Aberjhani's encouragement to post a title of this essay of her own prompts Sage Sweetwater to post a title from Sage's commentary on Aberjhani's A MOTH TO THE FLAME

Authors Note: This writing is the second part of a commentary in the form of a short essay which I left on Author/Poet Aberjhani's recent A MOTH TO THE FLAME - one of the strongest book reviews I have ever read, quilled by Author/Poet Aberjhani.  It pulled me in and I was drawn like a moth to the flame-[Sage Sweetwater]

PART 2: Rumi, Rushdie, and Jung -
Whirling Dervishes, The Satanic Verses, and the Philosopher's Stone.

Rumi: One-handed Basket Weaving.  This poem of Rumi's partly inspired my poem, "Wind River Shoshone Woman,"
in which Wind River Shoshone is an avatar who has metamorphosed.  I realized in Rumi's One-handed Basket Weaving that these Jungian feelings surfaced in my own Dreams and personal space - emptiness. And Rumi's lines in this poem, "Know that your body nurtures the spirit, helps it grow, and gives it wrong advise" persuaded me to "masturbate" to give it right advise, transforming into basket-weaving. My lines here in "Wind River Shoshone Woman" [b'tween, masturbate with the fantasy of your basketry not so tight, it leaks, teach celibacy how to speak different languages,] were written with Jungian philosophy.  And then Rushdie's lines in "The Satanic Verses" 'And yet, in spite of profanity and debilitation, this was a face inextricably mixed up with holiniess, perfection, grace: God stuff.  No accounting for tastes, that's all.  At any rate, you'll agree that for such an actor (for any actor, maybe, even for Chamcha, but most of all for him) to have a bee in his bonnet about avatars, like much-metamorphosed Vishnu, was not so very surprising. Rebirth: that's God stuff, too.'

 One-handed Basket Weaving by Rumi

 I've said before that every craftsman
searches for what's not there
to practice his craft.
A builder looks for the rotten hole
where the roof caved in. A water-carrier
picks the empty pot. A carpenter
stops at the house with no door.
Workers rush toward some hint
of emptiness, which they then
start to fill. Their hope, though,
is for emptiness, so don't think
you must avoid it. It contains
what you need!
Dear soul, if you were not friends
with the vast nothing inside,
why would you always be casting you net
into it, and waiting so patiently?
This invisible ocean has given you such abundance,
but still you call it "death",
that which provides you sustenance and work.
God has allowed some magical reversal to occur,
so that you see the scorpion pit
as an object of desire,
and all the beautiful expanse around it,
as dangerous and swarming with snakes.
This is how strange your fear of death
and emptiness is, and how perverse
the attachment to what you want.
Now that you've heard me
on your misapprehensions, dear friend,
listen to Attar's story on the same subject.
He strung the pearls of this
about King Mahmud, how among the spoils
of his Indian campaign there was a Hindu boy,
whom he adopted as a son. He educated
and provided royally for the boy
and later made him vice-regent, seated
on a gold throne beside himself.
One day he found the young man weeping..
"Why are you crying? You're the companion
of an emperor! The entire nation is ranged out
before you like stars that you can command!"
The young man replied, "I am remembering
my mother and father, and how they
scared me as a child with threats of you!
'Uh-oh, he's headed for King Mahmud's court!
Nothing could be more hellish!' Where are they now
when they should see me sitting here?"
This incident is about your fear of changing.
You are the Hindu boy. Mahmud, which means
Praise to the End, is the spirit's
poverty or emptiness.
The mother and father are your attachment
to beliefs and blood ties
and desires and comforting habits.
Don't listen to them!
They seem to protect
but they imprison.
They are your worst enemies.
They make you afraid
of living in emptiness.
Some day you'll weep tears of delight in that court,
remembering your mistaken parents!
Know that your body nurtures the spirit,
helps it grow, and gives it wrong advise.
The body becomes, eventually, like a vest
of chain mail in peaceful years,
too hot in summer and too cold in winter.
But the body's desires, in another way, are like
an unpredictable associate, whom you must be
patient with. And that companion is helpful,
because patience expands your capacity
to love and feel peace.
The patience of a rose close to a thorn
keeps it fragrant. It's patience that gives milk
to the male camel still nursing in its third year,
and patience is what the prophets show to us.
The beauty of careful sewing on a shirt
is the patience it contains.
Friendship and loyalty have patience
as the strength of their connection.
Feeling lonely and ignoble indicates
that you haven't been patient.
Be with those who mix with God
as honey blends with milk, and say,
"Anything that comes and goes,
rises and sets, is not
what I love." else you'll be like a caravan fire left
to flare itself out alone beside the road. 

Wind River Shoshone Woman by Sage Sweetwater

burning wild celery,
woodpecker drills a hole
to remind me how to get to
the sap, I emulate, I know the
drill, thrust good measure harnessed
in my leather strap, don't you need...in
your lap, and I...

...take what's rolled inside
the cornhusk, the vision is born
from the smoke rising dusk, fish
for salmon in spring, gather acorns
in fall, in b'tween, masturbate with the
fantasy of your basketry not so tight, it
leaks, teach celibacy how to speak different
languages, extinguished from the dew of a leaf
before I can stone, Mama Cass Elliot sings Creeque
Alley, "McGuinn and McGuire
still are gettin' higher in L.A.
you know where that's at," and I...

...Wind River Shoshone Woman,
fast until I see a robin, my transition
in the early spring, I keep count of the
passionate nights we fucked, on a marked
stick, Black Wind made Earth, Yellow Wind
made Light, Lavender Wind made love, notched
feather dyed red, according to warrior
coupe, I was wounded, transition
turned blood of the feather to ink
of the quill, I dreamed a storm, when
I woke, my heart was painted with
a jagged thunderbolt that tore into
my left breast, my body thrashed
with the marks of hailstones, and I...

...have vivid visions you are
the moon's representative, making
an ancient appearance, bringing me Light
from the dark who tramped on my garden and
chased pussy from range, I know the
drill, thrust good measure, the
deepest Truth harnessed in my
leather strap, don't you
need...in your lap, and I...

...Wind River Shoshone Woman
love this beautiful land, red cedar
message-laden, the Salmon elders
ask if I followed their instructions,
fish for salmon in spring, gather acorns
in fall, in b'tween, masturbate with the
fantasy of your basketry not so tight, it
leaks, teach celibacy how to speak different
languages...

I...


Copyright 2007 Ms. Sage Sweetwater, firebrand lesbian novelist

...the power of philosophical enlightenment - Rumi, Rushdie, and Jung - Sage Sweetwater's essay with a tie-in to Author/Poet Aberjhani's recent A MOTH TO THE FLAME. Please follow this link to Author/Poet Aberjhani's recent A MOTH TO THE FLAME.

http://www.authorsden.com/visit/viewarticle.asp?id=33673&AuthorID=25279