Celebrating Our Colors

Tags

celebration, colors, poetry, spring

It was about a week or so today that the first color of spring first burst upon us by the fence line in the backyard. The two willows which we had planted when we first moved into our new home a few years have back have grown from a foot high to at least eight feet. Both of them were proudly sporting their full blooms of pink and white flowers that stood in contrast against the still-leafless trees of the forest. At first sight, they looked very much like the light coating of the first snow of a season that paints every branch of the willows with a delicate white. 

In the week since, the March of the blooms has been held back a bit with the weather going back and forth between winter and spring like a kid trying to master their new yo-yo. As a result, the hydrangeas are lying in wait for a consistent warmup before they will set forth their colors. After a couple of initial sightings, the orange breasted blackbirds have also seemingly slowed their migration to the backyard forest from the South. It has been left to the mallard ducks to add color to the local lake with their brilliant blues shining amid the many pairs of nesting geese.

The myriad colors of the season may be delayed, but I am sure that they won’t be denied. Like the Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore wrote in his “Song of the Bird”

O Flame of the Forest,
	All your flower-torches are ablaze;
You have kissed our songs red with the passion of your youth.

In the spring breeze the mango-blossoms launch their messages to the unknown
	And the new leaves dream aloud all day.


It is only a matter of time that the ‘flame of the forest’ shall kindle the hearts of the birds and along with them, we shall see that  ‘the flower-torches are ablaze’. The birds’ songs will be ‘kissed red by the passion of spring’, and the ‘leaves shall dream aloud all day.’ Isn’t it wonderful that we can trust the poets of the world to remind us that we can find color in any season if we choose to let poetry into our hearts? What would our lives be like if we allowed ourselves to add more color to our lives through art, prose, theater, dance and so much more that enlivens us?

Spring is as good a time as any to add more color to our lives than we currently may be enjoying. If you need an excuse to dive headlong into more color, perhaps consider the Indian festival of colors – Holi – which falls on the full moon day (March 7/8) this year. Wear some colorful clothes, splash some virtual paint on some screens, write a verse or few of poetry with a theme of your choosing, break out some real crayons or paint brushes, share some sweets with a neighbor and more. In short, do whatever will bring a bit of lightness and playfulness to your heart. That’s what a sense of color can do for our spirit. 

It can make us feel like ‘mango-blossoms (that) launch their messages to the unknown’. Who knows — we may even pause the asking of questions and simply immerse in the colors of spring for a moment. 

Kumud

P.S. Join us for our weekly gathering and conversation on twitter in #SpiritChat, Sunday March 5 at 9amET. We will share some colors with each other – bring your favorite pieces of poetry, artwork, artists, and more to share. I will bring some questions and treats. Namaste – @AjmaniK

Willow blossoms are the first to arrive with spring colors to the garden…

On Mystical Music

Tags

harmony, music, mysticism, poetry, spirituality, symphony

Pre-dawn bird symphonies
Eastward the swallow flies
Crescendo of Cicadas
Announces the heat’s rise

	Late afternoon fluttering
	Arrival of Monarch butterflies
	Flying in effortless tandem
	The whispers of dragonflies

Moths resting on wildflowers
Under clear blue summer skies
A hummingbird near evergreens?
Oh, such a sweet surprise!

	The soft breeze twirling purples
	In channels where rainwater lies
	The sunflowers embrace grace
	Closing till the next sunrise

Soft veil of late dusk
Broken by fireflies
The heart comes mystically alight
So what if it took a million tries?

If we still ourselves enough, it seems to be everywhere. The music of the mystical is the intangible rhythm of the universe that helps us attune our heart, again and again, to who we truly are.

Music that is in harmony with our heart can hold us, create time and space for us, and eventually heal us in ways that are beyond the limits of our intellect. No words need to be spoken in order to align our natural vibration with that of the universe. Such is the beauty of mystical resonance that has the ability to raise our energy amplitude to levels we never knew that we were capable of.

May we make time and space to immerse in that universal music. May we have the courage to sing our song, and the patience to hear their songs. May we accept the invitation to be the raindrop that merges in the ocean with love, and experiences the oneness that is a sweet harmony of truth, awareness and joy.

May the mystical music move us to sing our heart’s song, so that we may manifest all of the divinity within us.

Namaste.

