My thoughts bounce
as epiphany of truth
when i dress them up in words
for you.
Do I talk to my soul
when I speak to you?
Are you the mirror
reflecting my true identity:
scars of experience
like craters on the moon,
sheen of realization
like the first rays of the sun?
Until Love–
revelatory of divinity–
glows in the darkness of my heart,
until sorrows of lifetimes dissolve.
Is it me, or is it you?
Or is it who I am with you?

It enlarged before my eyes –
dulling the present.
Or, perhaps, becoming one with it.
“Remember those voices you heard once–
releasing from fleshes of those who you thought you loved;
they loved you, you thought—
music, you thought at once,
then changed your mind.”

the moment said –
“Caught in “me” were you with the other,
listening to the whispers of your own soul.
Do those whispers still call you
from beneath the fleshes you revered so deeply?”

The moment breathed a long breath.
Past opened before my eyes
as if a bud flowered into a rose
under the vastness of our sky.

I thought to myself –
many layers embrace a soul:
flesh is just one, aura another,
yet another is traceries
of lives lived and desires unconsummated.

Have I found what I was looking for?
Have I found it within myself,
or, deep into the hearts of others?
They say it’s not something you find,
or lose –
not something you give or take.
In everything, in every being,
in every smile, tear, or frown,
in every act of cowardice or courage;
of faith or sacrilege,
in every act of passion or compassion –
if you can’t experience it in everything,
everywhere,
you won’t find it even if you dig
the nails of desire deep into fleshes,
or tear apart hearts of everyone,
or read their minds under magnifying glass of your
definition.
You won’t “achieve” it.
even if you traverse all roads to the unknown.

To channel my restlessness into a meaningful search, I entered a bookstore and started looking at latest best sellers titles. The best sellers’ table was mushrooming with several copies of “The Secret of the Nagas”, as well as the first book of Shiva Trilogy. I want to read both these books for a couple of reasons — recently added cause to the list of my reasons is a nomadic’s interesting thought about them on his Facebook wall. As soon as I picked the two books, a strong urge to look behind made me turn about and see what was “calling” me. It was like a dense energy which I felt at the back of my neck. To honor its presence and purpose, I turned in the opposite direction, and so did my mind; my decision.

“The Forty Rules of Love” is what kept me still for a few seconds then, and I’m still drunk on the slightest realization (yes, I mean “slightest”!) of Rumi’s love for Shams Tabriz. Shams prayed to find a companion through whom he could communicate the forty rules of love to the world, and in Konya (in the present day Turkey), Rumi started seeing predictive dreams about his master; companion; lover. Both of them felt the painful absence of their alter ego, but neither of them knew the worldly face or whereabouts of who they were yearning for. They were guided to each other in a synchronistic way.

With their union began the course of Rumi’s annihilation. All that Rumi possessed, he had to let go of. The great scholar unlearned what his books taught him, and he did so for his Love for Shams. He let Shams burn his dearest books which Rumi had refrained his wife from cleaning, and once even reprimanded her for touching them. A man who never sniffed wine went to a Jewish tavern to bring two bottles — one for Shams and one for himself, and this wine washed away Rumi’s reputation in public and some of his scholarly beliefs along with it. Rumi gave shelter to a prostitute; spent time with drunkards, lepers – all in the name of love. All that Rumi didn’t know of, or abstained from experiencing, he joyously lived through out of Love for Shams. Rumi disliked poetry and Shams’ absence from his life made him the world’s greatest mystic poet. Together Rumi and Shams gave birth to Dervish dances (Sufi whirling).

Their story, so well told by Elif Shafak, is full of love and Self-examination. It tells us that we let go of our attachments, including our reputations, beliefs, wealth when we experience divine love. This reminds me of what Rumi said, “Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field. I will meet you there.”

This novel is Rumi and Shams’ divine love story told by one of the main characters who is, perhaps, Shams reincarnated. To experience love with THIS Shams, the novel’s protagonist leaves her well-settled family life at the age of 40. The absence and presence of love in our lives can cause catastrophes of inconceivable nature.

40 is an auspicious number in both Hinduism and Islam. Google should serve lots of valuable information on platter if one is interested in knowing the significance of 40.

Elif Shafak is the second Turkish author I have read and I am not exaggerating when I say the stories Turkish authors tell and the way they tell them can touch hearts and souls at a deeper level which some best selling self-help books can’t reach. Serder Rozkon’s “The Missing Rose” keeps me spellbound even today.

So I have got one more reason to visit Turkey – to experience the energies of divine love at the tomb of Shams-i-Tabrizi in Konya.

The film refreshed some memories I’ll refrain from advertising here. With those memories resurfaced some questions I usually avoid now. Why do we expect “God” to be free of human emotions and sensuality, when human body is the only form in which most cultures have perceived Its avatars? God is a man or a woman. God is multilingual. Gods with long hair; bald Gods. Gods with robes; white, maroon, or saffron. We revere the anger that Gods seem to confer upon us as much as we venerate their love in every form. But we’re abhorred by the idea that God may have other human aspects, the dark side; a familiar dirty side. How much low esteem we harbor in our hearts about our species!

It was a feast for eyes to see Jesus dancing at a wedding (in the film, of course). The conqueror in me was delighted to see Jesus defeated on various junctures. In his tears lain my joy. A strange sense of clarity dawned on me when I found him confused about the voice of God. My ambitions soared high when he repressed his desires. A smile of accomplishment curved my face when Jesus said he wanted to kill those people who were throwing stones at Mary, but he spoke about love instead, because that was God’s voice. It was a moment of ecstasy to see him fearing the snakes of his creation.

The film revived my belief that even Gods or the sons of God have to accept their anger, fears, and desires without giving up the struggle to become who they’re born to be. They fail, too. Not just once, but several times.

His misery
is my delight.
His suffering,
my peace –
It’s my revenge
from God
for He gave this
life to me.

The other half Gods
buried in their closets –
beyond Life’s peep.
Know-alls say “past lives” –
“Fluid future”, it may be.

Philosophies burden my world.
Soul rejects reasoning.
The universe is a pretender –
to me, it seems.

An unheard tune
Why does the heart sing,
when His ears are closed;
eyes are shut
to my humble misery?

Weary from a fruitless voyage
my body is thawing out into the changing wind.
Who will sedate the memories of bygone –
meandering aimlessly?
Who will kill the Thirst –
outliving its epoch?
Who will seal the galaxies –
preserving the covert truth?
Like an obstinate child bent on carving his way
my “consciousness” is out seeking …

Memories wither the roses
Whose scent
Arose desire once –
Of living life together
Of conquering death in unison

Earth loses its velvet
That once caressed
Those feet –
Entwined together;
Around a dream

On a beautiful Spring day
When a heart recites stories
Written life after life
Of ageless pain
Of timeless search

Time loses its linearity the moment you bring back an experience from the past and create a constant space for it in your present.

Dec 7: Love ebbs away when judgments hold the reign of the mind.