(Piero di Cosimo – A Satyr Mourning over a Nymph)
Drink from this heart now,
for all this loving it contains.
When you look for it again,
it will be dancing in the wind. – Shaikh Abu Saeed Abil Kheir
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Greetings Friends!
Back again, working with the new shorter format. We have some great music, poetry, and a sweet folktale from Wales. Click on the Piero di Cosimo paintings, they are quite large and detail rich.
This entry is based around the poetry of Shaikh Abu Saeed Abil Kheir, a great Persian Sufi Poet. I am now selecting the poetry first, and moving forward with it in mind as the central theme to any edition. We will play with this a bit and see how it feels. Any feedback would be appreciated!
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Life is sweet at the apex of the solar year here in Portland, except it has been raining extensively (though I enjoy it at night). It has been a cool spring and early summer here, but the berries are going wild locally. The robins are all back, and digging up the back yard for worms and nesting material at a furious rate.
The raccoon’s are using our fence at night as a highway, you can here them barreling through at all hours after midnight upsetting the local hounds. The squirrels are a bit sparse, bespeaking the local feline populations hunting skills. I have never seen so few of the squirrel clan locally. Usually, our yard is swarming with them, but not this year.
Rowan (my son) graduated from college last week. We had a big blow out for him, and he was working the Monday after graduating at his first paid professional job. We have high hopes for him!
I hope this finds you all well, and enjoying the fruits of the mid-summer. I hope all of our relatives in the UK are on high ground with the recent flooding, and I pray your life is sweet and bountiful.
Bright Blessings,
Gwyllm
On The Menu:
Music: NeoMorpheous – Carbon Based Lifeforms – Interconnected Conscioussness Mix
Poetry: Shaikh Abu Saeed Abil Kheir – “Nobody, Son of Nobody”
From Wales: The Shepherd of Myddvai
Featured Artist: Piero di Cosimo
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NeoMorpheous – Carbon Based Lifeforms – Interconnected Conscioussness Mix
Full Album!
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Shaikh Abu Saeed Abil Kheir – “Nobody, Son of Nobody”
If you are seeking closeness to the Beloved,
love everyone.
Whether in their presence or absence,
see only their good.
If you want to be as clear and refreshing as
the breath of the morning breeze,
like the sun, have nothing but warmth and light
for everyone.
~~
Beloved, show me the way out of this prison.
Make me needless of both worlds.
Pray, erase from mind all
that is not You.
Have mercy Beloved,
though I am nothing but forgetfulness,
You are the essence of forgiveness.
Make me needless of all but You.
~~
Piousness and the path of love
are two different roads.
Love is the fire that burns both belief
and non-belief.
Those who practice Love have neither
religion nor caste.
~~
Be humble.
Only fools take pride in their station here, trapped in
a cage of dust, moisture, heat and air.
No need to complain of calamities,
this illusion of a life lasts but a moment.
~~
Suppose you can recite a thousand holy
verses from memory.
What are you going to do
with your ego self, the true
mark of the heretic?
Every time your head touches
the ground in prayers, remember,
this was to teach you to
put down that load of ego
which bars you from entering
the chamber of the Beloved.
To your mind feed understanding,
to your heart, tolerance and compassion.
The simpler your life, the more meaningful.
The less you desire of the world,
the more room you will have in it
to fill with the Beloved.
The best use of your tongue
is to repeat the Beloved’s Name in devotion.
The best prayers are those in
the solitude of the night.
The shortest way to the Friend
is through selfless service and
generosity to His creatures.
Those with no sense of honor and dignity are best avoided.
Those who change colors constantly
are best forgotten.
The best way to be with those
bereft of the Beloved’s qualities,
is to forget them in the
joy of silence in one’s corner of solitude.
~~
If you do not give up the crowds
you won’t find your way to Oneness.
If you do not drop your self
you won’t find your true worth.
If you do not offer all you
have to the Beloved,
you will live this life free of that
pain which makes it worth living.
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(Piero di Cosimo – Battle of Lapiths and Centaurs)
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From Wales: The Shepherd of Myddvai
Up in the Black Mountains in Caermarthenshire lies the lake known as Lyn y Van Vach. To the margin of this lake the shepherd of Myddvai once led his lambs, and lay there whilst they sought pasture. Suddenly, from the dark waters of the lake, he saw three maidens rise. Shaking the bright drops from their hair and gliding to the shore, they wandered about amongst his flock. They had more than mortal beauty, and he was filled with Jove for her that came nearest to him. He offered her thebread he had with him, and she took it and tried it, but then sang to him:
Hard-baked is thy bread,
’Tis not easy to catch me,
and then ran off laughing to the lake.
Next day he took with him bread not so well done, and watched for the maidens. When they came ashore he offered his bread as before, and the maiden tasted it and sang:
Unbaked is thy bread,
I will not have thee,
and again disappeared in the waves.
A third time did the shepherd of Myddvai try to attract the maiden, and this time he offered her bread that he had found floating about near the shore. This pleased her, and she promised to become his wife if he were able to pick her out from among her sisters on the following day. When the time came the shepherd knew his love by the strap of her sandal. Then she told him she would be as good a wife to him as any earthly maiden could be unless he should strike her three times without cause. Of course he deemed that this could never be; and she, summoning from the lake three cows, two oxen, and a bull, as her marriage portion, was led homeward by him as his bride.
The years passed happily, and three children were born to the shepherd and the lake-maiden. But one day here were going to a christening, and she said to her husband it was far to walk, so he told her to go for the horses.
“I will,” said she, “if you bring me my gloves which I’ve left in the house.”
But when he came back with the gloves, he found she had not gone for the horses; so he tapped her lightly on the shoulder with the gloves, and said, “Go, go.”
“That’s one,” said she.
Another time they were at a wedding, when suddenly the lake-maiden fell a-sobbing and a-weeping, amid the joy and mirth of all around her.
Her husband tapped her on the shoulder, and asked her, “Why do you weep?”
“Because they are entering into trouble; and trouble is upon you; for that is the second causeless blow you have given me. Be careful; the third is the last.”
The husband was careful never to strike her again. But one day at a funeral she suddenly burst out into fits of laughter. Her husband forgot, and touched her rather roughly on the shoulder, saying, “Is this a time for laughter?”
“I laugh,” she said, “because those that die go out of trouble, but your trouble has come. The last blow has been struck; our marriage is at an end, and so farewell.”
And with that she rose up and left the house and went to their home.
Then she, looking round upon her home, called to the cattle she had brought with her:
Brindle cow, white speckled,
Spotted cow, bold freckled,
Old white face, and gray Geringer,
And the white bull from the king’s coast,
Grey ox, and black calf,
All, all, follow me home,
Now the black calf had just been slaughtered, and was hanging on the hook; but it got off the hook alive and well and followed her; and the oxen, though they were ploughing, trailed the plough with them and did her bidding. So she fled to the lake again, they following her, and with them plunged into the dark waters. And to this day is the furrow seen which the plough left as it was dragged across the mountains to the tarn.
Only once did she come again, when her sons were grown to manhood, and then she gave them gifts of healing by which they won the name of Meddygon Myddvai, the physicians of Myddvai.
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(Piero di Cosimo – Venus, Mars und Amor)
Let sorrowful longing dwell in your heart,
never give up, never losing hope.
The Beloved says, “The broken ones are My darlings.”
Crush your heart, be broken. – Shaikh Abu Saeed Abil Kheir
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