The Yogabliss, Your Heart Life on-line Moving into Meditation classes met this morning. We explored darkness and light as generative forces that enable us to grow and heal.
We heard the voices of young and old poets affirm the shadow we cast as a source of love and light. We can navigate the terrain of darkness with our compass of love.
We heard poet farmer Wendell Berry’s advice on how to know the dark. The poem is from his 1970 Farming: A Hand Book. He evokes a blooming and singing darkness. Perhaps this touches the generative aliveness of soil. Soil that nurtures seeds. Seeds that will blossom in the light of new growth? You can find more of his work at Mr. Wendell Berry of Kentucky.
We heard Shadow and Light Source Both, a poem by Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Rūmī. Rumi was a thirteenth century Sufi mystic and poet. The poem was translated by Coleman Barks. You can read his interesting Sun Magazine interview, Walking Around In The Heart Coleman Barks On Rumi, Sensuality, And The Path With No Name.
We heard Angel Marie Russell’s poem, Shadow. Angel “is a mental health advocate, writer, musician and artist devoted to sharing her experience with PTSD as a survivor of domestic violence and child abuse through writing, music and art” You can find more of her writing at her literary blog, Lost Ghost.
If you enjoyed Shadow check out Hum, a beautiful celebration of light and our place in the All!
Relaxed Reflection
We just passed the Autumn Equinox. The Earth is turning toward rest and regeneration. We are on our journey into growing darkness. Light seems more fleeting and fragile. Shadows seem longer and darkness deeper. The changing light expresses life’s constant calling. The edges of separation dim until it’s easier to feel ourselves as part of Earth, stars, sun and moon.
How are you aware of daylight waning and darkness deepening?
Darkness calls us to draw close, to look inward. We can also attune to the dark around us. Our other senses become heightened. We can sense ourselves as part of all: all people, all creatures, all plants, this universe. In all is motion, this turning light into dark, day into night. We can recognize ourselves as expressions of life. Poet farmer, Wendell Berry invites us:
To go in the dark with a light is to know the light.
To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight,
and find that the dark, too, blooms and sings,
and is traveled by dark feet and dark wings.
We have been given this life. In life, where there is darkness, there will be light; where there is light, there will be darkness. Where there is sorrow, there will be joy; where there is joy there will be sorrow.
In our practice we can acknowledge the fullness of things. We can embrace what it is to be a human in the vast constellation the more than human.
I invite you to feel your body resting. Can you become aware of those areas of Earth outside and Earth inside? What is it like to draw life’s breath in and let it flow out again? We can experience life’s fullness, life’s emptiness by entering the breath more intimately. I invite you to feel each in-breath waxing and each out-breath waning. Life’s natural rhythm. Feel Body’s rhythmic movement through sensation and currents of subtle energy. Filling with light and emptying into darkness; joining in the subtle rhythms of the universe.
Can you be curious about when Body wants the next in-breath; when Body releases the out-breath? Can you rest in the silent stillness between? Can you rest in the fertile darkness and allow the seeds of life and love to germinate in their own time?
The Sufi poet Rumi speaks of Shadow and Light:
How does a part of the world leave the world?
How does wetness leave water?
Dont’ try to put out fire by throwing on
more fire! Don’t wash a wound with blood.
No matter how fast you run, your shadow
keeps up. Sometimes it’s in front!
Only full overhead sun diminishes your shadow.
But that shadow has been serving you.
What hurts you, blesses you. Darkness is
your candle. Your boundaries are your quest.
I could explain this, but it will break the
glass cover on your heart, and there’s no
fixing that.
You must have shadow and light source both.
Listen, and lay your head under the tree of awe.
When from that tree feathers and wings sprout on you,
be quieter than a dove. Don’t even open your mouth for
even a coo.
. . . shadow has been serving you. . . . Darkness is your candle. Listen, and lay your head under the tree of awe.
Feel your body settling on Earth’s body. Imagine laying your head under the tree of awe. Can you open the gifts of stillness? Slowing down and resting. The edges of separation soften until it’s easier to feel ourselves as part of Earth, stars, sun and moon. If we are blessed to be sitting in warm and lighted homes, the world reaches in to remind us that the cold and darkness touches each life differently. We are all touched and wounded by living. Our painful experiences are submerged and they continue to live in the dark. They germinate and grow as stories we tell about ourselves and the world.
How do we release that which longs to be freed? How do we not suppress painful experiences and truths? I invite you to tune in to your inner darkness. Sense it as vividly as you can. Feel it in your body. You might find it difficult to see dark without the help of light. The moon is our constant companion. Her journeys can be our teacher. We see the whole of the moon in the ever changing cycles of darkness and light. Tune into your inner light knowing it is revealed with the help of darkness. The poets encourage us to navigate with the compass of love. In our practice we realize our inner light as love.
Poet Angel Marie Russell writes of Shadow:
Do not fear your shadow.
It is there you hide your truth
From you.
Do not fear the darkness
It is there you find strength,
Courage to fight
The weight of its truth.
Do not fear sharing this weight.
Connection, like thread,
Sews up your wounds
That cut to the marrow
To be seen
In this truth
Heals not only you
Hold space for your own
Wounded heart
Lift it up to the heavens and wail
That they gave such a heart
As this
That feels so deep
Into inky depths
It threatens
To pull you down
Down
And further still
Into your pain
Do not fear your pain
Welcome it home
(Rejecting it fragments your truth)
And feel
Your heart has this strength
For though it was made but tiny flesh
Its fibers weave tapestry
Over scars
A shimmering armor
Not calloused
But shining ready
With light to balance this dark
We are not singular beings.
We dance between
light and dark both
When in the depths of despair
It is this shining, armored heart that
Leads us back to peace
Darkness is the terrain
Love is the compass
Light is the wayshower
To the truth of you
Oh, that you
knew the strength
Of your own
Heart.
Do not fear your shadow
Show it what it is to dance
With a being of light—
That being is you.