harmony – saara

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quite frankly the reality is you don’t know anything about me

you won’t either, as i have no interest in telling you
and i’ve come to realize you have no interest in hearing or absorbing it
nor the capability to integrate any knowledge gained about me into anything inside your brain or your heart

i don’t fault you; i am the same

never have i cared less to know about the daily trivialities of my fellow person
never have i expected any less of anyone

i know, i know, it looks like we are all returning to former spaces in collective harmony

but the reality is we’re riding solo in bumper cars
doing our best to carry on using the fumes of our own depleting volition,
only acknowledging the existence of others when they
literally ram into us, or we into them,
despite our very best efforts to avoid one another

we zoom away with the understanding that any damage is
two ways and inescapable in any such encounter,
and that our minds will have a lot to consider about what just happened or didn’t,
for as long as we continue to idle around the enclosure

you see, things are opening up out there
at a pace not matched by our minds,

at once worn out and comforted by

our

new

normal.

peace, peace, peace

image source: http://faxo.com/high-mountain-top-25051

There is something the matter with each of us.

Some of us weep in our homes, too “busy” to face our brethren.
Some of us are always on about the next best thing.

We may be neighbours but we resist becoming friends.

Where will you be, friend?

Where you will be at peace.

Where peace is friendly and friendship brings peace.

Peace, peace, peace.

Nothing else we ever asked for;
nothing else we ever knew.

It’s not that hard is it?

Peace must be somewhere, like a river or the sun;
Rising, now and again.

Why would we have to work so hard to get it,
and so hard to stay within it?

Once you get to a certain point,
it won’t be about what you do
but how you handle what’s done to you.

Peace, peace, peace.

Navroz Mubarak (2015)

Shoots of wheat. Image sourced from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheatgrass.

These days our eyes have opened to another sun,
quite further and beyond the one
that dapples everything with gold these evenings.

For the first time in our lives we yearn to cry,

navroz mubarak!

not for what has happened with us
but for what we hope will happen to you as well.

The day is here, and this time, springtime clichés are no longer.
Some seeds have grown up on their own into meaning.

How to describe this blessing?

Closing our eyes becomes the same as opening them;
this light continues beyond sight.

We are truly one this time, angelic in the abounding clarity
which at once we can see, and not see.

In our blessed gathering we are as light as we have ever been,
our true selves merging, one another with the rest.

Navroz (or Nowruz) is a festival celebrated around the world to commemorate the beginning of a new year and the first day of spring.

To learn more about Navroz, visit Wikipedia.org and/or TheIsmaili.org.

To read “navroz (2014)” on this blog, click here.

not one and the same

Oh, you’ve let me go,
says papery leaf, for a while miserable in the dampening mud.

Tree knows not the leaf
so tree discards the leaf;
they are not one and the same.

Leaf says,
Eventually I will return to you
in a way that you cannot refuse!

I will become you.

Leaf cries for the ground to take him in;
begs for the rain to dissolve him.

A story inspired during the autumn, but held back until an appropriate time.

Sometimes we don’t recognize ourselves in one another and it is difficult to appreciate our commonalities, what we share. Then again, we come from one source.

How can we adapt ourselves so that others will recognize us, and in so doing, embrace us as they would the known, the familiar?

presence / presentation

Image source: http://www.polyvore.com/ballet_dancer_silhouette_17_24h/thing?id=66665898

At times it becomes apparent to me,
that I occupy quite a lot of space.

I may start out of medium size,
with longish limbs and a short torso,
and a tendency to keep these wrapped up around each other.

But if you ask me to speak, to say, to perform,
then slowly, I begin to unfold,
one gesture at a time, into a circling kind of dance;
my range of movement evolving into one higher.

Slowly, I start to take up more space,
my limbs, stretching,
my hands, talking,
my posture, lengthening,
my eyes, brightening,
my voice, burgeoning.

I start to feel what I am saying,
I start to become those words.
I start to live these concepts I describe;
I see myself unfolding as a story told.

Tell me, when I unfold this way,
do you see me; do you feel my enhanced frame?

Does my size make you want to unfold too, to join me,
or do I make you want to shrink back into your space?

