LEAVES OF PARADISE

Poems by Renato Rezende

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I. Blue Light
I

I salute the Compassionate One—the Orange One

who passing her hands over my eyes
took away a thousand lives of illusion
and showered on me blue light.

Salutations to you
who awakened the fire of my hidden fire.

Please, accept this sacrifice

of words and light.

Once I looked at your picture

and felt I was looking into a mirror.
When I understood what had happened
I bowed –

You entered my body

and transformed it into gold.
How can I thank you? How?

When I first met you

you said “Write”
and so I’m writing.
II

Love is making me mad.

I’m going mad.
God, make me mad.
I’m dancing, I’m flying, I’m spinning.
If I endure this love
I’ll attain everything.
III

When I found you within my heart

I felt I loved everyone.

I had so much longing

for life
I wanted to be everyone
and be everywhere at the same time.

I found my home inside myself.

IV

My heart is melting
like sugar melts
in water

Your love is extinguishing me

like a candle

It feels good
to become nothing

I no longer
have a life
V

It’s merciless –
the sword of love.

Oh, God, crack it open.

Crack open this seed of love
or burn it forever –
Do whatever you please.
VI

Give me the strength to love

and the strength to bear so much love.
My heart is like a desert
My heart is like a fast running river
white water over stones

Your love is drowning me

killing me of thirst.
VII

God, I’m like a bird

with a twisted neck
dancing towards you
the solitary dance of death.
VIII

I’m nothing
for I think of nothing
and nothing
is inside
or outside

there is no inside
or outside

My mind stopped
when you looked at me.

I’m all
inside and out
side I’m all

a word

arises
II. About Love
ANGELS OF BEAUTY

How can a poet be weak

if he has to bear the angels of Beauty?

These angels destroy you

with a sword of light.
They blind you
to things on earth.
They cut off your senses.

What one calls weakness

is the strength
of holding on to these angels;

with one hand they pull you towards Heaven

with the other, the sword
separates you
from what you think you love.
LOVE LESSON

So many times
I drank
the wine of suffering.

So many times
I asked
for more.

Because once suffering is gone

it feels like nothing.

And I wanted to know

what exactly makes me suffer:

To see the other

as an outside lover.
GOLD

I tried very hard to be loved

by the people I love most,
but everything went wrong.

I suffered for a while

and then found out
I don't care
if I'm loved or not.

And even more:

It gives me joy to be considered low

by the ones I adore.
It gives me freedom.
It makes my love glow

like gold.
BLESSINGS

What a great blessing it is

to love and not be loved a bit.
What a paradox! What a blow
to the ego and to the laws
you carefully obeyed so far.
You act like a complete fool.
You compete with stray dogs
at the steps of her door.
You don't know what to do.
You want to die.

Then

You start to transcend.

You ask yourself,
What's this love for?
Who is the object of this love?
Who is the source? The body?
Whose? And what's
a body anyway but a shadow,
a mixture of fire and clay?
Who am I
after all? Who am I?
LOVE GAMES

Love is not a rare thing.

It's much more common
than we once thought.
But, also, alas, love is not
what we thought.
LAST NIGHT WHILE SLEEPING

Last night, while sleeping

I was still conscious,
in a nest of sweetness.

(I didn't remember or know

anything or anyone).
It proved to me once more
that love is really inside

and can only be realized

when one stops
the dream of his own life.
TO ALL THE UNWORTHY GIRLS I FALL IN LOVE WITH

There is something in you

that attracts me to you.
It's not your hair, or eyes, or mouth.
It's not your mind, neither is it your heart
although it lies deep within the heart, hidden
beneath your feelings
of unworthiness.
There
I see the most beautiful light
shining brightly, like a hidden pearl
of the finest blue.
My burning desire
is to offer it back to you.
TRUE LOVE

You left, and the love I felt for you,

lacking a form to hold on to

overflowed into the whole world.

You were gone.

My eyes were emptied

and then filled with the ability to see

you, inherent
in every creature.

The whole universe

was a mask you wore.

You left and offered me as a gift

this boundless reward.
WHERE?

If there is something else in this world

besides this shinning light
where is it?
LEAVES OF PARADISE

In the silent garden

under a tree
twelve noon, I see
sitting under a tree
of green golden leaves
a little girl:
it's me.

