bird

I Wish I knew How it Would Feel to be Free

Gill Washington Nina Simone, Song Lyrics Allspirit , , , , 0 Comment

Song Lyrics on Allspirit

As sung by Nina Simone

I wish I knew how it would feel to be free
I wish I could break all the chains holding me
I wish I could say all the things that I should say
say ’em loud, say ’em clear
for the whole round world to hear.

I wish I could share all the love that’s in my heart
remove all the bars that keep us apart
I wish you could know what it means to be me
Then you’d see and agree
that every man should be free.

I wish I could give all I’m longing to give
I wish I could live like I’m longing to live
I wish that I could do all the things that I can do
though I’m way overdue I’d be starting anew.

Well I wish I could be like a bird in the sky
how sweet it would be if I found I could fly
Oh I’d soar to the sun and look down at the sea
and I’d sing cos I’d know that
and I’d sing cos I’d know that
and I’d sing cos I’d know that
I’d know how it feels to be free
I’d know how it feels to be free
I’d know how it feels to be free

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Hard Times

Gill Washington Nature, Poems, Rabindranath Tagore, Spirituality , , , 0 Comment

By Rabindranath Tagore

Music is silenced, the dark descending slowly
Has stripped unending skies of all companions.
Weariness grips your limbs and within the locked horizons
Dumbly ring the bells of hugely gathering fears.
Still, O bird, O sightless bird,
Not yet, not yet the time to furl your wings.

It’s not melodious woodlands but the leaps and falls
Of an ocean’s drowsy booming,
Not a grove bedecked with flowers but a tumult flecked with foam.
Where is the shore that stored your buds and leaves?
Where the nest and the branch’s hold?
Still, O bird, my sightless bird,
Not yet, not yet the time to furl your wings.

Stretching in front of you the night’s immensity
Hides the western hill where sleeps the distant sun;
Still with bated breath the world is counting time and swimming
Across the shoreless dark a crescent moon
Has thinly just appeared upon the dim horizon.
–But O my bird, O sightless bird,
Not yet, not yet the time to furl your wings.

From upper skies the stars with pointing fingers
Intently watch your course and death’s impatience
Lashes at you from the deeps in swirling waves ;
And sad entreaties line the farthest shore
With hands outstretched and crooning ‘ Come, O come ! ‘
Still, O bird, O sightless bird,
Not yet, not yet the time to furl your wings.

All that is past: your fears and loves and hopes ;
All that is lost: your words and lamentation ;
No longer yours a home nor a bed composed of flowers.
For wings are all you have, and the sky’s broadening countryard,
And the dawn steeped in darkness, lacking all direction.
Dear bird, my sightless bird,
Not yet, not yet the time to furl your wings!

(translation Buddhadeva Bose)

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Whoever Brought Me Here, Will Have To Take Me Home

Gill Washington Poems, Rumi, Spirituality, Sufism , , , 0 Comment

By Rumi

All day I think about it, then at night I say it.
Where did I come from, and what am I supposed to be doing?
I have no idea.
My soul is from elsewhere, I’m sure of that,
and I intend to end up there.

This drunkenness began in some other tavern.
When I get back around to that place,
I’ll be completely sober. Meanwhile,
I’m like a bird from another continent, sitting in this aviary.
The day is coming when I fly off,
but who is it now in my ear who hears my voice?
Who says words with my mouth?

Who looks out with my eyes? What is the soul?
I cannot stop asking.
If I could taste one sip of an answer,
I could break out of this prison for drunks.
I didn’t come here of my own accord, and I can’t leave that way.
Whoever brought me here, will have to take me home.

This poetry. I never know what I’m going to say.
I don’t plan it.
When I’m outside the saying of it,
I get very quiet and rarely speak at all.

From: Essential Rumi

Coleman Barks with John Moyne

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Longing for the Birds of Solomon

Gill Washington Poems, Rumi, Spirituality, Sufism , , , 0 Comment

By Rumi

Is this stuff poetry? It’s what birds sing in cages.
Where are the words spoken by the birds of Solomon?

How would you know their cries, if you heard them,
When you haven’t seen Solomon even for two seconds?

Solomon’s bird lifts his wings, one tip touches East, one West.
Those who hear the notes feel an intensity in their whole body.

The bird descends from the Holy One’s bedroom door to earth.
And from earth it flies among light back to the Great Seat.

Without Solomon every bird is a bat in love with darkness.
Listen, oh mischievous bat, try to become his friend. Do you want to stay
in your cave forever?

If you go even three feet towards Solomon’s mountain,
Others will use that as a yardstick to measure their lives.

Suppose your leg is gimpy, and you have to hop, what’s the difference?
Going toward Solomon, even by limping, the leg grows whole.

The Rumi Collection – Edited by Kabir Helminski
Translation by Robert Bly

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