Kumud

P.S. Join us for our weekly gathering in #SpiritChat on twitter, Sunday Aug 8 at 9amET / 630pm India. Bring your favorite music to share, as we chat over tea and listen to some butterflies🦋 ~ AjmaniK

The music of wildflowers in the rainwater channels

The Spirit of Loyalty

Tags

heart matters, loyalty, poetry, service, spirituality

“I am loyal to the throne. Who are you loyal to?”

It is interesting that we can watch a two-plus hour movie (during a polar vortex shut-in) filled with action, and the one fragment that adheres to us, days later. In the movie “Black Panther”, the question above was asked by Okoye (the General) of Nakia (the future Queen), in the moments after there is upheaval in the country of Wakanda.

I thought about the question that evening, and it kept returning to my brain box for a few days. I am still thinking about it. Let us begin at the beginning. What is loyalty? One definition of loyalty is a strong feeling of support of allegiance. The other synonyms are faithfulness, obedience, adherence, devotion and the like. It would seem that loyalty would be a good quality or virtue to develop in our character, yes?

Before we answer the original question (who are we loyal to?), maybe we can reflect on some related questions. Where does our sense of loyalty come from? What qualities in others incite, grow and sustain loyalty within us? What makes our loyalties wax and wane over time? Have you experienced real-world examples of long-term, unwavering, even permanent loyalty in your life? If so, how did such examples of loyalty influence you, your life?

Now that we have put the questions out upfront, we can reflect on them and probe for the answers. If we choose not to probe, we can cast the questions out like seeds, and wait for the answers to bloom in their own time. Either way, if we remain loyal to the process of asking, and then provide space and time for the answers to be received by us, the process has a chance of working. In this increasingly hurried world, we can perhaps reflect on the question – how loyal are we to the process of receiving (answers)?

But I digress a bit. As I asked myself some of the questions about loyalty, one common answer that seemed to emerge was that a lot of our loyalties, allegiances, adherences, even devotions – are transitional and transient in nature. Time and space and relationships change as we transit through life, and so do our loyalties. Even the long-term loyalties of satellites (moons) to planets are constantly changing (albeit ever so slightly) over time. (Aside: what examples of ‘deep loyalty’ may Mother Nature reveal to us?) So what chance do we mere mortals, of finite life-spans, have of developing and honoring permanent loyalty?

Maybe we need to look beyond, if we are to experience a permanent sense of loyalty. Our physical frames of existence and our actions within them, bound as they are by time, space and causation, are bound by impermanence. Hence, the resulting loyalties are (mostly) impermanent. What if we were to go beyond the physical, and into the spiritual domain? If we were to become and be meditative, examine our heartspace and feel our heartsense, what deeper loyalties may be revealed in That light?

Before she asked that question of Nakia, Okoye actually said… “I am loyal to the throne, no matter who sits on it“. If we ask the same question of our heart, what will be the reply? Who sits on our heart’s throne? Who are we really loyal to? Does that relationship have a nature of permanence?

Kumud @AjmaniK

On behalf of the #SpiritChat community, I invite you to join us for a conversation on this topic – Sunday, February 3 at 9amET / 730pm India. We would love to know – who sits on your heart’s throne? Namaste.

Postscript: Fragments of a poem, that keep coming, as answers to the question… if you can think of additions, please share in the comments… Namaste…

There may be be love without cause,
Just because…
But what is the nature, of cause without love?

There may be clouds without rain,
With loud refrain…
But what is the worth, of rain without clouds?

There may be heat without light,
Warming the night…
But have we felt the love, of light without heat?

There can be sight without vision,
A heart’s decision…
But can there be vision without sight?

– A Traveler’s Loyalty

On Giving and Grace

Tags

giving, grace, gratitude, poetry

It is mid November. The tall trees slowly shed their leaves in an act of seasonal giving. The forest floor cradles the precious gift of glorious colors with autumnal grace. The winds seem to shift from their warm hue to a coooler shade of blue. There is much talk of the upcoming ‘holidays’ in the air, and ‘thanksgiving’ is less than a week away.

It is perhaps time to reflect on how our practice of ‘giving’ and ‘receiving’ has evolved over the years. How can we make this ‘thanksgiving’ more filled with purpose than the ones of years past? It is relatively easy for us to be graceful and thankful in our acts of giving. How can we attach the same level of grace to our receiving? Can we become like the forest floor in autumn and let our hearts be wide open in our receiving?

