The poem
Don't call this world adorable, or useful, that's not it. It's frisky, and a theater for more than fair winds. The eyelash of lightning is neither good nor evil. The struck tree burns like a pillar of gold. But the blue rain sinks, straight to the white feet of the trees whose mouths open. Doesn't the wind, turning in circles, invent the dance? Haven't the flowers moved, slowly, across Asia, then Europe, until at last, now, they shine in your own yard? Don't call this world an explanation, or even an education. When the Sufi poet whirled, was he looking outward, to the mountains so solidly there in a white-capped ring, or was he looking to the center of everything: the seed, the egg, the idea that was also there, beautiful as a thumb curved and touching the finger, tenderly, little love-ring, as he whirled, oh jug of breath, in the garden of dust?
We as human beings tend to use words to conceptualize life as this or that when it is far more than that. We limit it when we attempt to make it a place for our human dramas and to make nature do our bidding in sketching out our interpretation of what life is and what it is not. It is far more than that. The world opens up in all of its uniqueness and is in every corner the mystery of life’s substance. It is not there to fulfill one’s ego’s trip. It is more than that. It is more than the breath and yet not less and all contained in the majesty of now....
I have been searching for a proper poem for my best friend that is not expected to live much longer, through all of these emotions I am walking with this poem depicts the natural state of phenomena of peace and cause and effect. I will be reading this to her memorial. Thank you.