietly ringing at the back of your thoughts, gently haunting the comfort of our routines and routine relationships with the world.

It is an insistent grace that draws us
to the edge and beckons us to surrender
safe territory and enter our enormity.

These are words that lead us to silence. What else is there to say?

And there is nothing left to say
but we are That.

And that is what we sing about.

Stephen Levine US (1937 - ) Secular or Eclectic

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Ivan M. Granger June 18th, 2008

This is part one of a series of short videos from an informal poetry reading by Stephen Levine. An insightful, intimate talk, and poetry from his new collection of poetry.

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Ivan M. Granger June 16th, 2008

Dawn of Wisdom
by Georg Feuerstein

I searched and searched
but then I ceased
and simply stood
still as a man
facing the Sun
in morning’s climb
across the sky.
Then wisdom dawned
time after time
and filled my mind.

— from Transparent Leaves from the Tree of Life: Metaphysical Poems, by Georg Feuerstein

/ Photo by ewen and donabel /

I thought we’d shift gears this week, and read some poetry by contemporary writers — people better known to us as mystics and seekers than poets.

I first came across the writings of Yoga scholar Georg Feuerstein when I picked up his encyclopedic blue “phone book” called the Yoga Tradition, one of the best books I’ve found in English surveying the rich philosphies, writings, practices, traditions, and expressions of Yoga throughout its ancient history. I still keep that book by my bed today, something to reach for and read a short chapter on a warm summer evening before drifting off to sleep. Or early in the morning…

I searched and searched
but then I ceased
and simply stood
still as a man
facing the Sun…

Have a beautiful day today!

Georg Feuerstein (1947 - ) Yoga / Hindu Secular or Eclectic

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Ivan M. Granger June 16th, 2008

It’s about time for another post on poetry in the movies, don’t you think?

I didn’t expect much the when I first saw the movie In Her Shoes. The movie trailers made it look, well, silly. I was surprised to discover a movie with depth, a comedy-drama with insight into the tensions between close siblings, with insight into the ways early traumas can shape the way we grow into adulthood, the way we develop self-destructive patterns — and ways we can finally recognize a greater wholeness in ourselves.

And poetry plays a central part in that journey…

Here is the text of the e.e. cummings poem from this video clip:

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

–

Another powerful poem highlighted in the movie is Elizabeth Bishop’s “One Art”:

The art of losing isn’t hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.

—Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan’t have lied. It’s evident
the art of losing’s not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.

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Ivan M. Granger June 13th, 2008

You are Christ’s Hands
by Teresa of Avila

Christ has no body now on earth but yours,
      no hands but yours,
      no feet but yours,
Yours are the eyes through which to look out
      Christ’s compassion to the world
Yours are the feet with which he is to go about
      doing good;
Yours are the hands with which he is to bless men now.

— from The Essential Mystics: Selections from the World’s Great Wisdom Traditions, Edited by Andrew Harvey

/ Photo by batega /

Let’s round out our series on women’s voices in sacred poetry with this selection by St. Teresa of Avila.

I haven’t been able to confirm whether or not this beautiful poem was actually composed by Teresa of Avila or not. It is popularly attributed to her, but it is not included or even mentioned in The Collected Works of St. Teresa of Avila, which I assume has all of her known writings. It may be similar to the popular Prayer of St. Francis, which is a profound prayer-poem, but not actually composed by St. Francis of Assisi.

Whether this was composed by Teresa of Avila herself or by an anonymous Christian poet, this is one of my favorite prayer-poems. It is a prayer of supreme spiritual maturity. It is not someone imploring Christ to come and fix everything in the external way imagined by so many fundamentalist sects; rather, it recognizes the presence of the Divine within each of us and our sacred responsibility to embody that compassion and service to the world. Each one of us is the vehicle through which Christ (or Ishwara, or however you name the personal form of the Divine) sends blessings. Our job is to get out of the way and let that sacred current flow through us unhindered.

