BURNING

I come quietly into the office to give my beloved a hug, and he calls me "Smokey" from the several hours of burning I've been tending to in the back yard. I love this task. As a Sagg I am pre-programmed to love fire, of course. But I look forward to the transformation, the spontaniety, warmth, and to see the brush pile, the quack grass (couch grass) and the old set of trailer stairs slowly reduced to lovely grey ashes is worth waiting for the right day, and the right time. I especially like to have a "little nip" when I'm burning. Several years ago my husband cleaned up some property higher in the mountains in the Seeley Swan Valley. We dragged limbs from several lodgepole he'd cleared, and along with roaring 10 foot flames, we had a little nip of rum. That afternoon remains with me as a hilarious, touching and exquisite time that found us eventually retreating to the little cabin, making love, and returning to tend the embers, their amazing designs glowing in a moonless night.

Rumi talks about the burning, it's his synonym for our longing for union with the Beloved, or "The Holy Other." (Hafiz uses the same metaphor, as do a few other Sufi poets, or at least their translators do!) Our lives are a continuously purifying process of standing in the fateful flames produced by our understanding that our dense bodies are the fuel source, oxygen literally is a burning metabolizer within, and the heat? That's our inner knowing that there's more to our earthly lives just beyond what our eyes see, our ears hear, our minds create--some kind of unifying conciousness most of us can only barely discern. We rely on prophets, saints and masters to inform us as to the lay of that land, and they fill us with amazing tales to feed the fire.

My return to tasks inside the house finds me resting in the expansion, in conciousness born of searching for answers, then leaving the questions behind. While my ears delighted in the crackling and snapping, and my eyes feasted on the leaping flames of love, I returned to quiet, to trust, and to faith. May you find a flame to purify you from personality concerns to Divine Confidence.