Tag Archives: language

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The Reed Flute’s Song

“Language and music are possible only because we’re empty, hollow, and separated from the source. All language is a longing for home.” ~ Coleman Barks

The Reed Flute’s Song

Stay where you are

inside such a pure, hollow note. ~ Rumi

The last few years, perhaps because of Covid and the enforced isolation, each time I say good-bye when family leaves after a visit, I am filled with sadness. The scale of the sadness is in direct proportion to the joy I just shared while we were visiting. There are no words to convey the depth of my feeling. There are no words to hold all the love I wish to pour onto my loved ones. Although I have just spent a wonderful afternoon or evening with my children, or siblings, or cousins, I immediately long for more time with them once the door is closed and they are on their way. Is this even close to the longing Rumi is expressing?

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Mother Tongue

wallpaper-psychedelic-kaleidoscope-4-NGC-6188-2-WRAP-ws

(image credit: Ghislain Bonneau)

Mother tongue
the thought permeates my being

a language shared by all

emotions infuse me
a kaleidoscope of swirling
colors and images
visible
but just outside comprehension
sounds audible
but indistinguishable

shadows

excitement
to be reconnected
understood

buoyed
on the brink of something
forgotten

bold as time
a lost language
ours to claim

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Hypnotic State

Patchwork quilt

(image credit: bjman.deviantart.com)

I find myself in an unknown land
sleep walking
body in a trance
talons of comprehension
have loosened their grasp
taken flight

People smile quarter moon smiles
kindness evident in soft brown eyes
best human qualities on display
but no matter how hard I try
the exotic lilting language
remains foreign to me
estranged

I am learning this milieu
through faculties long dormant
acquiring trust in my senses

Sight allows a glimpse of this new world
garbled symbols join movement, color, style, rhythm
a patchwork concept that taunts
hanging just beyond perception

I smell loneliness, hunger, happiness, JOY

The environment tastes purple
unusual
tantalizing
inviting
Although not mute
my tongue feels twisted
articulation a lost art
formation of sound demands effort
conscious awareness

My ears delight in the musical litany I hear
long for when my own body does not betray
with crass sounds
indelicate and rude
but can join the melodic refrain
lovely angelic chorus
of those that surround me