As the wind whooshes through in the ‘wind tunnel’ between my home and the forest behind it, I clutch my cup of warm tea a little bit more firmly. It is as if I am trying to hold on to the sliver of summer’s residual warmth, before the onset of winter takes it away from me. The open book of Rumi’s poetry in front of me reminds me of grace…

Who is this with his hand out
saying, please, give just a little,
so I can give you a kingdom.

A little further on, I am reminded of eternity…

He makes this dying world eternal
His greatest alchemy
is how he does the unbinding
that keeps love from breathing deep.

And the value of patience…

Every second he changes cruelty
to loyal friendship.

We think of ourselves as ‘givers’ and ‘receivers’, and then there is this reminder…

Out of unconditioned emptiness
comes this planet with all its qualities.

And then, a nudge towards the grace of silence, of being, of becoming…

Be silent now.
Say fewer and fewer praise poems.
Let yourself become living poetry.
– Rumi in ‘Soul Houses’

Ever so slightly, I loosen my clasp on the warm cup of tea. I walk over to the tightly shut window, and loosen the latch to crack it open a little bit. The whooshing wind rushes in. Ever so slightly, in small actions performed with love, I yield. I am going to greet winter with grace. For it, I shall be thankful. Let me receive it with the same heart-filled-with-joy that I received summer, spring and autumn.

I may be excessive with my giveaway impulses,
but I still have what you gave
when you held my head against your chest
– Rumi in ‘What You Gave’

Let me take this opportunity to express my deep gratitude to every single one of you in the #SpiritChat community… Thank you for adding your grace to my life.

I will be silent now…

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. Join me and the #SpiritChat community as we explore ‘Giving and Grace’ – Sunday, November 19th at 9amEST / 2pm UTC / 7:30pm IST on twitter.

A Spirit of Reunion

Tags

lightness, poetry, reunion, spirituality, summer

I had been so busy with writing the technical paper and then putting the presentation together for the upcoming Aerospace conference that I had not walked the forest in almost two weeks. As I waited at the light at the bottom of the hill where I would normally go up the other side towards the West Gate and in to work, I glanced to my right and saw the bridge gleaming in the sunshine. Something tugged at my heart and said, come visit. We miss you.

So, I turned left at the light, parked in the first available space, and crossed over to the other side. On to the bridge, where now the clouds were playing hide and seek with the trusses. The lack of rain over the past few weeks had almost run the river aground, but not quite. I decided to turn right immediately after the bridge, with the idea of climbing the steep hill to walk the trail on the plateau above. But, it was not to be. The river had other plans for me. Ever so imperceptibly, she slowed down my walk, and brought me to a standstill.

And then, the flow of words began. I paid attention, listened, and wrote… I share a few of them with you.

The river runs so shallow
Yet the hill still rises steep
In walking these old trails
What new promises do I keep?

The air so still
Yet the singing of birds deep
I take in all the stillness
Into my core does the Joy sink deep; 

I stopped wondering long ago
Who is this muse that comes calling,
Amid the crescendo of the cicadas 
In the silence of the water falling; 

The invitation on some mornings
Is simply too powerful to resist
I try going towards the sun, 
but am imperceptibly lured by the mist; 

I came to walk long trails
Yet she has me rooted, standing still
Sit with me a while and visit she says 
Save for another day, the fragile hill; 

Summer is only here for so long
Like a firefly her light is fleeting
I am so honored that you invited me to stay
You raised my spirits with this brief meeting; 

If you will just stay that little bit longer 
Beneath the waters lie many a great treasure
So many dream of an endless summer
Yet of this moment they take little measure...

On this day, I experienced a beautiful reunion with nature, in a quiet oasis that invited me to be still. I arrived ‘empty handed’, yet left with a great treasure of poetry, peace, and a reminder to not stay away for too long. Have you participated in any reunions lately? Are you planning any in the near future? And how about your inner reunion with Joy, Awareness and Pure Existence? How do you experience That (re)union on a regular, even daily basis? Or have you forgotten…

Namaste,

Kumud @AjmaniK

I invite you to reunite with us in #SpiritChat on Sunday, July 16th at 9amET/1pmUTC on twitter – and particularly so if you have been away for a while. We hope you will bring some goodies to share.

The nature trails called, and I answered… only to stand still in reunion

The Spirit of a Poet

Tags

poetry, poets, spirit, spiritchat, spirituality

Come, Come, whoever you are: 
Wanderer, worshiper, lover of leaving. 
Ours is not a caravan of despair!

