Communion

COMMUNION

As I search

This world I know

The more I see

The more I grow

I’ve had many dreams

And as time, comes to pass

They seem to evaporate, alas

The one constant

That remains

Ti’s the certainty

Of growing pains

And the dross of self

Like weighted chains

We must ourselves develop

Lest lethargy and loss

Our-self envelop

The destiny, that we control

Compared to our dreams

May seem droll

But the essence is

Developing our soul

What better

More lofty goal

If what I understand is true

This world of ours

Will see it’s due

And we will awaken one day

To a world more true

We will find ourselves

In another place

Among the whole

Of the human race

Beyond this understanding

Of time and space

What we’ve done

In this world of ours

Our birth from suffering

Our growth from scars

Will determine our place

Among those eternal stars

How fleeting it seems

Are those lost dreams

When compared in purpose

To what God deems

For His words given

The purpose of which

Many souls have striven

Is to prepare us

For the world to come

And the truest self

That we become

-Shiidon, March 2011

There are different sources of inspiration for my poems. Many times it is my muse of the time, whether a person or a place, but sometimes it is something else. This poem bears it's beginnings at this time when I am fasting. The Bahá''í calendar is divided into nineteen months with nineteen days each and 4-5 days that are intercalary days each year. The Bahá'í new year is the first day of Spring, or March 21st. The month directly preceding the new year is our month of fasting. So, after that long explanation I sit here on the twelfth day of no food or drink between sunrise and sunset. It is interesting what occupies your time when you don't watch TV, live alone and then find yourself not spending time focusing on this world of needs such as food and drink. One of my favorite quotes helps explain this and I will post it at the end of this post. There is a lot of self reflection that happens now for me. I find myself reflecting on attachment and detachment. After I wrote this poem I looked at it and sat wondering where it came from. The words just flew at me as I wrote it and I was able to document was was emoting from my heart at the time.

I have come to realize how short life is and how much time is wasted on wishing for, or dreaming on things that may or may not come to pass. I have no friendships that I consider changed in my life. I could see or not see someone over time and to me I can pick up right where things were before. I look at my life and the lives of others and realize that we are all faced with our own challenges to overcome and those can bring us together or take us apart. There is still, however, the language of the heart. I do believe that we commune together in the next plain of existence. I think that we are not as separated from it as we think we are. I believe that the fears and misunderstandings that we sometimes have towards each other are nonexistent there. So, I act as if that is the case. The only time that it seems to hurt though, is when I expose my inner self and allow someone to see my vulnerabilities. I never know if they have truly understood me or not. That is in some small way why I write these poems and post these comments. It is a way of attempting to be understood.

For now, this bird is briefly soaring in the skies.

Ye are even as the bird which soareth, with the full force of its mighty wings and with complete and joyous confidence, through the immensity of the heavens, until, impelled to satisfy its hunger, it turneth longingly to the water and clay of the earth below it, and, having been entrapped in the mesh of its desire, findeth itself impotent to resume its flight to the realms whence it came. Powerless to shake off the burden weighing on its sullied wings, that bird, hitherto an inmate of the heavens, is now forced to seek a dwelling-place upon the dust. Wherefore, O My servants, defile not your wings with the clay of waywardness and vain desires, and suffer them not to be stained with the dust of envy and hate, that ye may not be hindered from soaring in the heavens of My divine knowledge. -Bahá'u'lláh, Gleanings page 323