The Nature of Us

…the food of them who haste to meet Thee is the fragments of their broken hearts.

Baha’u’llah

It is one of those days when the fragments of my broken heart are trying to piece themselves together.

Because they have been neglected for too long,

And my heart is not an easy puzzle to figure out.

And the fragments of my broken heart are not the ones who should be doing this work.

They are far from heart specialists.

They do not know which pieces go together to make my heart more whole.

They are only fragments that recognize the other fragments but don’t see how they can come together.

All they can do is cry and protest as they keep on assembling each other in the wrong way.

The air smelled of orange blossoms and tea, as it always did when she was around. I closed my eyes and opened my lips slightly, as if to taste the air, letting the smell-memory of my childhood unfold around me, to a time when we were more than just two of us, when the air was fragrant and moist, when the hot wind would blow through the palm trees on the polished Ceylon coast. It always surprises me slightly that my big sister still holds these smells in her skin and her clothes, though eight years have passed and every time I think back to what I remember, the details don’t even exist for me anymore; I just feel the heat and the wind and a band of glare from the white sands and the Indian Ocean. And I would go into my sister’s closet, where the smell remained the strongest, and close my eyes to strengthen my senses make all of those fragments that remained to me burn stronger, before there was nothing left at all.

Maybe because she was older when the tsunami hit that her Indian identity has not been erased as effectively as mine; me who hides within myself the secret that should the long-awaited “home coming” ever come to pass and we should leave Toronto back for Tamil Nadu, I would in fact mourn the loss of the true home that this Arrival City has become to me. She was 18 when we left, and I was 10, now I am the one who is 18, and my whole becoming-time has happened within the white-washed walls of this apartment. She has kept the traditions in me as best as she could. She has spoken our language to me so that I would not forget, at the expense of her own comfort in the English, in which I now think and dream. Sometimes I want to yell, to just shake her, and say wake up! This is your life here! Sometimes I want to walk into her room and find that the smell of orange blossoms and tea has finally scattered into the breezes to be lost forever. But still in my most secrets of moments, I come looking for its fragrance, to enwrap myself in its essence, and let that invisible part of me, that part of me that is her, find its home.

The last stage of the travellers’ journey meant finally facing Anastas Valley. This valley was the most difficult to traverse not because it was home to dragons, poisonous weeds or fiery pits; indeed the travellers had overcome all of these dangers. It was instead known to be a valley of doors, doors that lean against the round green hills as if they are a part of nature. Each door is unique: some are encased in jewels, some are sheer glass, wooden, steel, some too small to enter, some gigantic, the handles out of reach. Legend has it that a sinister wizard created the Valley by capturing children who then imagined all the doors, all the possibilities of escape. The wizard granted them their wishes in a cruel way, by trapping the children behind their own dreams, distant from reality, never free. No one dares to walk through the Valley for fear of what these children have become as the ages pass by. Villagers say that behind every door there is another valley with more doors. The people trapped inside think they have escaped, yet continually bury themselves in the dimensions beyond. Our travellers must walk through this Valley without envisioning the possibilities of the doors, without wondering what the dreams of the children were, and especially without having dreams of their own. It is well known that he who desires something aside from walking through the Valley becomes a door and loses the ability to distinguish himself from the labyrinth of possibilities.

The vast field was surrounded by dancing trees. The trees were in a state of ecstasy. The field was covered under various selections of the lushest green grass. There I was, standing in the field. The wind, so unrestrained, swam in the river of leaves on the branches. The wind then dove in the sea of tall and short grass. That invisible, loving entanglement did not deny anything on its path. The wind gently brushed against my skin and slid over my t-shirt which created a ripple effect like it would on a freedom flag.

