Of poets

Zarathustra is so sincere and so truthful that he will not even spare himself, if there is something uttered by him which is not absolutely true. And the problem about truth is, you cannot speak it in its totality.

At the most you can indicate some aspect, hint towards a few glimpses. But to the person you are speaking to, these fragments will remain absolutely puzzling, because he cannot fill the gaps. The mystic has a duty to fill the gaps and to make his statements as entire, as systematic as possible.

Therein is the source of lies.

The mystic has to lie, it is unavoidable.

The responsibility is not of the mystic; it is the very nature of truth that it is not absolutely available to knowledge, to language, to expression. More often, the mystics have chosen poetry as an expression, for the simple reason that to lie in poetry is easier than to lie in prose.

You may have never thought about it. A lie in poetry becomes a metaphor, becomes a way of saying, becomes a decoration. But in prose, the lie stands out so clearly that it is very difficult to hide it.

Poetry is more flexible, because poetry is part of the world of dreams; it is also part of fictitious expressions.

Fragments of truth can be expressed in poetry without feeling that you are not being just to the truth, and you are not being fair to the listener. Poetry is a beautiful camouflage. It is not an accident that many great poets are nothing but hidden mystics. And many great mystics have chosen poetry as an approach to the hearts of the people.

Prose is rational; it has to be logical, has to be supported by evidence and proofs. Poetry needs no reason, no logic, no support of any evidence or proof. It is a totally different dimension. All that it needs is beauty, all that it needs is music.

It is very easy, when there is no need for logic and reason, to mix fragments of truth into fictitious lies, and give it an expression of completion.

George Gurdjieff's disciple, P.D. Ouspensky, was a great mathematician - perhaps one of the greatest in the whole history of man. He was not a poet; he knew only logic and reason, which are the foundations of mathematics. But he fell in love with George Gurdjieff, a mystic.

George Gurdjieff was not known in the world. He was known only to a very few people, because he was a very strange man. His methods were strange, unconventional, unorthodox. His ways of expression were almost not understandable. His writing is a category in itself.

I don't think there is any single human being, except me, who has read his books from the very beginning to the end. It is such a torture, because he goes on making words of his own. You cannot find their meaning in any dictionary; they don't belong to any language. He knew many languages, and he mixes all those languages.

His sentences are so long that by the time you come to the end you have forgotten the beginning. A single sentence may run the whole page. And he was aware of it. He has written big volumes, one thousand pages, and rarely will you come to a sentence that you feel you have understood exactly.

It is deliberate. He wants you to go through this torture because, he says, unless you get something with effort you don't give any value to it. Out of one thousand pages, perhaps ten pages would have been enough to say what he wants to say. But he goes on in such a roundabout way that it takes pages for him to say a single statement.

Ouspensky, seeing the situation, wrote a book to explain Gurdjieff's system of thought. His writing is absolutely mathematical, rational; each sentence is significant. But he gives a subtitle to the book.

The title of the book is IN SEARCH OF THE MIRACULOUS, and the subtitle is FRAGMENTS OF AN UNKNOWN TEACHING.

When he was asked, "Why fragments?" he said, "I am not a poet. I will say only that which is absolutely reasonable, for which I can give you proof, for which logic stands in support. But I am aware that there are gaps between those fragments which can be known only by experience.

Nothing can be written about them.

"And I will not deceive the world by calling this a system, because it is not. These are only fragments - a few pieces here, a few pieces there which have allowed themselves to be expressed in language.

But the most important has remained unexpressed."

The difficulty lies with the very experience of truth. Either the man of experience remains silent.... If he wants to be absolutely true then he cannot say a single word, then silence is the only possible expression. But who will understand silence?

The second alternative is that he gives you fragments. But if they are given in prose, you will not be able to join them together into a whole system. They are pieces and don't make sense in themselves; and you don't know the whole of which they are pieces.

Hence, the mystics have chosen poetry as a way. Poetry has the great quality that it does not need to be absolutely true; it needs only to be absolutely beautiful. And lies can be beautiful, there is no problem. Sometimes they can be even more beautiful than the truth. Poetry allows the poet to fill the gaps with beautiful flowers, and give you a sense that you are being given a whole system of thought, in its entirety.

Zarathustra is such a sincere man that what he says about the poets, that they lie too much... he does not forget to remind his disciples that, "Zarathustra is also a poet."

This authenticity makes him one of the greatest men who has ever traveled in the inner spaces and the mysteries of man. And even if sometimes he lies, his lies are nothing but stepping-stones; they lead to the temple of truth. They are not the temple, true, but they lead to the temple.