“Yours are the hands with which he is to bless men now…”

Teresa of Avila Spain (1515 - 1582) Timeline Christian : Catholic

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Ivan M. Granger June 11th, 2008

[1544] Who has not found the Heaven–below–
by Emily Dickinson

Who has not found the Heaven–below–
Will fail it above–
For Angels rent the House next ours,
Wherever we remove–

— from Women in Praise of the Sacred: 43 Centuries of Spiritual Poetry by Women, Edited by Jane Hirshfield

/ Photo by Mayr /

Our exploration of women’s voices wouldn’t be complete without Emily Dickinson…

These four lines by that reclusive American mystic, Emily Dickinson, proclaim a deep truth:

Who has not found the Heaven–below–
Will fail it above–

This statement keeps getting mystics in trouble with orthodox religious authorities throughout the centuries. It is the assertion that heaven is not found somewhere ‘out there’ — not in the future, not after death, not (only) in celestial realms. Heaven is here, now, within us and surrounding us always! And — the most dangerous part of this insight — if we don’t discover it here “below,” it won’t be found elsewhere “above.”

A statement like this shatters the religious waiting game, waiting for death, waiting for the Second Coming (or for the Maitreya Buddha, or for a better rebirth, or whatever…) If the presence of Christ/Buddha-mind/fana’/liberation is not found right here, the passive expectation of That coming upon us elsewhere with “fail.”

Another way of saying this is that, as we discover heaven below, we find ourselves already dwelling in heaven above. But, on the other hand, if we continue to deny heaven below, we’ll fail at discovering how to enter heaven above.

Dickinson says, “For Angels rent the House next ours, / Wherever we remove–” No matter where we go, the Divine Presence is right there with us. We just have to knock on the neighboring reality and introduce ourselves…

Emily Dickinson US (1830 - 1886) Timeline Secular or Eclectic Christian : Protestant

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Ivan M. Granger June 9th, 2008

The Fountain
by Denise Levertov

Don’t say, don’t say there is no water
to solace the dryness at our hearts.
I have seen
 
the fountain springing out of the rock wall
and you drinking there. And I too
before your eyes
 
found footholds and climbed
to drink the cool water.
 
The woman of that place, shading her eyes,
frowned as she watched—but not because
she grudged the water,
 
only because she was waiting
to see we drank our fill and were
refreshed.
 
Don’t say, don’t say there is no water.
That fountain is there among its scalloped
green and gray stones,
 
it is still there and always there
with its quiet song and strange power
to spring in us,
 
up and out through the rock.

— from Poems: 1960-1967, by Denise Levertov

/ Photo by Weaselmcfee /

The image of this fountain has such rich resonance.

The water and the “dryness at our hearts.”

Its water springing out of the rock wall.

Footholds allowing us to climb.

Drinking the cool water.

The “woman of that place,” waiting to see how much we will drink.

And Levertov’s exhortation, “Don’t say, don’t say there is no water.” That line, to me, is the pulsing heart of the poem. Those words follow you long after the rest of the poem softens into the gossamer of memory.

It is still there and always there…

Rather than try to offer my own understanding of this poem, I’ll just let these words work their wet alchemy, their “quiet song and strange power… to spring in us.”

Have a beautiful day!

Denise Levertov US (1923 - 1997) Timeline Secular or Eclectic : Beat Jewish

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Ivan M. Granger June 4th, 2008

O my Lord, if I worship you
by Rabia (Rabi’a Al-’Adawiyya)

English version by Charles Upton

O my Lord,

But if I worship you
for yourself alone, grant me then the beauty of your Face.

— from Doorkeeper of the Heart: Versions of Rabia, Translated by Charles Upton

/ Photo by BohPhoto /

After Monday’s poem, I thought we should dedicate the entire week to women’s voices in sacred poetry…

This poem is a truly courageous prayer. It is fierce in its renunciation of false worship. In it Rabia demands of herself genuine worship, which she rightly defines as love of God for God alone — not for what the individual can “get” from God. Even the attainment of heaven or the avoidance of hell can become to the mind like possessions, something desired, something avoided, ultimately drawing the attention away from the radiant Divine Face everywhere.

