WALLED GARDEN TRANSLATIONS

The road your self must journey on lies in polishing the mirror of your heart. - Sanai, tr. David Pendlebury But if I hold my mirror to the sun, I can’t pretend the two of these are one and same: although the image of the sun is in the mirror, it is not the sun itself; likewise the mirror itself is one thing and the image is another. One may never know a thing about the sun and still reflect its light, just as the sun may shine its rays of light on everyone but never be diminished. I am one who looks through cloudy skies, and I am one whose eyes are sometimes clouded, so the sun and what I would perceive are not the same; whatever else, the sun is not to blame.

We tried reasoning our way to Him: it did not work... Reason took us as far as the door; but it was his presence that let us in. -  Sanai, tr. David Pendlebury Reason started writing. Self became the paper. Matter took form and Form took shape. Love, be encouraged; Trembling, be reserved. Reason, be instructed, Self, become aware: As long as you are here Your portion is your tomb, Your home is distraction And you live in deceit, But set your eyes on the willow, Let your soul see paradise; Let your lips pronounce the letters And perceive their deeper meaning With your soul. While your pleasure is desire And desire is your treasure You remain a little child: Carry on, play away, But you return with nothing From the ocean but foam And empty possessions Scattered all around you Like oyster shells Marking your obsession But mis...

(A Restatement from David Pendlebury’s Garden) The non-existent have come to serve at the door of true existence, nor is it just today that this is so but since time began dervishes have come bereft of wealth and power, swarming like ants at the door of love. ...No one knows how far it is from nothingness to God, but the self will wander right and left day and night for years and years turning around itself like an ox in the mill; break free from yourself, free yourself from yourself and in little time the wandering will cease and the door will open to you.

When love sets fire to your soul and lifts it from its place its foot no longer touches ground; love whispers, the ground moves and stagnant reasons disappear; you are no longer there; Your feet begin to move, just as a river finds the ocean with no more talk of searching; you are nothing but the river and there is nothing in the end but the ocean of God.

God knows what depths and shallows each soul can navigate, the draught of every creature. God creates... – Sanai, tr. Coleman Barks ...and through this sacred rhythm I come to appreciate that everything is sacred. God creates and bestows each godly wisdom within. There is no mind. Another knowing lives outside of time, beyond the basic neurons that spark our mortal fire, above the carnal pulse of our desire; nor can I have desire of such capacity to wish for all that God has given me. Before this altar silence becomes my eloquence and emptiness my path to sustenance, and I will find tomorrow connected to today, and I will learn to celebrate the way that God has set before me, this day, my daily earth, the life I live, the wisdom I am worth.

(A Restatement of Coleman Barks’ Wild Rose of Praise) Those unable to grieve are a vacant wind; Those unable to speak their love are as cold as hammered steel; Those who are ungrateful are frightened of themselves; and those who cannot remember God have grown older than the hills. Say the name, O wild rose, speak the unpronounceable; Moisten your lips, move your tongue and praise the indescribable; Utter the words of every spring waking the divine; Open your mouth, O wild rose, and reveal your hidden gold.

I have no argument for you, my friend; no matter how the fires of conviction burn within, I shall remain conspicuously calm, let others recommend the course of conversation, let them render judgment on us all: no less convicted, they of the open air, until the flicker of their flame surrenders to the wind. For you, my friend, I have no argument but the wind itself: may it ever fuel your dance and feed your soul and start your turbines turning; and that inner fire, may it be your self content: even as the wind begins to rage against you, may you ever keep your spirits trimmed and burning.

The sun of truth rises unbidden, and with it sets the moon of learning. In this halt of just a week, to be is not to be, and to come is to go. - Sanai, tr. David Pendlebury For all that I know, that which I’ve learned, I am a moon that mirrors a distant fire: I watch the sun rise, but my reflected brilliance fades with the light of day. For all that I know, that which I’ve found, I am a rooster that crows in the early dawn: I turn toward the fire, but all my hallelujahs fade with the light of day. This is what I know:   As long as I am living the sun will shine, and the sun will shine when I am gone, and the moon will rise and the rooster will crow and the shadows will stir and the gardens will grow. For all that I know, or I suppose, I am a wildflower in a garden of shadows: I stretch towards the fire, but every morning glo...

I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all the power of the enemy; nothing will harm you. However, do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven. - Luke 10:19-20 (NIV) It is better, in this beehive, to be tailored in the truth of humility than underdressed in the lies of violence. This is no place to be naked and raving. Leave your strength at the door and put on the armor of lowliness. God will recognize your allegiance, and you will trample the heights of heaven beneath your feet.