They may be lies, but they are like arrows, pointing towards the faraway truth. And a lie that can help you to understand truth is not just a lie - don't condemn it. It is not true, but it has been of immense help to find the truth.

Zarathustra is saying... and the opening statement this evening has far-reaching effects:

'SINCE I HAVE KNOWN THE BODY BETTER,' SAID ZARATHUSTRA TO ONE OF HIS DISCIPLES, 'THE SPIRIT HAS BEEN ONLY FIGURATIVELY SPIRIT TO ME; AND ALL THAT IS "INTRANSITORY" - THAT TOO HAS BEEN ONLY AN "IMAGE"'.He is saying, "Since I have known the body in its totality, the spirit, the soul, the self, have been only figuratively used by me" - because what we call the soul is not separate from the body.

It can be understood easily if I say that the body is your outer soul and the soul is your inner body.

But it is one phenomenon, it is one energy. The space outside your house and the space inside your house are not two spaces - the outside space and the inside space are a one and absolutely single phenomenon.

There have been people in the world who believe in the body, the materialists. In the East there has been an ancient school of them, the Charvakas. In the West: Epicurus, Karl Marx, Bertrand Russell, Jean-Paul Sartre. These people represent the materialist viewpoint - that matter is the only reality; all that exists is matter, spirit is only a poetic image.

And there has been the opposite school of spiritualists, who say that the soul is the authentic reality; the body is ephemeral, illusory - because they have made it a criterion: unless something is eternal it is not real. The body is not eternal - one day it is born, then it is constantly changing, every moment, and one day it dies. It is simply a long dream. Even dreams, when you are dreaming them, appear to be real. So is the case with the body and the outside world - it only appears to be real.

But because it is ephemeral, constantly changing, it cannot be given the name of absolute reality.

But inside you, invisible, is the spirit.And just as inside you there is an invisible spirit, your soul, so in the universe also there is an invisible spirit, God. The spirit of the individual is only part of the universal spirit. The spirit is the reality; matter is only a dream.

Both these schools have been conflicting continually for centuries without coming to any conclusion; and there is no hope that they can ever come to any conclusion, because the reality is something else. Neither of them is aware of it.

Modern physics has given a tremendous new insight. According to modern physics and its research, matter certainly does not exist. The spiritualists were very happy to hear this from the scientific sources, that matter does not exist. They thought that their standpoint has been proved - not only logically, but scientifically also; not only religiously, but by an objective science. But they have not understood exactly what modern physics is saying.

Modern physics is saying: matter does not exist, what exists is energy. Condensed energy appears to be like matter. But as you divide matter, ultimately you come to the electron - a particle of electricity - which is not material, which is immaterial energy.

But it is not spiritual either. This energy expresses itself in two ways, according to me: one expression is matter, another expression is spirit - different formulations of the same energy. When it is condensed it appears as matter. When it is not condensed it appears as spirit.

Zarathustra had no knowledge of what was going to happen after twenty-five centuries, but he came very close to the fact. He says: SINCE I HAVE KNOWN THE BODY BETTER... as I have explored the body in its very depth, in its interiority, I have become aware that spirit or soul are only metaphors - figurative ways of indicating that the body also has an immaterial interior to it.

But it is not against the body; it is part of it, it is the same phenomenon. Just as when you see ice melting, the water seems to be totally different - it is flowing, the ice is static - but the difference is only of temperature. And if the water is heated, it will change again into another form; it will become vapor. So you have three forms of one energy - you have the ice, you have the water, and you have the vapor. And the vapor is invisible. You cannot connect the vapor with the ice; you cannot even see it.

Zarathustra is saying, "Trying to understand the body in its totality, I have come to know that spirit is nothing but a manifestation of the same energy as that which the body is." The same energy has two aspects: on the outside it is visible, on the inside it is invisible. He is trying to destroy the duality which all the religions have created in the mind of man. He is trying to destroy the schism between the materialist and the spiritualist.

His effort is for a tremendous synthesis - that you need not torture the body to attain spiritual experiences. On the contrary, the body has to be as healthy, as wholesome as possible, because that will be helpful for you to go into your innermost invisible world. There is no conflict, there is a deep harmony.

Zarathustra teaches harmony. Other than Zarathustra, everybody has been teaching conflict. The moment a person becomes convinced of the conflict between the body and the spirit, he is a house divided against himself. His whole energy goes into fighting with himself. The poor situation in which humanity finds itself is the ultimate outcome of this split in man.

Zarathustra is saying that spirit, soul and all these words are beautiful words, but they are only figurative - they are only metaphors, they are only poetic. Don't get caught in any conflict. You are one whole, you are one organic unity; hence there is no need for any inner fight. And the moment you are no longer in any inner fight, your whole energy is available to rise higher towards the superman.

