I’m enjoying Abdur Rahman’s poetry and was particularly struck by these lines of his last week from You are the Hawk:
Seize me in Your Talons
and tear me away
from this narrow
heart of mine.
The words tell us so much about the process of transformation: we cannot accomplish it entirely by ourselves, we desire it, but giving ourselves over to it may be painful or even violent.
I don’t want a narrow heart, I want a fat heart. I want a wide juicy heart to pump compassion round my body, a rich and welcoming heart that will not exclude people and experiences.
But I confess I want it without allowing pain in, and I don’t think that’s possible.
The Rev. Tom Butler spoke on the radio this morning of the many acts of kindness and friendship to strangers we have seen during the floods in Britain that have brought death and homelessness. (The transcript is well worth reading.) It’s natural to think of flooding on this scale in biblical terms, and Tom refers to these kindnesses as “the ark of the human heart”.
How do we allow our hearts to be an ark for others? How do we resist the hardening of our hearts that can come sometimes just to avoid more immediate pain? How do we keep the barriers down and allow our hearts to be soft and full? How do we have fat hearts? How do we welcome the Hawk?
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
“ark of the human heart”…I like that…
I am also enjoying Abdur Rahman’s poetry.
As we are talking about compassion, how about this from Rumi? I think the lamp, lifeboat and ladder metaphors are particularly apt in this time of flooding.
Forget the world, and so
command the world.
Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder.
Help someone’s soul heal.
Walk out of your house like a shepherd.
Stay in the spiritual fire.
Let it cook you.
Peace, Tess, Towanda and Barney,
I hope that, by God’s grace, you’re all well.
Thank you for your kind thoughts. All that is beautiful comes from the Beloved. Truly, only the uglinesses are mine.
Thank you for the short poem of Mevlana Rumi Barney. May God sanctify Mevlana’s secret.
I too would love a fat heart without the pain that goes along with it. But, as you say, alas! Such a thing doesn’t seem possible.
How do we welcome the Hawk? A tough question! For me, though, sin has taught me that I am a faulty, frail human being. The only thing I have to give therefore is that very frailty. Ya Allah!
Abdur Rahman
Thanks for your comments.
Barney, the Rumi is wonderful (as always).