Sanctuary For The Heart

In our garden, this morning

Do not despair when the beloved sends you away.
Today's rejection may turn
tomorrow into an invitation.

If the door shuts, do not go away.
Be patient, even if every possibility seems closed.
The friend has secret ways known to no one else.

Rumi
* p. 96

It's 9:30 PM. Rain is thrumming on the roof steady and hard. I am wrapped in a rainbow afghan that my mother made for me when I was twelve. I hear only my wife's book page turning occasionally in the other room. In the silence I feel a sadness, a loss that the day of talking and driving cannot divide from me.

I hold in my hand a polished wooden frame that holds a single sheet of paper titled The Constitution of the Field of Seven Houses, May 15, 2008. Written here is an invitation and commitment that I had hoped our family could share. I hold words that offer loving kindness and respect. And there is also a simple rule of no violence in the forms of words or actions that are meant to harm another.

Right in the middle of the sheet are the words: "This is a place where people are safe and free to reach for the life that they long for." The words: "tolerance, listening, cherishing, dialogue, privacy and sanctuary are woven into the document. These are ideals we all agreed to pursue and instill when we moved here.

I feel sad because I see that the home I idealized and envisioned is often shouting out with demands or anger or even violence. And I am split. On one side is the innocent who longs for unconditional mutual positive regard. And another side that sinks into despair because I often do not feel safe here. Perhaps God loves us between these two polarities. I hope so.

I wonder how Adam and Eve felt when they lost the nurturing of the Garden and were sent out into the world to toil and bleed on the land? I think, how hard it is to grow up, even when you are already 48 years on this earth. Tonight, in my childhood shawl, I hear a sad rainfall moaning: "It's not fair!"

No, it's not fair. But the morning will come. Some part of me will bleed... like the rest of the world. Some part of me dazed from the awareness that the rule book seems to be shattered, along with a peace of the heart. And some part will be healed again.

Morning will come. The constitution that hung in our front hall will rest beneath my bed. But the words true meaning will burn in me like the sun. They will shine, even if I don't feel safe, even if a storm of children's unkindness and disrespect blows in on the winds.

Is there a place for ideals in a world at war? Is there a place for peace and love?
I say Yes, YES!.

The day that I say : "There is no sanctuary for my heart." is a day that life would stop shining for for me.

The tome of loving kindness is under the bed instead of forgotten in plain sight. How does one be an adult and still have innocence of magic in their life? Love is not easy. And yet it is so necessary in this world.

From Rumi's Secret Places:

Lovers find secret places inside this violent world
where they make transactions
with beauty.

* p. 48

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* Rumi translated by Coleman Barks, Rumi, Bridge to the Soul. Journeys Into the Music and Silence of the Heart, 2007, Harper Collins Books, NY