We can’t be happy, Hafiz says, until we discover we’re not who we think we are. Then he leans near, whispers… So… how are we going to pull that off? I think he’s going somewhere with this. I can’t help myself: I’m grinning like the operator of a prison search light who’s secretly pulling for the inmates to escape and run riot, waiting for my Friend’s next words to bust through the cell block wall and stride […]
One night when Hafiz was working the phones, a call came in. The man began by announcing that he had a few questions, as if he were preparing his counter party for a barrage of heavy artillery. The way he said it made it sound like he had a few answers, too. Look, he said, you can’t really know if there is anything beyond this life or not, but consider: if there isn’t a God, […]
However you came to this point, however you made contact with your inner geometry, whatever brought you to the point of finally placing all your stock into who you are, into that infinitesimal droplet of radiance lurking in your chest of which you’ve but caught fleeting glimpses, not yet even knowing what they might be, it doesn’t really matter. You’re here. Let’s leave it at that. However you came to this point, all we can […]
If you make a plot of human population over the past few thousand years, the results are– well listen, let’s speak plainly here, as friends who have not the time for posturing or taking offense: the results are startling. If you are inclined towards levity you may even have a chuckle as you gape at the steeply rising curve and reflect upon the multiplicative industriousness of the recent age. Experts in prognostication and the statistical arts such as […]
“The way will be muddy and seemingly alone, even when you find yourself in crowds, even when all the refugees are funneled together through a narrow pass. You will find yourself trying to avoid being crushed, trying to avoid being left behind, trying to avoid being starved, trying to avoid being plundered. You may dream of blue skies and sunlight, but your path will wind beneath overcast skies and sprinkling rain. You may dream of virgin […]
Sometimes me and the boys like to go on jaunts. Get outta’ the office. Fact-finding missions what we call ’em. Get a handful of shirt, press crumpled cotton fists towards unsuspecting chins and make eyes into accusatory coals. Speak calmly while turning the place upside down to shake it for loose evidence. This will only take a moment, sir. See what coins fall out and jangle to rest on the pavement like glaring statements of […]
That longing at the center of your being is Hafiz and Christ, the Buddha, ten thousand angelic beings, my mother, your great great Uncle so and so, the not so famous one, his pet Lhasa Apso Louie, along with everyone you’ve ever loved and ever will love and all their friends and neighbors plus a few party crashers and so on and so forth– hell, it may as well be Love Itself!– shouting and waving […]
One morning Hafiz was giving a seaside discourse on the subject of Love. The wind was whipping in off the surf, causing flags to flutter and hats to fly. Overhead, gray clouds and brilliant sun were vying for dominance, swirling around one another so that the sky appeared to boil like a kettle. A woman near the back stood to ask a question. “What about the hockey problem?” The wind carried her words directly from […]
Once, when he was still learning his craft of ushering the anxious and doubtful from the shadows of falsehood to the river of poetry at the center of their own being, and in a well-intentioned effort to raise the general morale, Hafiz gave away two court-side seats to the Explosion of the Sun. Because, as we all know, sometimes having something to look forward to can make all the difference. In this particular case, the […]
Barreling down life’s asphalt highway in a vehicle of some description– a modern coup of surface rocketry whose every line represents the fulfillment of computerized crash-testing and the collected fall-out of Greek ideas, gathered like a powder, fired in the furnace of time and sculpted into the shape of silent, diving falcons– a machine built for catapulting over the ground in space-blurring borings through wind and air that leave behind a shimmering, perfectly tubular quiet […]
Embracing Forever 