Fighting with yourself, you cannot overcome.

Looking from the outside, I can manage a fight between my two hands. They can start beating each other, hurting each other; but whichever hand is hurt or wounded, basically I am hurt, I am wounded.

The fight between my two hands cannot decide which hand has become victorious. They are both my hands. They are getting my energy. One thing is certain, nobody can be victorious. But their fight will become a failure for my whole being, because they will destroy my energy, which could have been used to attain a higher state of consciousness.

Zarathustra is saying that he wants the body and the spirit as one, the God and the world as one.

Only one exists. What name you give to it does not matter. If you love to call it God so much - call it. If you are obsessed with the word matter and you want to call it matter - call it. Your matter will have some spiritual quality, your matter will have intelligence. And to those who want to call it God, they have also to remember that your God will have in him the vast universe of matter.

He is not a person to fight over words, but he wants to indicate that if we understand the organic unity between the visible and the invisible, between the changing and the unchanging, between the moving and the unmoving, we can create a foundation for a better man to arrive. We can herald and declare that the superman is going to succeed us. We have not been able to do it up to now, because our whole energy goes into fighting with ourselves.

'I HEARD YOU SAY THAT ONCE BEFORE,' ANSWERED THE DISCIPLE; 'AND THEN YOU ADDED: "BUT THE POETS LIE TOO MUCH." WHY DID YOU SAY THAT THE POETS LIE TOO MUCH?'

The poets certainly lie too much. Zarathustra must have said it. The poets have to lie too much to say a few small fragments of truth. They use lies as devices to communicate some echoes, faraway echoes, of truth. They do a great service to humanity.

It is good that there have been poets. And it is good that there have been poets courageous enough to lie in the service of truth; otherwise the world would have been far more ignorant than it is, far more in darkness than it is.

But Zarathustra takes the disciple from a very different aspect and hits him hard. He has said already, all creators are hard. They have to be hard, because unless they can destroy, they cannot create.

'WHY?' SAID ZARATHUSTRA - rather than answering the question, he questions the disciple - 'WHY?' SAID ZARATHUSTRA. 'YOU ASK WHY? I AM NOT ONE OF THOSE WHO MAY BE QUESTIONED ABOUT THEIR WHY.'

A tremendously beautiful statement. He is saying, "Don't ask me why. I am not one of those who may be questioned about their why, because I am not a philosopher, I am not a scholar. My statements are not based on reason; hence to ask why is irrelevant. My statements are based on my experience and you cannot ask the same question about a statement that is based on experience."

For example, if somebody says to you, "I love you," you cannot ask, "Why?" That will look so strange.

You can say, "Thank you," you can say, "I also love you so much, you are in my heart. But we need not meet, because whenever I need to see you, I just look into my heart, it is enough" - but you cannot ask why.

That question will be stupid. And even if somebody asks it, nobody can answer why. That's why for centuries people have called love blind - because it cannot answer why. They have called the experience of love, "falling in love." It is an irrational, illogical, emotional experience. It is not something logical, rational, mathematical, scientific, where "why" is relevant.

Zarathustra is saying, "My whole philosophy of life is based on my own experience. You can ask how we can experience it. You can ask the how, but you cannot ask why." Do you see the difference between why and how? Why asks for the reason - love has no reason. How asks for the situation, in what situation it happened. Is there a way, is there a possibility for one to become open and available to love? Is there some method, so that you can remove all the obstacles that may be preventing the stream of love from flowing? You can ask the how, which is relevant, but you cannot ask why.

DO MY EXPERIENCES DATE FROM YESTERDAY? IT IS A LONG TIME SINCE I EXPERIENCED THE REASONS FOR MY OPINIONS. The philosopher has reasons for his opinions, the mystic has no reasons for his opinions. He has only one argument, himself; he has only one proof, his presence; he has only one evidence, his own life. You can watch it. You can try and enquire and explore his silences, his grace, his beauty. You can look into his eyes, you can look into his words and the authority that they carry; you can even just sit by his side and feel his presence.

Be silent and allow a little merger, a little melting. You can hold his hand, and allow his energy, his warmth, his love, to answer you. But you cannot ask why; you cannot ask reasons for his opinions. His opinions are not opinions, that's why you cannot ask for reasons. His opinions are his experiences. The philosopher has no experience; all his opinions are based on reason. He can immediately give you a long list of reasons.

One great logician had come to see Ramakrishna, and Ramakrishna asked him, "I hear you have created a society of the highest intellectuals of Calcutta" - and in those days Calcutta was the capital of India. "The highest strata of the society belongs to your society. Can you tell me, why do you believe in God?" The logician immediately started telling him a dozen reasons, why he believes in God.