What kind of presence do you have, and how does that presence become enhanced when you are doing things you enjoy?

Do you ever feel that someone is “in your space”, or that you need more space in order to really be you?

Do you worry that your presence could unintentionally encroach on that of others, preventing them from fully expressing themselves?

to the beloved (2014)

A colour we cannot name. © Saara Punjani 2014. — A colour we cannot name.
© Saara Punjani 2014.

the water of the stream flows to its end
and i, flow in all planes to the beloved

the beloved calls, and i dissolve into the wind;
the beloved exists, so i go

these waters gleam now and again silver,
now and again a colour we cannot name

once,

we think,

we think we glimpsed the beloved’s face reflected there

now we undertake this pilgrimage every day

the beloved is, so i am too,

for the moment

the water of the stream flows to its end

and i, on my way to the beloved

the shower of your blessing (2014)

this, is the shower of your blessing
the one that comes down as music
needing only something off which to sound

we hover now, on the best place there is:
on the threshold, a step away from your rain,
but not fully inside of it

only here can we truly appreciate what you send

were we immersed,
we could not see how this rain drops abundantly on every leaf,
each of which curls, bows, in gratitude

were we too far away
we could not see how this rain constantly merges with itself,
ever merging into larger course

a trickle to a stream, a stream to a river:
instinctively, we know where this merger leads

sinking ship (2014)

years do not slowly shape this knowledge,
as waves tend to slowly shape shore

put us in a room of strangers aboard a slowly sinking ship,
and no one need explain what to do

if a man leaves a room, and we dislike him,
we paint that dislike onto his memory
so as not to have to dislike ourselves

but if a man leaves the world,
suddenly, all surfaces are occupied;
where now do we place our colours?

in a sinking ship, none are friends,
and yet, we know each other well

in my eyes, you can see your grief;
in your grief, i see all of me

never have we shared a meal
as candid as this one,

and today, i wear my face without paint.

living in you (2014)

living in you is a sober kind of intoxication

in it, my capacity to give increases,
and a focus resolves: that each day must be lived

what you must do, is what has been assigned;
all you need know, is your task

will you be the one blade of grass that refuses to bow in the wind?

it’s incredible how fortunate we’ve been made;
it’s incredible how fortunate we’ve become.

navroz (2014)

what is new about this day, navroz?

is it simply the flip of a sunny switch, or the overnight emergence of garden weed?

what do you want to be?
what do you want to change?

you have had the winter to yourself

now, prepare yourself to be grown

prepare yourself to be tamed, pruned
and tethered at the hands of another

prepare yourself to shift your roots
in accommodation of those that grow beside

it hurts, the pain of limiting yourself
though you know your own potential
to spread far and wide

but, if you shift your roots appropriately,
you will have set stage below ground for what will come to be above

what harmony you create in the hidden
is in every way what will come to be seen, outside

your choice to curb the tumorous growth of your self
is the reason for the interwoven canopy above

my heart is becoming blind (2014)

my heart is becoming blind,
but finding meaning in a way that was not open to it before

when the eyes were wide,
the fingers were dead; the world of raised letterforms,
unavailable

my heart is becoming deaf,
but finding meaning in a way that was not open to it before

when the ears were sensitive,
the eyes pre-conceived; the world of fresh signs,
overlooked

my heart is becoming mute,
but finding meaning in a way that was not open to it before

when the mouth ran on,
the ears grew stiff; the world of boundless harmony,
unheard

my heart is losing its mind,
but finding meaning in a way that it could only understand
after walking a new path
of learning
of knowing
of being

what sense is this?
which fingers grasp the idea of you?
which eyes are open for your light?

my heart grows an entire body around it
though one existed before

my heart causes an entire body to inflate
into the one the existed before

what pushes on the walls of my old self,
wanting out?

am i to burst, or am i to shed,
what was once dead,
what was once me?

your place in the world (2014)

you are a single gem in the diamond necklace of the world
next to all others, your shimmer joins in the collective
and there is only the symphony of all,
each note perfectly timed

but set apart, we can truly examine
what is you
your depth, your clarity;
what you bring to a darkened night

look at you, in perfect harmony
look at you, a part of the whole
look at you, so capable of being;
so sure of your place in the world.