Araqi
 
Love Lesson 19
 
 
Lover’s heart the abode forbidden for all eyes [1], the pavilion encompassing the imperium of greatness and honor (Ezzat), the vast enclosure wherein waves the intermixture of two oceans: Qayb (Transcendental Unseen) and Shahaadat (Outer Manifest) [2]. And within this heart the ceaseless will-power:

Even if a thousand times cupbearer serves this ocean
Remains the desire to drink another cup insatiable 
 
Beyond any doubts, the expanse of lover’s heart a place of gathering larger far beyond the measure of the cosmos. Where worlds lost within the clench of his fist, where the theater of Uniqueness established upon the atrium of Oneness. Palatial court of monarchy is here (lover’s heart) [3], all affairs dramatized here, solutions problems deprivation opulence freedom and bondage all manifest here [4]:
 
Whilst the deprivation has hidden what was everlasting
And the enrichment returned what was concealed
 
Wow! That idol whose beauty fits not into this universe
How can it nest within my tiny heart ceaseless?
 
Abu Yazid spoke of the vastness of his own heart, “If the Lord’s Throne and what is within passed by a corner of the Aref’s (Divine Cognoscenti) heart, Aref is completely unaware”. Jonaid said, “How could Aref sense anything since the Mohdath (Transient senses) when approached by the Qadim (Immemorially Preexistent and Ancient) leaves nothing of the transience remaining”. Abu Yazid once glanced upon his heart found no sensation of transience and all within was Qadim (Immemorially Preexistent and Ancient). [5]
 
Someone fashioned an ewer out of ice and filled it with water. Once sun shone upon it, he found the ewer and the water same:
 
The hunter, prey and the bait indeed are all It
The cupbearer, drunkard, wine and the cup are all It
 
Wow! What a bewildering drama! “Expanded the heart of My Slave, and the heart is between the two fingers of the Most Beneficent (Ar-Rahman)” [6]. It is within the heart and yet the heart clenched by It, behold how the translator adumbrates this:
 
Although entrapped I am within Your Zolf bound [7]
Ceaseless You are within this broken heart of mine
 
Know that because of the Graces of Your own
At the same time You are within the tresses of my Zolf
 
Everyone is entrapped inescapably within Its (The Beloved’s) bondage, fears no one, fits nowhere except within Itself, Oneness fits not except within the singularity of Oneness, (Its) incommensurable uniqueness finds no repose except in Oneness. These words elucidate the truth about the heart but very few understand. (Listen carefully) Following are the soliloquies of your heart:
 
I said: You are such beautiful a-bird wow!
It said: That is just yourself since I am myself Singular
 
I am both love and lover and the Beloved as well
Like both Mirror and beauty and the eye as well
 
End.
 
 
 
 
 
[1] What is the biggest lie? “I know what is inside my heart” there are no eyes including your own capable to see what is deep within you. Your actions as well as those around you constitute a mirror, gazing upon which you may see something within yourself.
 
[2] Although we differ very little, genetically speaking, from flies and apes, our heart though build form the same components is vast and contains what even our own minds can not comprehend ever. Within this vastness expands two opposite and limitless entities a) The outer-manifest we interface through our senses or knowledge b) The unseen and hidden that somehow are within our heart and the clash of these two compose much of our spirituality.
 
[3] Beloved chose mankind as the surrogate ruler on this earth:
 
“Behold, thy Lord said to the angels: "I will create a vicegerent on earth." They said: "Wilt Thou place therein one who will make mischief therein and shed blood?- whilst we do celebrate Thy praises and glorify Thy holy (name)?" He said: "I know what ye know not."” Koran [2:30]
 
But man chose to be a slave, indeed a slave to his Self.
 
[4] Our hearts like a simulator simulates the drama of human affairs. This drama makes no sense to birds or fish or galaxies. It only makes sense within the human heart.
 
[5] Our senses work for the present and immediate past. They are transient and temporal. However much of what is within our hearts is non-transient and come from the time immemorial. This immutable infinite past with no beginning or cause fits somehow within our heart.
 
[6] Hadith (Narration) from Prophet Peace Be Upon Him.
 
[7] Zolf, Zolafa in Arabic means to advance or go near or approach. However in Farsi means curls or braids of hair. Sufis used this Koranic term confused with Farsi meaning to make poetic terminology of drawing close proximity to Beloved.


Background: Photo by Jonathan Herbert.
 
 
© 2004-2002,   Dara O. Shayda