words about absolute nonsense from Obesh Eniac @Lutalpic

“But we shouldn’t think of him. What is he anyway? Is he not after all a portion of death in life, materialized out of our conception of emptiness? Whoever he may be, God bless him.” – Daniil Kharms
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(from “The Absolute Nonsense of Daniil Kharms” http://numerocinqmagazine.com/2013/01/09/the-artful-artlessness-of-daniil-kharmstranslation-alex-cigale/ )
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Obesh Eniac: I love that part. Most people believe that there is such thing as permanent self.
Hence the fear of emptiness. Buddhists believe that there is thought but no thinker.
The body changes, so do thoughts. There’s no permanent consciousness to experience the thoughts.
Our anxiety and negative patterns of thought come from being attached to a fixed self which is fluid and impermanent by its nature. There’s a similar concept in Sufism. “On the surface, ‘annihilation’ and ‘extinction’ might seem similar. But what a Buddhist extinguishes is craving, while what a Sufi annihilates is themselves before God.

One must throw oneself into annihilation, which in fact is the fullness of Being. As Rumi reminds us, “We and our existences are all nonexistences, but You are absolute Existence, appearing as annihilation.”
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http://networkologies.wordpress.com/2012/05/17/fana-sufisms-notion-of-self-annihilation-or-why-nirvana-is-samsara-in-mahayana-buddhism/ …

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Night in Damascus – Maya Naser (30 July 1979 – 26 Sept 2012)

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2 July 2012
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Little bit after midnight, me looking out from the window of my bedroom inside Damascus city, watching a full sky moon and listening to the sounds of the army shelling rebels sites in the outskirts, asking myself; is this real? Is this fire I can barely see someone’s house burning, or maybe a neighborhood store? Is this my country on fire?

Then for a moment I convince myself, I am just dreaming and my day is going to be a busy one, I better go sleep, I ought to wake up in few hours to go to my work, multiple meetings are waiting ahead, then a lunch with my beloved girlfriend, afterwards I have a gathering with my best friend to discuss his wedding details. Basically; in few hours I have to get up to have another hard day of life? Who said life should be easy anyway!!!

Then I snap out of this sweet dream, just to remember, I lost my job! That friend of mine had been killed a few weeks ago; his body was sent to his fiancé in a black bag! We didn’t know why he was slaughtered; we didn’t understand what his fault was! He was a doctor serving patients, never been into politics, but sure never been pro Assad, amid all this, the reality hit me, he was a minority and the years his father spent in prison for being opposition for the current system didn’t grant my friend any mercy, his ethnic roots were stronger to be noticed than his family position of this system! And yes this is my country, and this fire is at someone’s place, someone I might never know but that doesn’t mean he never existed!!!

Killings and counter killings became a regular part of our daily lives in Syria; some believe they have the right to kill because their god ordered them to do so! Some others believe its okay because they are trying to create a better Syria so why not generate total chaos and begin from there. Most of them don’t care, they kill because they want to topple a president, blaming him in person for all the problems the state is going through, so why not kill his sect members, his army soldiers, his government officials, all their families – if possible – and everyone who opposes their opinion!

In return those who believe Syria was in a better state before the Arab Spring hit us, think themselves a target, not only their opinions but rather their entire existence – this might be true. Why not? Bombs and bullets aren’t smart enough to distinguish the right from the wrong, can’t determine whether this man deserves killing or not, and definitely aren’t interested if this person is pro Assad or against, as long as this piece of kill will initiate retaliation, and create chaos.
Bottom line is; my people are dying and I am still in the line waiting my turn.
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Dover Beach – Matthew Arnold

The sea is calm tonight.
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits – on the French coast the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
Come to the window, sweet is the night air!
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanched land,
Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin, and cease, and then again begin,
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.

Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the Aegean, and it brought
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
Of human misery; we
Find also in the sound a thought,
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.

The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth’s shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.

Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.
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from @SyrianCleopatra, a conversation about Syria, worth repeating

“Just heard this hardcore Islamist Muslim Brotherhood supporter admit that even he is beginning to worry that the extreme extremists will take over Syria. wow…..The Islamist MB-supporter, with his own tongue, said that the extreme extremists are already threatening to behead anyone who suggests creating a constitution and parliament because they believe that is “copying off the west” and that the Quran is the sole set of laws for Syria. …He also said that most of these “extreme extremists”, although physically powerful, are uneducated people who barely have an elementary school degree. …This Islamist MB supporter admits that Assad is much better for Syria (Islamically) than extremists who will most likely make people hate Islam. …And it’s true. If extremists ever attain power over Syria, we can expect the next generation to be Islam-loathing atheists.”

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farmland views from the road

Driving north through the Overberg district,
the farms patchworks of dryness waiting for winter rains

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Chuang Tsu – Endlessly Transforming

“You were born in a human form, and you find joy in it.
Yet there are ten thousand other forms endlessly transforming
that are equally good, and the joy in these is untold.
The sage dwells among those things that can never be lost,
and so he lives forever.”
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Chuang Tsu – “Inner Chapters” (translated by Gia-fu feng and Jane English
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blue skies on this morning’s walk

“The way is not in the sky. The way is in the heart.” – Buddha
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