This World Which Is Made of Our Love for Emptiness
Praise to the emptiness that blanks out existence. Existence:
This place made from our love for that emptiness!
Yet somehow comes emptiness,
this existence goes.
Praise to that happening, over and over!
For years I pulled my own existence out of emptiness.
Then one swoop, one swing of the arm,
that work is over.
Free of who I was, free of presence, free of dangerous fear, hope,
free of mountainous wanting.
The here-and-now mountain is a tiny piece of a piece of straw
blown off into emptiness.
These words I’m saying so much begin to lose meaning:
Existence, emptiness, mountain, straw:
Words and what they try to say swept
out the window, down the slant of the roof.
I did not realize they had R & B in the 13th century when Rumi said, “Dancing is not just getting up painlessly, like a leaf blown on the wind; dancing is when you tear your heart out and rise out of your body to hang suspended between the worlds.”
Is that an out of body experience? When the music touches your soul and allows you to forget any body movements or awkwardness that is when you are totally connected to the music as it was intended by the composer.
Years ago, I went to a blues club and listened to this live band. The music was so good, I could not help but get up from my table and start moving to the music. My date was a bit uncomfortable but wanted to be a gentleman and not let me dance alone since there was no dance floor at this place. So he started dancing with me. At the break, the singer of the band came to sit with us. He looked at me and said point blank, “You are not from Toronto” which was where this club was. He said it was the nicest compliment to musicians when people cannot help but get up and dance to the music they are playing. I had not been out to bars much but the few places I had been in Montreal and our Jazz festival with music in the street…people just dance when the music moves them.
I remember another time my partner at the time told me when I was dancing to soul music, that he felt I was in another world, “It’s as if you don’t even know that I`m here.” He appeared disappointed that the music took hold of me and away from him. Unfortunately, I don’t think he actually “heard” the same music I did.
Listening to good music especially R & B and just sitting down to listen feels so constricted…almost like we are being punished by teasing us with the melodies and we are confined to our seats. It is like having an itch and you are not allowed to scratch it. What do you do when you hear music that truly moves you?
eyes closed swaying to the beat out of body dancing freely like a child the spirit moves
[…] “Let the beauty of what you love be what you do.” […] Rumi
There is no question the love she has for her children and their children; they are from her, a part of her extending into the future. And as she is like a daisy with each petal depicts the multiplicity of her personality, hence, several petals group together forming another passion…her love of reaching out to those in need.
pain bleeds
late in the night – and then,
gentle sigh of relief
sweetens the night air
voice of comfort
With snow-filled sidewalks, I’m forced to walk home on the street. Snow plows were only clearing main arteries and our bus skidded a few times across le Pont Champlain. Challenging snow drifts made me only appreciate more, the crunch crunch underfoot upon virgin snow.
