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Hafiz,
Awake a while.
Just one True moment of Love
Will last for days.
—Daniel Ladinsky, I Heard God Laughing: Renderings of Hafiz
Stay out of the shade, my Love,
Come out, I’m waiting,
Quit curling up under the brush,
Never return,
Decide that now, not later,
Don’t wait for anyone’s permission,
Lose all your friends, if you must,
Let your family think you weird, if you must,
Become a fool to your religion, if you must,
Be declared insane, if you must,
Be lonely, if that is the consequence,
There is no time to delay,
Why delay when the Light waits outside to kiss you?
Only the Sun can keep you smiling
In a world like this;
Only Love deserves your allegiance,
All else will, finally, forsake you.
Do you dare listen to me?
Don’t go and get a book
To learn how to write a few verses;
An orchestra is already playing—
Listen to your heart!
God peeped out, with a smile, said:
Boo!
What will be your reply?
—Brian K. Wilcox
Poetry is not meant to be figured out. Poetry does not explain, poetry invites. Poetry woos by impreciseness. Poetry is a window. Poetry is a pond reflecting something. Maybe that is why so many mystics are poets and so few theologians and preachers are poets. Poetry does not thrive where everyone has to be inside with the windows and doors tightly shut. Poetry is not interested in such allegiance and safety. Poetry does not sit with the majority. Poetry throws one out into the world, even into the heavens. Poetry plunges one into the deep and hangs her from a tree, and she is laughing, swinging like a monkey—a child again, a child again! Stay away from poetry if you do not want to die. Let poetry steal your heart and take you, you do not know where, if you want to live in Love, now and forever. Become ashes, and never repent. Or, one can choose not to die and stay with the others under the brush and call such mere existence life.
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