Golden mangoes, golden avocados, golden birds

the girl speaks and her voice
is the first breeze ever to blow
those golden leaves.
She sings the sweet
music that flows
like water in a silent cascade
besides flowers,
silver water, shadow, a sacred sound
resonates within the Heart
like gentle blue rays
of a diamond, of a rose
of light -- What do I know?

I saw the child

under the golden tree
and asked,
"Who are you?"
The golden birds sang
answering,
"What we are
is not what appears to be.
We will not remain forever
in the form of this tree."
 *

The whole universe

is created when we kiss.
SOMETIMES

There are times

when the pull of love is so strong
that among all things on earth
one can not find a single thing
to love alone.
III. The poet
CHILDHOOD

As a child
you opened the faucet of the bathtub
and for a second couldn't tell if the water
running through your feet, burning
was too hot or too cold:

Beyond the pairs of opposites,

There – somehow – you find yourself.
THE NYMPH

Last night I dreamt

of a nymph or mermaid – a woman I know
under a cascade
of water, her breasts
white and sweeter
than the sweetest bread.

As I watched her, between her legs

a fish grew into an enormous
prick; crooked, victorious, blind
and beautiful as a swan's neck
fighting, red, ready to fire.

She moved
only to show it to me.

When I saw her again, during the day, I was struck

because I didn't look down. I didn't have to.
About her, there was something I knew
which was very natural and intimate: my own.
DÖRTHE

You drove your bike across the Englische Garten

and I recognized you, my Yellow Butterfly, my Dear.

I was going to cry for you, but held back

and waited. I have been waiting for ten years.

Now something is happening. For some reason

you are driving on – as I'm writing this poem.
FAMILY FIELDS

One ancestor of mine

was a rich land owner, a latifundiário
in Brazil, about a hundred years ago.
His farms were like deep-green seas
of coffee trees, with golden beans.

One day a young Italian girl, an immigrant

came to work in his land.
He found her attractive and chased her
so much she fled back to Italy
with her outraged husband.

So strong was this ancestor's desire

that he felt no shame, left his family
and traveled three months over the sea
to reach the island of Sicily.

There something happened to this man, this ancestor of mine.

Maybe he realized he was just a man, humbled
by the world's immensity.
Maybe he was struck by their dignity, even though they were poor.

In Italy he left that girl in peace

and came back to Brazil, never again
to leave his family or fall prey to lust.
THE POET

The prince is in despair

for the love of a whore.
She doesn’t care about him.
He is crazy about her.
HOLLOW AT HEART

Some people are born hollow.

It's a kind of handicap.
Like not having a leg or an arm.
Like being blind or speechless.

The hollow heart always feels it is less

and then lesser. Its hunger and thirst
can never be quenched. At the core
there is a deep cloud of numbness.

I'm a man empty at heart.

I would like to exchange this handicap
for that of a missing leg or arm.
THE BUDDHA OUTSIDE BANGKOK

Every year birds build their nests

on the enormous statue of Buddha
forgotten outside Bangkok.
Spiders create their webs
on the Lord's ears and hair.
Those spiders and birds, so close
and so far from God they are!
Amidst the busy jungle
oblivious to happiness or pain
the great Buddha rests in peace.
THESE PEOPLE

Glancing at a children's clothes

catalog (Storybook Heirlooms)
seeing perfect girls with balloons
smiling with their mothers in sweetness
apparently unaware that disaster
may strike at any time
I'm unsure of myself.
Do these people wear these things before
or after -- as we all one day --
meet the ground
kiss the wall
are violated by God and life?
DOGS

As the dogs do, in a corner

by themselves
when they are upset
so did I,
when I lost you
hid in a steam-room
and smelled the hairs of my ass.
LIKE A STONE THROWN INTO A POND

Decent girls should cover their limbs

because even the purest of men entertains thoughts
when he sees naked female flesh.
Why is that so? Why
is so strong the pull of sex?

Young dear, please, hide your dark legs.

I was perfectly fine, in peace
with my own self.
I wasn't even feeling lonely
when you arrived

Like a stone
thrown into a silent pond
at night.
BIRTHDAY

I will keep the sword.

I will add the crown,
the wings.

This is my kingdom.

The whole world

is my garden.
IV. Literature
THE STORY OF LILA IN THE YOGA VASISTHA

Immersed in this story I suddenly saw

the whole world as a tiny point of light,
pure mental energy, devoid
of space and time.

