Why it Doesn’t Work So well: Horny mystics, The Love Ideal West, and my fucking Lucky Charms

There is some kiss we want
with our whole lives,
the touch of Spirit on the body.

Seawater begs the pearl
to break its shell.

And the lily, how passionately
it needs some wild Darling!

At night, I open the window
and ask the moon to come
and press its face into mine.
Breathe into me.

Close the language-door,
and open the love-window.

The moon won’t use the door,
only the window.

In honor of Valentine’s Day, over-consumption of chocolates, roses with no smell, and all the orgasms which were faked, I thought I would bestow upon you the reader, some treasures culled from my ebullient peregrinations through both the world at large, and the illusive shadow it cast over the machinations of our human drama. I am going to tell you about love and one of the reasons historically its fucked up in a unique way in the here in the New World, for free. I’m your private fucking Santa Claus today.

Getting Right Into it

The above poem was part of some cute quaint little book to be given as a valentine’s gift to a your lady of choice. It was pink and lacy has a cute font, it was small and could be easily added to the panoply of small gifts and perverted/romantic knickknacks.

It is in many ways the epitome of what I want to talk about. The poem was actually written by a 13th century mystic/Islamic scholar from Anatolia who for some strange reason wasn’t roasted at the stake or tortured in some unusual way, due to the incongruence of his ideas with what was socially accepted. His works have been in many case misappropriated and presented a bit to obscure some things as Westerners we don’t like, (pretty much anything Islamic)

Basic Idea here is that we take something, misappropriate it in such a way as to assist in the creation of some illusory distraction or idea that we attach an inordinate amount of importance. We have done this for “Love” a few centuries ago around the medieval time in the history of Europe, the literature of the time give us a lot of clues, luckily for you guys I am well versed in the that period of history. I have a have written book on the use of the symbol in the medieval times as a vehicle of subversive commentary on the socio-political and religious establishment. Ah the curse of mental fecundity and too little time

The Troubadours, Pastoral love and Boning

The crusade brought an unprecedented amount of contact between the Europeans and the middle easterners. This let to a cross cultural sharing in many ways. One was was in literature.

Marriage at the time was an arranged affair, no one married much for love, and all of a sudden we see the explosion of stories like that of Tristan and Isolde, strange love triangles like the one between King Arthur Guinevere and Sir Lancelot. We had love for loves sake in literature and of course this caught on like wild fire, new forms of literature came about troubadours went around singing songs of love very very similar to the Sufi mystics and poets of the middle east.

It was during this time that the love ideal got cemented in Western Culture through our misunderstanding and misappropriation of the many of the poems and other literary structures and devices we got from a period of about 200 year from 1095 and 1291. You may be surprised to know that the structure of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, the eponymous Medieval Literature work was lifted from the Mystic Fariddudin Attar’s the Parliament of the Birds. Also The Merchant tale in this corpus of work was clearly taken or artistically lifted from Rumi’s Masnavi from which I believe the poem mentioned above comes from. It could have been lifted also from the 1001 Nights a corpus of tales originating in India ironically enough which traveled through the Levant and North Africa into Europe many stories are thought to conceal a variety of mystical and esoteric knowledge

This doesnt belong here but I heard Crazy in Love on my Mp3 player today so why the fuck not 🙂

Anyways snitches, 🙂 Love became this magical thing that razed reason to ground, made people leave behind riches and status to be with well endowed simpleton shepherds. One became head over heals crazy and infatuated and psychologically unbalanced for the object of one’s affection. One became a prisoner to an immense passion that in stories somethings debased the main character. Your basic love story Tristan und Isolde follows the following pattern which I have taken from 14 century century Divan (Poetry collection of another mystic)

We’re prisoners in the shackles of an immense passion Afflicted and tormented with manacles on our ankles we are the miserable ones in the deserts of love skilled in the field of riot and revolution. Sometimes were thunder sometimes a bolt of lightening sometimes were clouds sometimes the sea. Sometimes were intellectuals sometimes were crazy were bewildered…just bewildered headless, footless, nothing in our pockets, worthless drunkards… though sometimes were revealed sometimes concealed sometimes earth-like were abased and debased sometimes sky like were exalted and transcendent in the tavern of ruin 

Horny Mystics

I always found mystics to write the most salacious, horny bastard sorta poetry, check it out from St Teresa of Avila:

I let enter my mouth what will enrich me, I wear what will make my eye content I sleep where I will wake with the strength to love deeply

I thought of putting my hand where I could tell no one on that part of my soul that is always warm I knew a sacred liquid there could flow and give me peace

My favorite female Mystic Mirabai

I cant forget about love for more than two seconds I get dizzy if I think about anything but the way you pant in my ear.

“I want
you to have
this,

all the beauty in my eyes, and the grace of my mouth,
all the splendor of my strength,

all the
wonder of the musk parts
of my
body,

for are we
not talking about real love, real
love?”

Ok bringing it together over Lucky charms

This is a bit disjointed and all over the place like some of these mystics, but I am doing a million other things at the same time like eating Lucky Charms – not so magical anymore at 30. From the scientific point of view, various approaches to investigating the connection between spirituality and erotic experience are increasingly being explored. It’s very interesting stuff I am not gonna bore you with I’m sure the articles in your favorite dirty mag touch upon all this in depth, there still articles in those things right?

A lot of the Wetern ideal of Love was created and maintained in part at its core by the seemingly romantic literary output of mystical both Christian and Islamic. In misappropriating of literature we built up an entire structure an entire ideology or psychological schema which at is core is incomplete and lacking. The Western ideal of love as can be seen in all those fucking Cameron Diaz, Katherine Heigel, or Meg Ryan and all is highly unbalanced and can drive a mutha fucka crazy.

Black and white of a large painting by Wallace Putnam of Mansur al Hallaj Dancing to the mutha fucking Gallows!!! Homey had style

The love spoken about at the core of all these poems, isnt what we think it is at all. Its the Kind of thing that sends one dancing happily to the Gallows to be killed and torture like Mansur al Hallaj. Yes he fucking two stepped his way to be cut up mutilated hanged and burned to ashes, saying that he was on his way to his Beloved. That is for all intents and purposes, a lot for a fucking Thursday.

All this makes me think, maybe with all the profanity and organ grinding and cunnilingus jokes I am mystic? I do dance without provocation on the way to work which is a slow death. I did the whole public nudity thing. I think I am a shoe-in for being a crazy foul mouth mystic maybe like  Diogenes of Sinope  with a phallus shaped candle ? Whaddya think