Kashmiri Overseas Association, Inc. (KOA)

I have just tossed the stack of unpaid bills to the far corner of my room,
Bundled up the junk mail for the Monday garbage pickup,
While the newspapers lie strewn unopened on the dinette. I want to leave the chains of the world behind me,
Pack up my knapsack
And journey up to see the light through the woods.

The woods are two hours on a bike,
Secluded in the rear rising plateau of the Morton Mountains,
Where slender and tall oaks mingle with wild shrubs and flowers,
The riotous brooks bubble over the moss covered rocks,
And the light dances through the enigmatic chiaroscuros,
Where the splendor of nature merges with the splendor of imagination.

Here in the kingdom of the filtered light
Trees bend with fluid grace, leaves fall with solemn dignity.
Human footsteps are an intrusion in the music of eternity,
But the rustling of leaves with wind adds to the music of silence.
Every movement is electric, every thought seems to be burgeoning for the first time,
Every tree and every blade of grass seems unique, every hue resplendent.

Walking through the leaf and flower decked path,
In the intertwined ribbon of light and shade,
With every tree trunk a knot in the green embroidery,
Each treetop aspiring to touch the infinite blue above,
Every wildflower a greeting to the journey ahead –
The journey without a destination.

The hallowed tapestry of the woods unfolds with a silent splash.
As one walks over myriad paths through the trees – undefined but yet leading forward,
One encounters light that is filtered bright but appears multi-sourced:
Diffused, concaved, sanguine, multi-hued – a fine multilayered sfumato,
In effulgent opulence – a latticed fabric creating a maize of prisms -
A stream of vibrant crystal concatenations.

The trees reference the sheet of epileptic torrent of light cascading through them –
Earthly sentinels of the rushing infinite.
Each path in the woods appears leading to an unknown place,
Each falling leaf embraces you with tender and silent grace.
The tree branches slice light multi-layered and the sky blue sneaks edging them.
Talking breaks the echo of eternity, walking disturbs the halo of infinity.

There is a heart of loneliness in the woods,
A womb forever pregnant.
Man feels melting into the scene – a natural integration.
The tapestry of the hallowed light beckons to an unknown point.
The realm ahead appears enchanting and eternal,
While the world behind seems receding into insignificance.

The light coming through the woods evokes a new imagination,
A dream of a new world, a vision of a new life.
It is a message of liberation and new meaning,
It asks for giving and not possession, being and not becoming.
Climbing up the Morton Mountains, wrapped in woods,
The heights permit a wide and a penetrating view of the world below where man lives.

A blade of grass has more wisdom than a library full of books,
A sunset is more rewarding than a week’s bull market on Wall St.
Where have we lost the mind in the matter, the spirit in the process;
Where have we lost the miracle of nature, the life in the world.
Man is trapped in the petty materialistic schemes of his brain,
While the light through the woods lies unexplored in front of him.

4.30.04

Meditation on Time

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