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Ivan M. Granger June 2nd, 2008

O I saw witchcraft tonight
by Mirabai

English version by Robert Bly

O I saw witchcraft tonight
in the region of Braj.
A milking girl going her rounds,
a pot on her head,
came face to face with the Dark One.
My friend, she is babbling,
can no longer say “buttermilk.”
– Come get the Dark One, the Dark One!
A pot full of Shyam! –
In the overgrown lanes
of Vrindavan forest
the Enchanter of Hearts fixed his
eye on this girl,
then departed.
Mira’s lord is hot, lovely
and raven –
tonight she saw witchcraft
at Braj.

/ Photo by AMagill /

The “Dark One” referred to in Mirabai’s poetry is Krishna, whose name can be loosely translated as the dark one.

In this poem, milk is the ambrosial drink, the sweet subtle liquid-like substance often perceived during states of sacred ecstasy.

For a woman mystic who worships a masculine form of the Divine, to refer to milk also has a connotation of heavenly semen — the result of ecstatic union between lover and Beloved.

Mirabai herself is the “milking girl going her rounds.” She is the mystic gathering the blissful substance of divine union, traveling town to town as a mendicant sadvi (female ascetic), with her awareness making the pilgrimage through the psycho-spiritual centers of the spiritual body.

The milk pot is “on her head” — a reference to the skull as the bowl that catches the fountain of the rising Kundalini Shakti and the descending heavenly liquid.

When the ecstasy of spiritual union is strong, it is sometimes associated with an outpouring of words — one more reason so many mystics become “babbling” poets.

Her skull, the “pot,” is full of Shyam — Krishna, God — and from this overflowing cup of divine milk, she is eager to share with all.

Mirabai India (1498 - 1565?) Timeline Yoga / Hindu : Vaishnava (Krishna/Rama)

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Ivan M. Granger May 30th, 2008

If you’re interested in my thoughts on sacred poetry, how I ended up on this path, or if you’re just curious what my voice sounds like, you may want to listen to an interview I did recently with the Ecstatic Art & Theater Project. They are an excellent organization that explores and encourages the sacred/transcendent/ecstatic in art and theater.

Ecstatic Art & Theater Project

Online Newsletter focusing on sacred poetry.

Audio Interview (20 min).

I’d love to hear your comments on the interview, either via email or through the blog. So please let me know what you thought after listening.

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Ivan M. Granger May 30th, 2008

E ho mai
by Hawaiian (Anonymous)

E ho mai
Ka ike mai luna mai e

O na mea huna no eau
O na mele e

E ho mai
E ho mai
E ho mai

Grant us
knowledge from above,

Grant,
Grant,
Grant us these things.

/ Photo by jaybergesen /

Years ago, I took a class on ho’oponopono. (If you sound it out slowly, it’s not the tounge-twister it first looks like.) Ho’oponopno means literally “to make things right, to return things to harmony.” It is a traditional healing method, but it isn’t focused on healing the body. Ho’oponopno is for healing relationships, families, communities.

As part of the class, I had to learn this chant. Hawaiian chant can be compared to Hindu Sanskrit mantra in that to truly say it properly can take a great deal of training. The inflections are important. The breath is important. Most of all, the sense of personal presence is important.

This Hawaiian chant must be said with force and with heart. It is a prayer, but it is not passive. It is a calling forth, a reaching out and a drawing in — of wisdom, of knowledge, of truth. It evokes in us pono, rightness.

Try sounding out the Hawaiian. Slowly at first, until the sounds become familiar. Then louder, with confidence. Say it over and over again. Imagine repeating this chant in a group. Let it ring through your body and your day!

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