  -Jalaluddin Rumi

Writing poetry – cheap therapy!
All it costs is time,
And heart and some paper,
And it doesn’t have to rhyme!

     -Helena,  @VegyPower on Twitter, also @mysticpoetry

 April is National Poetry Month in the USA and this week’s #SpiritChat is devoted to Poetry!

 I’m delighted and grateful that Kumud asked me to co-host this week’s #SpiritChat.  Above are two poems with very different histories.  The first is from Rumi, a 13th-century Persian poet.  He’s the best-selling poet the USA.  The second is by me, an unknown!

 With these poems we invite you to join a poetic caravan of spirit for #SpiritChat, this Sunday, April 13, at 9:00 a.m. Eastern Time.

 Share your original or favorite lines of poetry during the Twitter chat.  It doesn’t have to be “spiritual” poetry! (Some may say that all poetry is spiritual, and we’ll explore that.)

 You can post as much of the poem as will fit into a tweet, or entice us by posting a line and then the link to the entire poem.

 My poetry adventure began when I was in 3^rd grade.  My teacher told me that she was asked to choose ONE STUDENT to participate in a haiku workshop.  She added, “I thought you’d appreciate it.”  I felt happy and surprised that she chose ME!  I didn’t know she knew me so well.  I enjoyed it very much, and, was hooked on haiku!

 Fast forward forty years:  I decided to “give back” by offering an after-school enrichment class called “Fun with Poetry” at an elementary school.  I wanted to ignite the spark of love for poetry, just as that haiku workshop did for me.  The emphasis was on FUN, with the hope that students would want to continue to read and write poetry.  I still have the notes of appreciation written by the parents of my poetry kids!

 In high school, I took an elective course in poetry. The truth is that I registered only because my then-boyfriend was a poet.  That relationship didn’t last but my relationship with poetry did!

 As a child, poetry for me was an art form.  As a young adult its role matured into an expression of the spiritual journey. 

I was introduced to the Sufi mystic poets Rumi, Hafiz, and Kabir in 1973 at age twenty-one, while reading the books of my spiritual teacher, Sant Kirpal Singh (1894-1974).  http://www.sos.org/page/rich-heritage.html  

He often quoted the Sufi mystics to illustrate a subtle idea.  Like them, he wrote poetry:

Like a lotus flower with its head above the muddy pool, we should live in the world and yet be out of it.

     -Sant Kirpal Singh

 These poems speak of the inner journey that each soul on the spiritual path eventually experiences.

My beloved teacher left this earth in 1974.  His son, Sant Darshan Singh (1921-1989) http://www.sos.org/page/rich-heritage.html  carried on the work of initiating seekers into a form of meditation called Surat Shabd Yoga (translation: “the yoga of putting one’s attention on the Inner Light and Music”). http://www.sos.org/page/meditation-connecting-with-our-soul.html

When the flowers of the church, mosque & temple gather together,
Spring will blossom forth in Your garden, O Lord.

     -Sant Darshan Singh

 Sant Darshan Singh had majored in Persian literature, and, like his father, was a poet.  He wrote traditional Sufi poetry in Urdu, and translated his verses into English.  He received the Urdu Academy Award for Poetry four times. His pen name was, simply, DARSHAN.  One of his verses is:

Poetry is the music of the heart,
And music is the poetry of the soul.

 I was blessed to have attended many of his programs in the 1980s during his visits to the United States.  These talks were intoxicating, lyrical events that included periods of silent meditation as well as poetry.  He cited his verses to illustrate the topic of the evening.

(Sant Darshan Singh is the author of a book titled, LOVE AT EVERY STEP: MY CONCEPT OF POETRY.)

From one of his poems:

Begin to live your life according to your aspirations
And step toward your chosen goal.
Life is not worth Its name
Unless we meet the challenge of the times.
Play on the instrument of the heart,
Even if it be broken.

My heart was, indeed, broken when Sant Darshan left this world in 1989.  His work is being carried on today by Sant Rajinder Singh, a spiritual Master who often speaks poetically:

There is a silken thread of love which connects each and every one of us.

And…

When we strip away the world and the mind, we find ourselves as a drop of love.

