Happy Nawruz to all who celebrate the Vernal Equinox.
March 21st holds a lot of cultural significance for many around the world. Here's one view.
photo by Sue Cauhape
I first experienced Nawruz when I joined the Baha'i Faith in the 1980s. My sixteen years involved with the Faith opened a spiritual path that led beyond my Mormon Great Basin roots. As we shared the Writings and Prayers of Baha'u'llah in gatherings, people offered me their interpretations and beliefs. It all excited me with new cultural and social views and how to bring human civilization into a global community. It was a way to cleanse us of the many discriminatory attitudes that stymied our progress toward this final goal.
Cleansing humanity included the physical as well as the spiritual. One Persian woman told me how she and her family prepared for Nawruz by deep-cleaning the house, laundering all the clothing and linens, and sorting out the clutter of the past year. As mundane is housekeeping is, it puts everything in order. Coming at the completion of the nineteen-day Baha'I Fast as it does, Nawruz celebrates this material and spiritual purge, making us ready for a new year.
The Fast, among others issues, tested my resolve and faith, honing my dependence upon food as sustenance rather than relying on God's support. While I valued much of the Faith's lessons, my rebellious spirit balked at group think again, much as it did with Mormonism. Also, the various interpretations of other Baha'is began to feel more like gossip. Jeff and I coined a term whenever we referred to dubious information as coming from the Kitab-i-Heresay.
There came a point when I left the card-carrying organization of religion. I needed to explore what I had gleaned from various sources and pin down what I internalized as truth. I wanted my heart to guide me in this endeavor. Soon, I believed the Voice of God was speaking to me. Not the Joseph Smith prophecy manner or the reptilian voices that tell people to clean the guns every day, but in a recognizable personal voice. That voice led me to find Jeff, my husband of 40-plus years, so I knew it was there, struggling to be heard acknowledged. My still small voice has never guided me wrong, warning me of situations and people that I should avoid. Whenever I ignored it, I got into trouble.
Little by little, day by day, as Baha'I leader, Abdul-Baha, said, I sifted through the chatter and cacophony until I could hear what my heart told me. These poems I share with you today show the process, which is still continuing. It will never really finish until I walk through that Veil to whatever comes.
Do'a
Monday calls the pensive ones to sea leaving their lives like lemmings they worship their god of tide and current gazing out across the waves eyes closed hands supine, gathering Spirit from the air hearing only the windswept Call to Prayers: Oboe cries of seabirds Applause in the foam licking the sand The silent chorus of grain sliding against shaft In the constant shift of land The forever communion Of the supplicant with Forces within the sea The wind The planetary paths Around the Sun of Truth, The ancient Voice. (written in 1980 when I moved to Santa Cruz and the Baha'i community there.)
Thunderhorse
Hey ya ya heya heya
he calls to attract God’s attention
the voice of his flute pierces the air
Hey ya ya I am here listen to me.
Each day he follows the forest path
to the back of the Baha’I school property
to a circle he carved in the earth
he kneels on a one-hundred-year-old blanket
away from people who know him only as Wayne.
Born Creole and Seminole, adopted by Navajo,
He's robed in a faith that promises
to unify all things within him.
He yearns to return to Dine’tah
to see his friends in the Valley
to hear the red and blue silence of the desert
as soon as his work at the school is done.
There’s always one more class to teach
one more project to build
one more favor for the director
who knows how to control his will.
While sunset flashes through redwoods
he presses a chain saw into a huge chunk
of wood, carving away the layers
to expose the eagle within it.
When dusk silences the school day
he retreats to his private prayers
away from droned words of God
read from a book in the main hall.
His flute sings, his voice cries
hey ya ya heya heyaÂ
listen to me, here
I am.
(written a few years later)
artist unknown
The Finger of God
When JD told us in that HAM radio class, "Everything in the Universe has an electro-magnetic charge," it felt like my head spun around as if possessed. That tiny bit of information jammed into my brain, roiled around until my whole perspective changed. All the stories of a white-haired God sitting on a throne, sorting out his progeny in hierarchies of good and bad, blew out the window. The foreign emissary of physics took my hand and led me through a labyrinth of thought that led to the feet of Moses and taught me what he was. Plucked from the reedy shore of the Nile, he spent his youth studying beside the Pharoah's son, learning about math and how the stars and planets aligned to guide architects' designs of the pyramids. He was an educated man who tried to explain the Universe to people who worshiped stones. Thus he wrote Genesis, and of course people even today take the whole fantastic tale literally. A writer must always consider the capacity of the reader. So I finally realized that the Finger of God that struck some primordial puddle of goo is the same magnificent touch that flares the grassy plains with a flash of lightning, carves canyon hoo-doos with a billion years of rain, and throws the tides and currents against white cliffs. Inside our heads, a complex glob of tissue swirls in just the right mixture of chemicals, animated by that spark of life. It lights our ideas, toys with our emotions until we writhe with rage or caress with devotion that one we mysteriously declare as our soul mate, and believe without a shadow of doubt or deep exploration how and why we came to be. And when we die, that little electro-magnetic charge will journey from the base of our spines, pop out the top of our heads to the ionosphere where we will abide amidst all the others for Eternity. And every time a HAM radio operator keys up his mic and utters, CQCQCQ can anyone hear me out there? the ionosphere will vibrate with a billion shocks and we will all quiver with excitement. (written about 2018 after I became a ham radio operator)Â Â Â Â Â
Enough
Little by little, day by day Twenty-four hours to spend my day Wash all the dishes, cook up a meal Nuke what we'll eat, no potatoes to peel Clear 'round the flowers so they can be seen Allow weeds to grow and cool in between A few rows of knitting, a novel to read A small quilt is finished to throw on the bed I've no grand illusions, my dreams are all done There's no mass of riches to pass when I'm gone Little by little I complete all my tasks My life is enough, nothing more shall I ask. (written in 2020)
Here's a final and colorful look at all the Days celebrated around the world on March 21st. This is a big day, my friends. My favorite Days are International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination and World Forest Day. What's you favorite? Reply in the Comments.
During a three year posting in Azerbaijan, my kids, but especially my son, really learned to enjoy Nawruz.
We lived on a little culdesac that joined the street that paralleled the north side of the President's dacha and my son became friends with uniformed guards who protected the President. One Nawruz, he talked them into building a fire on the side of the street to jump through and cause the evil spirits chasing them to be consumed by the flames. It was quite a sight to see a young American kid celebrating a Nawruz tradition with stern men in ceremonial uniforms as they all took turns jumping through the flames.
Maybe we need more kids in the diplomatic corps. They seem to know instinctively how to bring diverse groups together.