What happens

The grail knights ascend to the sixth heaven, to attain mastery of the heart, (ie the second aspect of the mind - feelings.) They endure an agony of bliss. All that is left of them is an inner Eye consumed with the fire of love. The crashing of their Lancelot vessel (the highest craft of all) in the searing fiery gale (the Beloved's revealed Face/ the Sun) occurs not at the end of the heaven but is itself the heaven. Now only a lover's leap remains between them and the God that fills their Eye, but they cannot leap themselves to do it.


Form and technique

I started writing formal ghazals (in English) when I found out that they were Meher Baba's favourite poetic form.  A ghazal is a classical Persian lyric poem - typically describing a state of mystical love - believed to be the ancestor of the sonnet. Both ghazal and sonnet are love poems that  combine lyrical abandonment with tightly controlled rhythm, rhyme and line organisation, a balanced tension of heart and mind forces. Only, where a sonnet moves forward in time, the ghazal stays in one place, both metrically and in terms of thought. The sonnet is an argument; the ghazal is a meditation. The sonnet chats; the ghazal chants. 



Ma darpiyalih ak-i rukh-i yar didih im
Ay bikhabar zi lazzat-i shurb-i mudam-i ma (Hafiz.)
'We have seen the face of the Beloved reflected in the (heart's) cup
O ignorant one, no notion have you of the bliss we imbibe therefrom.'



This face that burns upon my Eye in searing fiery gale:
More clear than any seen on Earth or heavenward trail.

The Lancelot shot down in flames, the highest craft of all:
Conception deconstructed lifting Guinevere’s veil.

‘I see your face in everything, but cannot leap the gulf
Between belief in what I see and being what I fail.’

It’s Leila’s I-consuming, never-ending, parted love
For Majnu, her sole bleeding where his sole trod upon a nail.

He feels his wreck in her, a bliss that pierces his heart
And bleeds from hers like wounds of Passion’s holiest nail.

The agony of longing long, the ecstasy of pain
In hearts that See their grail through golden bars of a gaol!

Your Sun is Everything and there is nothing that is not the Sun:
My black hole All-consumed in one whole - yet shadows prevail.

In sainted flames of love, with nothing else it can see
It burns away in grief, this Eye that can’t have the Grail.

O Heart of Hearts, her Absent Heart is All to you now.
She’s in the Seventh Sun, where Lovers leap and visions...fail

©Gareth Calway 2016 published in "6 Degrees of Separation; 7 Degrees of Love" (Sheriar) http://garethcalway.blogspot.co.uk/2016/01/6-degrees-of-separation-7-degrees-of.html
Track art by Isla Rafferty.

This Face That Burns Upon My Eye in Searing Fiery Gale

A marriage (and we are actually married, 45 years so far) of melody and rhythm. We do folk, indie, Americana, Norfolk noir, beat poems &  ghazals. Traditional tunes with contemporary beats. Music videos  https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCb8wV0-DNiFs1R5G2VSytBQ
Maz lead & harmony vocals, acoustic guitar. Gaz vocals, voice, bass, drums & percussion, harmonium, recorders, lyre harp, field recordings.

New tracks tagged #grail legend