Song of Solomon

Come,

my Beloved!

Let us go fearless to the bonfire!

Let us spend our dark night among the holy

hyenas and all that would rip and tear at

our facades until we are cleansed raw

of any pretense, any subtle sense of self

believed in need of preserving.

Let us rise early to the mist-kissed vineyards,

let our lingering sleepiness and dreamy self-images

 be crushed like bunched grape clusters --

tart juice to sweet fruit wine.

Let us see if the vine of real love has budded,

its vulnerable tenderness blossomed open, light

into light, a song, a miracle of sound birth,

what no heart has even known, this

particular touch, this one.

Ancient balm, ever-fresh, the supernal grace

of welcoming spaciousness, of blue sky

dawning, this touch of Presence,

the mysterious movement

of life itself.

The jasmine beckons with its fragrance,

and at our doors are delicious fruits,

both new and old,

which I have kept for you,

my Beloved --

each is perfect death to

one whose appetite for truth is

greater than their need to salvage

dusty relics from the weary search.

By night on my worn cushion

I sought that which my soul loves;

I sought it, but I found it not.

I rose up then, and searched

the temples and high holy places,

and yet found it not, that which

my soul loves, that which

grants the heart

true peace.

Oh my Beloved,

you who tantalize the very air

with your majestic absence, why do you

yet hide your countenance from me,

why hold your sweet tongue mute?

My Beloved is mine, I am My Beloved’s.

Between us is the vast and windy chaos,

a filmy, blowsy garment stitched of

luminous dreams and dark imagination.

When we are at last stripped bare in the furnace

of love’s annihilation,  our naked brilliance will

outshine sun and moon; our starry joy, bliss

entwined, will whirl through the shattered

gates of time.

Yes, for what I have sought, I am

not other; the eternal is not elsewhere,

and what I am, Beloved, and where I am,

You are.

Come, come my Beloved,

my Radiant One, my breath,

my blood, my tender heart beat!

The fire awaits, its impersonal flames

leap up at our approach.

Come, my Beloved—

we sleep now, but our

heart wakens.