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love is

I woke this morning from a dream and fell into Shahram Shiva's book translation of Rumi's poetry, entitled HUSH, Don't Say Anything to God: Passionate Poems of Rumi and consumed it.  I read the entire book in a state of predawn ecstasy before the horizon began to blush at my ardor.  So many of us are afraid to love and to be loved.  It's no wonder given the image of sentimental love served up by our fast food culture, scented sweet and full of lies, promising salvation and delivering disappointment. A blasphemy.  Love is.  Omnipresent.  Omnipotent.  Omniscient.  Beyond words and thoughts.  Contained in every experience. Everything is an invitation to love...whether sublime or painful...an invitation to break our hearts a thousand times and a thousand times over until finally that breaking finishes its task...freeing love from all illusions of other.  Love is.
There is a candle in your heart,
     ready to be kindled,
There is a void in your soul,
     ready to be filled.
You feel the separation
     from the Beloved.
Invite Him to fill you up,
     embrace the fire.
Remind those who tell you otherwise that
     Love
     comes to you of its own accord,
     and the yearning for it
     cannot be learned in any school.
                        -  rumi

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