The Thread Of The Kalima Poem by Mystic Qalandar

A turning—
constant, revolving inward—
before I enter
the still, tranquil chamber
of the heart.

There, truth—
the truth of truths—
begins to gather around me,
at first almost imperceptible,
like light passing through a doorway
before the eye can give it a name.

Then awareness opens
its final petals
and is admitted,
blooming in the warmth
of the intimacy of the nearest of the near:
closer than the jugular vein,
closer than breath
before it becomes breath,
closer than the thought
that calls itself "I."

Then I descend
into my true and rightful depth—
not nonbeing or absence, but fullness;
not silence, but the stillness
in which all sounds
remember their source and origin.

I sit in the contemplation
of the Divine Presence,
the whole pondering the whole,
the drop discovering
that its being
is itself the ocean's testimony.

And from the hidden chamber
of the soul, a voice rises—
or the soul becomes the place
where it is heard:
The Lord is speaking,
Listen with the ear of the soul.

Whoever grasps the thread of the Kalima
beneath speech,
the current flowing beneath every tongue,
the Word before words,
the breath beneath the name,
is handed the key
to the most ancient drama or riddle:

Who speaks
when the voice says "I"?
Who hears
when silence answers?

And when this question ends,
who remains
except that One
whose speech is this universe,
whose hearing is the soul,
whose silence is the secret
in which the two are one?

— MyKoul