     -Sant Rajinder Singh

(You can learn more about Sant Rajinder Singh Ji Maharaj at the website of Science of Spirituality, www.sos.org.  and on twitter at @Global_SOS. It’s a non-profit, multi-faith, global organization dedicated to love, unity, peace, and service.)

I love words.  Here’s a recent haiku:

Having the right word,
Having the right screwdriver:
Humanity’s tools.

Thanks again to Kumud Ajmani, the host of #SpiritChat, for inviting me to co-host. 

Come, come, whoever you are, to #SpiritChat on Twitter this Sunday, April 13, 2014 at 9:00 a.m. Eastern Time. 

Ours is not a caravan of despair! 

(Apologies to Rumi.  I have a feeling he’s a good sport.)

 Namaste

Helena @VegyPower and @mysticpoetry

(Thank you, Helena, for this beautiful post about poetry and how it has influenced you and your spirituality. I invite all readers to add their poetry or their favorite poets in the comments. Thank you! – Kumud @AjmaniK)

Postscript:

The full transcript (with stats and more) is available at http://bit.ly/sc-tr-0413 (96 contributors, 1.3M reach, 1320 tweets, 7.1M deliveries)

A “curated” (and much more readable) summary via the storify web service is available at http://sfy.co/ggdY

Questions:

Q1. The Spirit of a Poet. What does this invoke in your heart? In your mind? #SpiritChat

Q2. Do you have a fave type of poetry (haiku, sonnet, couplet, ghazal, etc.)? What do you love about it? v/@VegyPower #SpiritChat

Q3. What purpose does poetry serve in your life? Is it even important? Why so? v/@VegyPower #SpiritChat

Q4. What is the connection between poetry, meditation, and silence? #SpiritChat

Q5. What is it about poetry that influences our spirit differently, than, say, prose? Or does it? #SpiritChat

Q6. “To have great poets, we need great audiences too” – Agree or Disagree? Why? #SpiritChat

Q7. Please share lines of an original poem or a favorite poem by another poet. Links welcome 🙂 v/@VegyPower #SpiritChat

Q8. For those wanting to write poetry… Where does a poem truly begin? Where does it end? #SpiritChat

The Spirit of Children – SpiritChat Topic for Sun Sep 18

Tags

children, poetry, quotes, spirit, spiritchat

A great man is one who has not lost the child’s heart

                            ~ Mencius (372-289 BCE)

We all have experienced the pure joy of being with children ~ whether they are ours or other people’s. There is something about their innocence and purity of Spirit that reminds us perhaps of our own purity and innocence.

I have often heard, and I believe it to be true, that “Children are our Future”. And indeed they are. As a parent, I have developed a great appreciation for the fact that we need to do whatever we can to give them the best environment possible that preserves their innocence and gentle spirit for as long as possible.

This was confirmed to me this week, in perhaps the busiest week of my professional career in a while, in the midst of all the great things that were happening, through this dialogue with my daughter as I got her ready for school.

As breakfast approached on Friday, I asked her, “What do you want for breakfast sweetie?” She thought for a second, and then said, “How about toast?” I know she loves butter on toast., but, I asked anyway ~ “What would you like on your toast?”

Without hesitation, she said “How about YOU on toast Dad!”

I couldn’t help but smile. She must have seen something in my face, perhaps the accumulated weariness of the week gone by, and she wanted to make me smile. My immediate response was ~ “But that’s silly! I won’t fit on the toast!”.

And she said ~ “It’s OK Dad. Just put butter. But, I Love You!”

A simple fifteen second conversation had put my whole week in perspective. My mental exhaustion disappeared in a flash ~ and it took the tender spirit of a child to teach me a great lesson: The ones we Love, particularly children, can always make us smile 🙂

So, I am inspired to invite all of you to share in this coming week ~ let us talk about the “Spirit of Children”. Their uniqueness, their lightness, their radiance and their Love.

Please join us to kick off the discussion on Sunday Sep 18th at 9am ET / 1pm GMT in a chat on twitter with the hashtag #SpiritChat. The morning discussion will be followed by an evening discussion at 7pm PT / 10pm ET and flow into the week.

I leave you with a brief poem by William Wordsworth (1770-1850) titled My Heart Leaps

My heart leaps up when I behold

A rainbow in the sky;

So was it when my life began,

So is it now I am a man;

So be it when I shall grow old,

Or let me die!

The Child is the father of the Man;

And I could wish my days to be

Bound each to each by natural piety.

Kumud