Poetry Chaikhana Blog

The boundary between self and the world
is bridged by the breath.

Words affect breath.
Thoughts affect breath.
Breath guides awareness.

A mystic must be supremely pragmatic:
Use what works,
whatever opens the heart
and fires the spirit.

Walk through this world
as an alien being
with curiosity and wonder
and constant questioning.

People become violently obsessed
with rules and traditions and texts
only when they have lost the sense
of what they really point to.

We need to retrain our eyes to see
the spaces between and the secrets behind.

Follow the trace of time
until the start
collapses with the end
in the space of the heart.

Who am I excluding from my heart?
How can I fix that?

Ego is the fundamental trance,
the seed of all addiction.
Find the secret
it so desperately hides!

Pure, compassionate,
and devastating honesty
with yourself
is the only way.

Let each experience
feed the fire
of love.

Through you
the world learns
to recognize itself
– as heaven.

Inner perfection is already attained.
Realizing this is the first enlightenment.
Then the work becomes coaxing the skittish mind
to rest upon that truth.

If you don’t occasionally
make a fool of yourself,
you’re not fully alive.

Our wounds
are the marks of initiation.
Our wounds
become our wisdom
Our wounds
mark our way.

The great, flowing vastness
one IS…
well, it is perceived,
but it is not known.

Acquire the habit of peace.