Who or what is this friend called Muse?

Class 1: The Muse and the Mystics: The Poetry of Rumi and the Ecstatic Makers

Who or what is this friend called Muse? How close does she live to the soul? What did Rumi (1207), Hafez (1326), and Kabir (1440) know and write about 500 to 800 years ago that serve as a language compass, a spiritual compass if you will, in 2016? Does this consciousness also enhance our daily writing practice as we knock on the door of the Muse? Coleman Barks, the prolific translator of Rumi reminded: Be loyal to your daily practice. Keep working and knocking on the door. As you’ll remember it is said in one of Rumi’s pithy moments, that the door we’re knocking on opens from the inside.

Rumi said words can sound like a poem, but not have any juice. No flavor to relish. The Muse & The Mystics is a stepping stone that follows Jim Moreno’s last workshop in April’s National Poetry Month, Poetry That Inspires: Poems of the Heart. The Muse & The Mystics is designed to put juice into your poetry and help you pay attention to your intuitive voice, the fecund wisdom that is lodged in the balcony of your heart and is waiting for you to discover this deep ear in your chest.

Kabir said, If you want the truth, I’ll tell you the truth: Listen to the secret sound, the real sound, which is inside you. The Muse & The Mystics begins with realizing that each poet brings something from their personality, their being, their history, that makes it safe to write, to go inside to reach for the handle of the door to the Muse that only opens from the inside. This Container negates any reference to The Muse & The Mystics being a critique class. It is a writing class where all writers have the gift of dignity and are reminded to let their poet write the poem, not their editor.

Hafez said, An awake heart is like a sky that pours light. Jim Moreno’s intent is for The Muse and The Mystics to provide light for your writing practice so remember we’ll keep the light on for you.

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