Sleepless my mind wanders directionless
I try restraining it, but to try without will is, I’m coming to realize, ineffective
My efforts are unsuccessful, and I end my pursuit to command things
Things I’m not meant to control
It’s done; I let go, and regret what I’ve already tried to do
I cry and pray and wonder
Why do I crave power that isn’t mine, so that I relinquish power that is?
What gives us power? Who gives us our own power back?
I’m shaking and falling and losing myself on top of this creature.
Understanding flashes in front of my eyes and I realize its truth.
I need to submit. If I submit, I’ll be free.
Revelation. I’ve read the line before, but it finally means something.
Tonight I feel like I finally understood a little bit.
Now I am sleepless, but it feels better.
I choose not to sleep, not because sleep won’t come to me, but because I refuse to come to it. We’ll find each other eventually.
I refuse to allow it that unbridled control it has exercised over the weakest of us.
Why sleep when I feel rested and impelled to do more important things?
I choose to be sleepless. That is, only for tonight. I won’t become a fool who denies his body what it needs forever. I am not a rebel.
Sometimes, and only sometimes, one side takes precedence, and gives life back the other. At least I hope it will. I suppose I’ll let you know what happens tomorrow.

He expected her to be on time and she expected him to understand when she showed up late. By understand, she meant accept her lateness without showing her the slightest trace of annoyance. But while he tried to understand the reasons she was late, he could never accept what he saw as such blatant disrespect. He didn’t feel it would be truthful or fair to her to act as if nothing was the matter. He knew however if he expressed displeasure at the lateness, she would become disappointed and angry with him. He did not wish this, because overall he liked her and wanted to please her. The unfairness of this circumstance and his own powerlessness to do anything about it would give rise to a burning fire in his gut, a species of rage that frightened both of them, as soon as the clock read 5pm when they were supposed to meet and he could not see her car in the distance. When she arrived half an hour later and found him in this condition, she would then retaliate with a stinging retort exposing one of his shortcomings, infuriating him even more. There would be an awkward silence and then they would begin the tutoring session.

Little blue boxes piled up one on the other: that is what she sees. And in each box are orange fires that whisper and cling saying don’t let me out don’t let me out. Pyramids of boxes are born out of boxes: one box stepped on another boxes hand, one saw toes coming toward it and shivered inside itself. The one seeing doesn’t utter a word, but the alphabet lingers around her corners, pinching them to make them right. At some point everyone stopped moving, except the fires in their hearts, bent heads of waiting flames. So patient you wouldn’t think they could be any other way. But it’s painful, this perpetual entrance, painful that you see it as the darkness, that you believe in lifeless fires that can burn like a photograph.

Inspired by the collaborative approach of “The Nature of Us,” a group that was gathered in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan last week underwent a collective writing process after studying an important message. A sentence inspired by the study was written on a piece of paper, and handed to someone to write a second sentence in response. The paper was then folded down to cover the first sentence, and handed to another friend to respond to the last sentence written, after which they folded the paper over the previous sentence for someone else to write a sentence in response to their own. This continued until 17 individuals had anonomously each contributed a line.

No one knew the original sentence or could see the whole poem until the paper was finally unfolded and read aloud at the end of the night. The final product illustrates the collective unity of thought of the group that allowed for a coherent poem to be written as many threads came together.

We are part of a process that is fundamentally organic in nature.

Because nature, after all, is the mother of all organic growth, right?

And nature is the counterpart of spiritual realities.
However, one does not ever know his path in life.
In life, our life, one life, all life, ever
Look forward, go forward, be forward, forever.
It’s a good vantage point to look back and see how far you’ve come
While also having a vision of the future.

Okay, I’ve got something to share, but I don’t know if it’s any good. I don’t want to say too much about it; just want to explain a bit about what I was trying to do with it. Not sure I got the point across adequately. It’s not really finished, but hopefully you’ll kind of get the basic idea. I wrote this, like, really really fast. I was at Starbucks on Wednesday and I sat myself down and literally wrote it in, like, one and a half hours. So, it’s gonna be really rough in parts, and there are a few sections that don’t quite work, so I’ll have to work on it some more obviously. Just ask me if you have any questions about it after.

Her eyes are piercing, but warm.
They connect to mine in an instant, and she sees past their cloudy guard
Hers aren’t eyes that can inspire worry or hurt, no.
They are warm

Like keys they unlock
They sense and perceive
Though weeping themselves, she smiles
Her unyielding token of faith