Ending us feels like

Water pressed from the cream

As all the excess runs away,

Collected and discarded

You’re going away and so I go forward into destiny

I don’t dance in the euphoria of our togetherness

Like pearls on a strand is the path to your heart

An ant am I on the crawl cross the capillaries of fate

Slipping on time to get to you

And spinning nearly every time off an invisible edge

She takes his jabs seriously,

Talantbek Chekirov

exasperated by both tone and objective

Thinking, how could a man be so single-minded

and obtuse?

Her skin crawls imagining his stories

into reality with the foulness of his language

and insistence on depictions of the most base

of human experiences.

Yet, she forgives his coarseness when her body shivers in the heated silence

that darkness brings

When tensions between them melt,

pressed out by the purifying acts of physical love.

In those times he brings her past the words

and into the theater of animal fantasy.

How does one resist, in good faith,

The subtle, mechanical spell of lust

That at one moment seems only a passing appreciation

And the next becomes progressively consumate in thought

Leading to opportunity for deed

The world unravels itself in tangles of these affairs!

And at one point can the thread be snapped?

And where is the line to be drawn?

Are these the kinds of questions that have led us to cover

every inch of ourselves in cloth?

So that no man should ever have to ask himself?

I try not to say I know God, that I understand Allah, that the nature of the universe is not a mystery;

but then to myself and in secret I explore the depths and the simplicities in full view of the One who sees the insides of my heart and soul;

and by means of design am provided the tools for excavation.

I scoop up the earth and mud established and concretely cemented, digging for pure, raw reality;

and at some point realize that the slick muck and shining layers are not an illusion.

The hate, the fear, the insipid platitudes along with the hope, compassion and peaceful breath – no more false than the sought for foundation.

All comes from and all returns to the source.

The weeds be kind and gentle

this first breath of fall

while tearing up around the edges

you return to drink the rain

and wrap the body laying in the ground

so it to can become the rotten longing

fields and orchards tumble into grief

the children scatter to collect the end of a great harvest

to hold it in a jar, preserving the essence of life

because we refuse not to go on

even while the whole world dies around us

The third time she saw him, he was standing on the other side of an empty soccer field.

In the earliest morning hour, the moment before dawn,

The miraculous creation of color in a world of black and white transfixed her eyes.

Objects seemed to spring into existence out of nothingness.

He stood there with gaze fixed on the horizon,

Looking like the last member of an ancient race: lost in time and forgotten.

The scene took her,

And it seemed she awoke within a dream.

Standing under the fig tree, blended and hidden from view,

She wondered whom this human form held.

The first pangs of longing stole shallow inhalations inside her chest.

Each time she exhaled she discovered emptiness,

And trembled with fear.

She had heard that desire could lead to other things.

Like breathing, what was essential in life could not be held onto for more than a moment.

Her next inhalation brought into her all the potential

For passion, attachment and loss that a lifetime might offer.

But she knew none of what it meant,

Sensing it only as a slight pain in her side

That by a tragic error of fate she mistook for love.

The most poignant moment comes

Like an ice cold draft spilling down my back

It’s like waking up inside a dream

All these months curled up in pious repose

In celibacy, in solitude, in the quiet shell of grief

Because someone I love got lost in the weeds of addiction

My mouth is dry with fiery lust

This pure physical desire has no particular object to crave

It just happens with a shock of conscience

Inside the purifying practices of the holy month

Do I not cleave to God in this time?

Am I not supposed to further fall away from earthly pleasures?

How is this opposite phenomenon occurring?

Inside my mind and my body the aching chemistry

Wet with hormone, and rapid synaptic cracklings shake the libido

My sensual urges rise, awakened from their dormant reprieve

I exist to know God and to become my true self through experience

To follow heavenly mandate

Which is simply this – surrender

And so far as I know the plan to do so is even more simple

Loss, longing and grief lead to humility and submission

And this the essence of right living

<<<<Nourishing Destiny: The inner tradition of Chinese Medicine, by L.S. Jarret>>>>

There was a subtle way between us

That made me feel strong before the trouble came to test these virtues we call:

Love, compassion, forgiveness, honesty

And when you fell victim to your own lowering beast

My resolute faithfulness must have burnt your conscience

With the ache we know as guilt

There was no pain more great than to watch you suffer and to feel

The great chasm of powerlessness growing

But that chaos and uncertainty over losing you destroyed

Long kept beliefs in control, manipulation and solitude

The grief that came drove me to my knees

Humility and surrender became my righteousness

As your spirit leaked away in sickness, dying, falling away into the dark
tragedy of your addiction

My life force increased and my blessings overflowed the cup of my being

Allah has pushed us apart on our paths to discover Him

But I thank you and pray for your salvation in this lifetime