The Unstruck Drum of Eternity: Poetry of Kabir

Written by: Kabir - Interpreted by Jabez L. Van Cleef
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  • Summary

  • Continuing in the grand tradition of Rumi and Kahlil Gibran, explore the light within your own sensuality in the company of Kabir, the incomparable 15th century poet, weaver, mystic and musician of Benares. "Open the window to the west, / In the sky of love, now be lost; / Drink the sweeter honey that steeps / And imbues with heat, the petals / Of the lotus of the heart's lips. / Receive the waves in your body: / What splendor is in the warm sea! / Hearken to the sounds of conches / And bells, rising through the branches." The poetry of this 15th century mystic has been recreated in modern English rhymed couplets by Jabez L. Van Cleef, joining the ranks of his poetic interpretations of spiritual texts from all of the world's great religious traditions. Van Cleef's voice in dramatic readings explores the fine distinctions between metered prose and music, by creating a spoken word sound environment that lulls the listener into a state of profound receptivity. In this collection of songs there will be found examples which illustrate nearly every aspect of Kabir's thought, and all the fluctuations of the mystic's emotion: the ecstasy, the despair, the still beatitude, the eager self-devotion, the flashes of wide illumination, the moments of intimate love. All opposites are reconciled: bondage and liberty, love and renunciation, pleasure and pain. Unity is the one thing that matters to the soul, its destiny and its need; and this union, this discovery of God, is the simplest and most natural of all things, if we would but grasp it. It is brought about by love, not by knowledge or ceremonial observances; and the apprehension which that union confers is ineffable--"neither This nor That," as the poet has it. The Divine may best be found in the here-and-now: in the normal, human, bodily existence, the "mud" of material life. "We can reach the goal without crossing the road -- In the home is reality." There love and detachment, bondage and freedom, joy and pain play by turns upon the soul; and it is from their conflict that the Unstruck Music of the Infinite proceeds.
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Episodes
  • CHAPTER 16: O DEAR ONE

    CHAPTER 16: O DEAR ONE
    Mar 23 2008
    O DEAR ONE! Here, behold my land! / Sorrowless past understanding! / I cry aloud to king and beggar, / To emperor and miracle worker...
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    7 mins
  • CHAPTER 15: CLOUDS THICKEN

    CHAPTER 15: CLOUDS THICKEN
    Mar 23 2008
    CLOUDS THICKEN and rise in the sky! / O, listen to the deep voice cry, / The clouds roaring, Lay waste! Lay waste! / The gray rain comes in from the east; / Its monotonous hiss strikes the dust...
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    6 mins
  • CHAPTER 14: I AM NEITHER

    CHAPTER 14: I AM NEITHER
    Mar 23 2008
    I AM NEITHER of the pious, / Nor the force of ungodliness; / I live neither by the strict laws, / Nor by the vagaries of sense...
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    7 mins

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