This is how you are to bless.... - Numbers 6:23 (NIV) The grand design of the universe proceeds regardless of apologies and creeds, no matter what’s believed or not believed: that God exists precedes how God’s perceived and all the universe thus far perfected is God’s reality on us reflected. What good, then, if we separate the light into a thousand rays of wrong and right when there is truth in each ray we receive? I may not always know what to believe, but I believe that God’s expecting me to keep reflecting everything I see without distortion, judgment or rejection and faithful to the source of my reflection. God bless thee, wolf or Joseph, small or great, and keep thee all the same by wrath or mercy unbiased by thy aid or opposition, no matter what thy rank or reputation; God shine His face upon thee for thy favor and turn His face toward thee for thy peace regardless of thy service ...

Love is charity, and charity is giving with nothing to gain. Love is serenity, courage, wisdom, the considerations of change. Love is peace beyond understanding, a song in the silence, a calm in the storm. Love walks through the noisy street and delights in being a part of it. Love stands in an open field and listens to the song.

Was once a man could tell the difference, could see into the souls of fools: once was the kind of man who measured ignorance with ridicule, who magnified the flaws of every mote in his periphery with arrogance: but let the evidence speak for itself, just as it always does: “Saffron, my friend, what have you heard of it? I said Saffron, fool, what have you seen of it? You know its name, you taste it every day, but say just a word of it and you give yourself away.” Was once a man of quiet innocense and simple faith in everything that was in front of him, whose life experience confirmed what he believed, who had no cause to quarrel with the things he could not see, no arguments with those whose arguments defined what they denied, who simply was. “Saffron, you ask, what have I heard of it beyond its name, what do I know of it? I have it by me, of this I can be sure, and it is goo...

Being told we are made in the image of God, we imagine: the foot that walks beside, the hand that reaches out, the fingers and the touch and the change of place, the grace of one descending, the image of a man, the form of one who sits upon a throne with a face that shines upon us and words to gather round, with flesh and blood and a body to embrace. It is this God that we imagine, this God we wear around our necks, that leads to arguments and war, but I will believe there is a better God than this God of blind design, a greater God than mortals can conceive.

In time we are no longer testing the arguments that our experience will somehow make us stronger as if each pang of hunger itself were sustenance, as if the circumstance of age could make us younger. No more this vain pretending our skin gets tougher when we feel reality burn like the sun. We are born to suffer and bear our mortality; there will be no happy ending before this day is done. But this too is from the sun: a secondary fire cast from rippling waters, a flashing picture of the waters’ movement brushed upon the wall, and you start to see that everything is a mirror of a higher power of aboriginal light; But this too is from the sun: the bent reflection of passing souls on a dagger’s face whose verging angle and sharpened edge turn angels into devils, and you let your dagger talk to you, but it never tells you what is true or what is fa...

My heart is but a mirror in the fog of my own hypocrisy; my very soul is stained by the rust of doubt and unbelief, and the fog won’t lift and the rust won’t go away. God knows I’ve tried to make this mirror shine but all I have is spit and vinegar, a sprayer of hate and a rag of hostility, and the fog won’t lift and the rust won’t go away. “Faith,” I’m told, “will make your mirror shine: faith and the unstained virtue of your creed.” And so I turn my mirror to the sun and through the darkness I begin to pray: “Create in me a clean heart, O God, renew my spirit, help my unbelief ...that the fog would lift and the rust would go away.”

Sew no purse, tear no veil, lick no plate, buy no flattery. See no colors, make no claims. Look past form, shape and shade, everything defined in terms of evil, good, black and white, but let the air be hot and wet, let the earth feel cold and dry. Let there be no contradiction. Fire is hot and water wet, everything defined; fire dry and water cold for all Eternity, and yet without the quintessential word laying down Eternity everything is argument and all things contradict.

1 There was a song before this song was sung. There was a rhyme Before these words were ever heard. There was a place and time Before we found our here and now, And there was poetry Before we wrote our poem down. Poetry precedes the poem, as Creation beats within a mother’s heart Before her child is born, as from the start What is or is about to happen has Forever been. Behold the poem of A rising sun or of the world that turns Towards its fire. Behold the fire that burns In lovers long before they fall in love. Behold the love. Behold the long before And look for more. Look for the energy Of dreamers who once flickered in the dark Like pilots to the dawn. Keep looking for The spirit pre-igniting every spark Of love, of mine for you and yours for me. 2 Once one is one and only one: the perfect unity... Of love, of mine for you and yours for me, Of late I haven’t had too m...

