Showing posts with label poetry. Show all posts
Showing posts with label poetry. Show all posts

Running with Rumi

⊆ Thursday, May 21, 2009 by Donia | , , . | ˜ 0 comments »


(i started this entry on the 22nd of April. then the fun began and continued and continues...i took a lot of shelter in the insights and inspiration of this beloved poet. his writings have provided a lot of strength and assurance and catalysts of introspection this past month.)

My mind and heart are being run through by rumi...
here are some gems from today...

_____________

When I am with you,
we stay up all night.
When you're not here,
I can't go to sleep.

Praise God for those two insomnias!
And the difference between them.

- Coleman Barks, The Essential Rumi
________

Love is the cure
Love is the cure,
for your pain will keep giving birth to more pain
until your eyes constantly exhale love
as effortlessly as your body yields its scent.

From Love Poems from God, by Daniel Ladinsky.


___________


Ode 1823

I don't get tired of you. Don't grow weary
of being compassionate toward me!


All this thirst equipment
must surely be tired of me,
the waterjar, the water carrier.


I have a thirsty fish in me
that can never find enough
of what it's thirsty for!


Show me the way to the ocean!
Break these half-measures,
these small containers.


All this fantasy
and grief.


Let my house be drowned in the wave
that rose last night in the courtyard
hidden in the center of my chest.


Joseph fell like the moon into my well.
The harvest I expected was washed away.
But no matter.


A fire has risen above my tombstone hat.
I don't want learning, or dignity,
or respectability.


I want this music and this dawn
and the warmth of your cheek against mine.


The grief-armies assemble,
but I'm not going with them.


This is how it always is
when I finish a poem.


A great silence comes over me,
and I wonder why I ever thought
to use language.

-From Coleman Bark's Like This
________________


For those who have a pretty penny to spare and want to wear their love for Rumi, you can check out what these people have to offer. I think i shall stick to memorization and internalizing.


Installment 2 of my India Travel Journal

⊆ Tuesday, March 31, 2009 by Donia | , , , . | ˜ 0 comments »

You can read the first part here.
And if you want an Indian Travel that is a feast for the eyes, check
out my photographer friend Robert Stoetzel's 100 days in India blog.
Part II:

30 hour express
A short stint on the Purushottam "Express".
Making all the local stops.
3 tier a/c.
Good for reading, thinking
and looking at the country and people around you. The man across from was a real gentleman.
He sat with Guruji and discussed philosophy and various ancient prayers.
Before sleeping the second night we had a picnic of salad and chickpeas with puris.

He wouldn't let us wash our plates afterwards.

Bhubaneswar Jan 6-9th -

Mint Chocolate Chip
My little room with cool green walls, brown door and ceiling fan (reluctant to work). Wealthy in its simplicity. Austere but not uncomfortably so. Rooming with weavers who ride their webs, clinging tightly. At the mercy of the wind and their own creation when the shutters are open...patient, waiting, waiting, waiting when outside airs do not come in. The sounds of the neighborhood drift in, especially the slap of feet on concrete as dance practice convenes next door.
This beautiful picture is by Anne Whitman. It can be found here.

The Search for Sweet Grass and the Short Cows
In Vrindavan my home is a peninsula -
cows on three sides.
Orissa's cows are short
(2/3 the size of others)
with big tummies,
as though big cow parts were put in
little cow bodies.
They chew cud with distended bellies
even if underfed.
They seem a bit more adventurous
than the average bovine.

Out the back window i see a group grazing.
one leaves, walking towards me and longer grasses
her legs sink into marshiness,
she continues despite great difficulty.

Riding on the back of a scooter that evening
I see 3 other cows stuck and eating
as the light was leaving.

from here
Annie
From the front window i see and more often hear a raggedy version of Sandy. He - always tied up, never knowing grass - only a half moon of concrete - walking in circles, never touched or softly talked to, only teased by a 5 year old boy.

Old Friends
Next door at Guruji's
A treasury of poems,
not recognized as such by his daughter.
But for me,
a meeting with old friends
Blake, Keats, Wordsworth,
and good old Will.
Poignant and powerful
encountering them here.