This brilliant point – the whole universe,

could fit in a millionth part of my fingertip.
I was in awe, and for the longest time
gazed at this light, unable to read.

And indeed, in the last page, the sage said

that Lila's story removes from our mind
the last, the smallest remnant of our belief
in whatever we usually think or perceive.
ANOTHER ODYSSEY

When Dawn with her fingertips of rose

broke the day after Odysseus's return to his hall
bathing the whole world with golden light:
the chamber where the patient hero lay with his wife
finally asleep in her soft white arms, and also
the open marbled halls of Olympus, where
the gods and goddesses live eternally in bliss;
Athena, the gray-eyed, opened her eyes first
and seeing down below the royal couple so
sweetly embraced, took pity on them, and decided
to erase from time the 20 years he suffered in exile.

When Dawn with her fingertips of rose

awoke with her gentle rays the sleeping king
for yet another day of a long life lived in Ithaka,
Odysseus, kissing his wife's hands softly, rose
and vaguely remembered a dream of a war
and many years of salty sea, under a blazing sun,
in which he was lost, and upon his return
he and his son, only a baby now, in his own hall
killed his mistress' suitors: his life-long friends' sons.

He, Odysseus, the hero of no war and no adventure,

pondered his dream, and realized, wrongly,
that he had done nothing
and now was afraid of growing old.
THOREAU

He writes that his cabin is next to a pond

and he knows this pond is everywhere,
on the side of a high mountain, for instance,
Olympus, or Mount Meru.

Thoreau, in his hut, reads the Vedas and the Gita,

fascinated, while the morning wind blows outside.

The morning wind forever blows,

the poem of creation is uninterrupted.
Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in.
Its thin current slides away, but eternity remains.
I would drink deeper.... He writes in his journal.

He lays down his book and goes outside

to draw water. There he meets the servant of a Brahmin
and their buckets grate together in the same well:

The Walden, the Nile, the vast Atlantic

-- other names for the Ganges.
THE FRENZY OF ORLANDO

If Orlando, the great Count

had then remembered God –
the God for whom he fought

When he read those Arabic

words of love, written (as if
with the ink of his own blood)

On the walls of a cave, he would

take the loss of Angelica well, and
aware of the real war, be saved.
THE KATHA UPANISHAD

Three times Nachiketa asked his father,

To whom will you offer me?
And his father offered him to Death.

From Death first he redeemed his father.

Then he learned about the sacred fire
which is the source of the world. This fire of sacrifice
received his name: Nachiketa.

Nachiketa asked the Lord of Death

that what he really wanted: knowledge of the Self.
Even the gods didn't know it, and Death
offered to the boy
women, empires, and eternity instead.

Man is not to be satisfied with wealth, he answered.

Solemnly, Lord Yama had to teach him

what he wanted to learn.
JNANESHWARI

The Ganges in the form of song

sweet
as mango
eaten by a golden boy
bathing in a river

one afternoon long passed

(this afternoon)
in India.

In this river of poems

we meet beyond centuries and seasons
Some Notes

Nachiketa is the young hero of the Katha Upanishad, one of the most beautiful of all Upanishads, the
later part of each one of the four Vedas (revealed scriptures of India). Nachiketa achieves Self-
realization by receiving the teachings of Yama, the lord of Death.

The Yoga Vasistha is one of the leading texts of Hinduism. Its insightful stories and teachings consist
of the spiritual instruction given to young Rama (another incarnation of Vishnu, or God) by the sage
Vasistha.

My edition of Thoreau's Walden is a hardcover published by Barnes & Noble Inc., 1993. The reference
to Olympus and the quotes can be found in the chapter "Where I lived, and what I lived for". The story
of the Bhramin's servant and the buckets of water is in "The pond in the winter". Mount Meru is a
sacred mountain in the Himalayas.

Ariosto's Orlando Furioso (The Frenzy of Orlando) is a Renaissance epic that tells the story of the
defense of Christendom against the advance of Islam in Europe. Orlando is a Christian medieval knight
who loses his mind due to his great love for Angelica, a pagan princess who does not love him.

Jnaneshwari is a glorious commentary in verse on the Bhagavad Gita written by a fifteen year-old
boy, Jnaneshwar Maharaj (1275-1296), one of the greatest saints of India. The Bhagavad Gita is the
most spiritually rich fragment of the Mahabharata, the epic of India's ancient history.