I have been bound to imagery and form, without regard to their source and eternity; I have taken scripture at its word, and found God’s essence in chapter and verse; and yet I have bowed down to devils wearing the rings of kings. “He sat upon the throne” was all I needed. I have praised the images in my church, never thinking of God as the artist; I have followed the form of the worship service never considering the contingencies. I have come to believe that God will send the devils on their way, but I have never dared to move beyond “He sat” to “He has no place.” I have been bound to the image of a throne and the form of one who wears a fitting crown; I have let the scriptures tell me what is true, as even “he that sat upon the throne revealed...” I have proudly worn my Christianity and celebrated God’s descendancy; I have put this at the center of my creed, believing that my God will come again,...

1 Once one is one and only one: the perfect unity; one less than this is emptiness. One finds one cannot be without the other; none’s the lover who can love alone, but when two lovers come together and become their own identity they start to see the journey they’ve begun, their heart and mind as one combined:  once one is one is one. 2 One unexpressed, no more, no less than one, will always be itself, the integer of individuality existing to exist. One who insists without a sound on keeping his position is a shadow on the ground, no more, no less than emptiness, a countenance unknown, a spirit unsuspected: one unmoving, one alone. 3 One added to one more is two, a plain duality and nothing less than two, unless each looks for unity receptively. Two cannot see as one as long as one turns from the other; none’s the l...

Reason, the traveler, never gets to God: the traveler’s heart and soul are dust upon the road; reason’s eyes are dry, unwashed by the love of God, and blind, unwise to the holiness of God. Reason, the innocent child, stirs up imagination out of darkness; the child is moved to discuss eternity with thoughtfulness and sensuality until God shows up and sweeps it all away. Reason, the ambitious bird, takes to the air, a sparrow claiming the ranks of Gabriel, but Reason too, like every Gabriel before the Lord, must one day bow its head and fold its wing. How can one describe God if Reason denies that God’s the One, the step at the start of the journey, and the image before the dream? How can one discuss God if God is just an argument and heaven is some distant place beyond the rank and file? O Lone Traveler, stumbling on your wicked soul, O Raw Youth, caught up in your shallow sense, ...

How can one describe God? What wins the argument? Speech is limited to comparison, Silence is sworn to dereliction, Reason travels far to reach amazement, Zeal arrives at self-enrichment, Imagination cannot find the truth, and Understanding turns to vanity. The prophets are confused by God, the saints are stupefied. God is the mind’s desire and master of the soul, the devotee’s commitment, the disciple’s goal, but all of this is beyond where reason goes, exists above existence, acts without regard to the usual bounds: There is no “in” or “out”, “how” or “why”.

How can one describe God? What wins the argument? I tried reasoning my way to God: it did not work; How can one know a way that cannot be known? Reason took me no further than the door, But in the end God’s presence let me in. I tried willing the door to open: it would not move. How can one see a face before it’s shown? My willfulness had gotten me this far, But in the end God’s presence let me in. If reason is incompetent to know its own nature And will is incapable of knowing itself, If I don’t seem to know the first thing about knowledge, Why would I think I could ever know God? I tried willing myself to God, but I lost my will; I tried reasoning my way to God, but in the end I t was God’s love and kindness that opened the door; I t was God’s grace and presence that let me in.

But what about this intellectual exercise of mine, stirring up the dust and shifting with the wind? If I can’t find my way to God unless God shows the way, there can be no mindless praise, but what about this praiseless mind of mine? And what about intelligence? The premise of creation, the covet of my soul is the core of my design, yet it’s nothing but a word, only one of many spoken, and it’s keeping me in place. I’m sworn to intelligence, another soldier standing at the gate. If love is perfected by love reciprocated, why must my intelligence be tethered to the ground? My mind, my very soul, is confounded and bewildered, beholden to the mind over mine.

I cannot wrap my mind around God’s ways. I cannot comprehend the shape of God, nor deign to understand the details of God’s intricate design, though I would try. I cannot stretch my soul around the grace of God. I cannot hold the scope of God, delivered and revealed so perfectly within my failing field of vision. I am blind, and yet I see that God occurs to me as God allows, despite these thoughts that drag their mortal chains, beyond these dreams that lag reality, and though my wings of reason God restrains God’s wisdom will prevail. Within God’s house, my reason is a guest; as God allows, a servant soul invited to the host’s parade; a child perpetually enrolled in the master’s school, rewriting what’s assigned with a crooked scrawl.