Selections from My India Travel Diary, circa 2005

⊆ Monday, March 23, 2009 by Donia | , , , , , . | ˜ 3 comments »


Last night while speaking to a dear friend of mine about India, Odissi Dance, creativity, life, the universe, and everything, a small remembrance kept on tugging at my brain...

Hadn't there been some travel notes that i had shared with family and friends while dancing in India one time? Didn't i still have that email some where?

So today i looked and found what i had written. So, i am sharing it in installments here, 'cause why not?
Date: Wed, 12 Jan 2005 11:31:38
If you travel through America, states tend to blend into one another, of course there are distinguishing features between them in the form of regionalisms and topography. But going state to state in India can be like traveling to different countries. Nearly every state has its own language with a unique script. Cuisine, style, favored deity, customs and even truck art are all quite distinct.


Two shots of Bhubaneswar's famous Lingaraj temple

For the next three weeks i am a resident of Bhubaneswar. This city, the capitol of Orissa (an eastern coastal state - partially affected by recent tsunamis but before i arrived and not in his area) is famous for its many temples dedicated to Shiva (in the Hindu trinity - the demigod in charge of destruction). Some ancient texts say that at one time there were 10 million deities of him worshipped here. Apparently, it is not uncommon to find remnants of old temples while digging here. Actually, Bhubaneswar is another name for Shiva.

Orissa is particularly famous for is arts: textiles, painting, and dance
are its specialties.
The latter is why i am here...to study Odissi dance intensely (much to the dismay of all my muscles, who have become sore to the touch). There are 7 more forms of Indian classical dance. All of them are based on an ancient text called the Natya Shastra. Originally, they were all exclusively performed in temples and the dances would elaborate on devotional themes.






Here are some pieces of my mind these days...

Noida - a town with all the letters needed to make me
Dec. 31 - Jan. 4
Here - near Delhi - for five days with Guruji (my dance teacher)

Can't buy me love:
in a big house with love
locked in a mirror
like moisture-sucking wall paper
makes you pull away quick
nauseous and eager for the sun's water

The Sweet Smell of Poison
Teeny, buzzing, whining, biting aggressors.
Better to tolerate them
and maybe tolerate malaria
or experience a "Good Knight" with the friendly perfumy household insecticide. Itching to choose the latter (the citronella oil from back home isn't holding up)
I wonder what my lungs think of the decision.


Bird watchers Delight
You cannot imagine the variety...

In Vrindavan (the "hometown" of Krishna, 90 km from Delhi, where i just was for three weeks):

The green feathered red-mouthed parrots travel around town at 4 pm chatting about the day.

One full moon night i got up, stepped outside and heard the peacocks meowing, as is their habit when nights resemble days.

A shock of blue on the clothes line and the king of fishers returns to his court. Of course, there still are crows and pigeons, there always are...
Noida has a bird previously unbeknownst to me. It sings only when a car is put in
reverse then its song resounds - like a parakeet on steroids. And there are auto
rickshaws that quack when their horns beep.

Nostalgic confusion:
In the 6th grade i was under the impression that my statue was just that, impressive. my illusion was sustained by the thought that if you could see some of the top of someone's head then you were taller than them. A class walk past a reflective window clarified my short status. Here the reverse has occurred. Assuming myself among the smallest, the dance studio mirror has revealed otherwise.

The Oldest and the Youngest:
Dancing
All the other students call me Didi (older sister)
asking me how long i have been studying
Smiling, i call them Didi.

Good Care
At the art center - where Guruji stays and classes are held is one humble uncle. He maintains the place. Pious, unassuming, and attentive. One cold evening he gave hot herbal tea and peanuts. Three times he walked me home not wanting me to go unaccompanied. On the way, speaking sometimes in English sometimes in Hindi he told me about his hometown, the site of one famous ancient university (he will travel the 1600 km there in February), remembered his one visit to Vrindavan and spoke of when he lost his mind for a time after being suddenly rejected from the airforce academy because of a defect with his ear.


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