Each pilgrim kisses the black stone there

I'm off to the Odin. Andersen's Dream, the play which I observed in rehearsal for two months, is being performed for one week only, this year, in Bergamo Italy. I'm going to see it. And to visit the Odin's home theatre.

Blogging may be intermittent while I'm on the road. If I can get to a computer, my Raw Umber blog will be flowing deep.

Someone Digging In The Ground

An eye is meant to see things,
The soul is here for its own joy.
A head has one use: for loving a true love.
Legs: to run after.

Love is for vanishing into the sky. The mind,
for learning what men have done and tried to do.
Mysteries are not to be solved. The eye goes blind
when it only wants to see why.

A lover is always accused of something.
But when he finds his love, whatever was lost
in the looking comes back, completely changed.
On the way to Mecca, many dangers: thieves,
the blowing sand, only camel’s milk to drink.
Still, each pilgrim kisses the black stone there
with pure longing, feeling in the surface
the taste of the lips he wants.

This talk is like stamping new coins. They pile up,
while the real work is done outside
by someone digging in the ground.

-- Rumi

We need places in the world that are worthy of pilgrimage. Sanctuaries.

"What would you do if you had the Gift of creating sanctuary?" I asked my friend Juval once. "Create a sanctuary for sanctuaries," he said.