Listening, after each reason Ramakrishna laughed. And his disciples were feeling very embarrassed, because those reasons were so logical, and Ramakrishna was an uneducated man; he was not answering anything, he was simply laughing. When the logician had given all his reasons, he said, "Is that enough?"

Ramakrishna said, "You believe in God because of these reasons, but you don't have any experience. All these reasons can be argued about; a better logician can destroy all your reasons. I am a poor man and uneducated, but you can understand it - that there is no argument in the world which cannot be counter-argued. If this is all that is the basis of your love and your trust and your faith in God, it is not enough.

"I don't have any reason, but I know. I know the way a man with eyes knows the sun. There is no reason. If somebody asks me, 'Give me the argument, why you believe in the sun,' what can I say except that I can see it? Only the blind man needs reasons. So don't feel offended and angry. I want to say to you: forget all these reasons, this is rubbish. You don't have even a glimpse, what to say of an experience."

Zarathustra is saying, 'IT IS A LONG TIME SINCE I EXPERIENCED THE REASONS FOR MY OPINIONS.

'SHOULD I NOT HAVE TO BE A BARREL OF MEMORY, IF I WANTED TO CARRY MY REASONS, TOO, ABOUT WITH ME?

'IT IS ALREADY TOO MUCH FOR ME TO RETAIN EVEN MY OPINIONS....

It is so beautiful, what he is saying: IT IS ALREADY TOO MUCH FOR ME TO RETAIN EVEN MY OPINIONS; AND MANY A BIRD HAS FLOWN AWAY. Many times I forget even my opinions - MANY A BIRD HAS FLOWN AWAY. I am in silence, I am in innocence, I have become a child again.

Whatever I say is spontaneous. It is not based on any thinking, it is just blossoming in my heart. My spring has come. You can't ask the flowers, why are you blossoming? The flowers cannot give you any reasons.

'YET WHAT DID ZARATHUSTRA ONCE SAY TO YOU? THAT THE POETS LIE TOO MUCH? - BUT ZARATHUSTRA TOO IS A POET. He is saying, "I don't remember what I have said to you. I don't carry my opinions and my reasons and my statements around with me - it would be such a load - I go light. The higher you move, the lighter you have to be - unburdened, unloaded. At the highest peak, you are absolutely light. You are saying, perhaps I have said that poets lie too much.

I must remind you... BUT ZARATHUSTRA TOO IS A POET."

This sincerity is very difficult to find. Gautam Buddha will not say this, Mahavira will not say this, Jesus will not say this. Zarathustra is so human, so authentic and so sincere: "Poets lie, but I am also a poet and I have also lied."

Perhaps it is a necessity; it cannot be avoided. Great art consists of using lies as stepping-stones for the truth, making a ladder of lies to reach to the heights of truth. Lies are not necessarily against truth; it depends how you use them, it depends on your articulateness.

I am reminded of a small story: Gautam Buddha and his disciple Ananda are coming from a faraway place. They have lost their way - they were supposed to reach the city where they were going hours ago, but it is almost sunset and there is no sign of the city. They can see far away into the distance, because they are on the heights of a hill. Ananda has become very concerned and worried; Gautam Buddha is old, sick, he needs some comfortable place to rest for the night. The whole day, in his old age and sickness, he has been walking.

Just by the side, a wood cutter is collecting wood. Ananda asks him, "How far is the nearest town?"

He says, "Don't be so depressed, it is not more than two miles."

That gave Ananda new courage, and new energy. Buddha smiled. Ananda could not understand why he smiled, but he remained silent, not wanting to bother him - he is already tired.

Two miles pass, and there is no sign of the city. There is an old woman, who lives by the side of the road on her farm, and they ask her, "How far is the town?" She says, "My sons, it will be not more than two miles. You have already reached, it is just a little bit further."

Ananda said, "But the other man was saying two miles, and this old woman is also saying two miles."

Buddha again laughed; he said, "Perhaps it is two miles, let us try."

Two miles passed and the town is still not anywhere in sight. They meet another man who is going in the opposite direction. He certainly must know how far the town is - he is coming from the town.

Ananda, very excitedly, asks him, "How far is the town?" The man says, "How far? It may be just two miles." And Buddha laughed again.

Now it was too much. Ananda said, "We are tired and you are still laughing. And you must be laughing at me, because there is nobody else here. I am getting worried, because now it is getting dark, and we cannot even see any lights anywhere. And all these people are strange - everybody says two miles. We have already gone six miles, and it is still two miles. It seems the people of this area can only count up to two miles."

Buddha said, "You don't understand, Ananda. This is what I have been doing my whole life. Those people are very compassionate. They know it is not two miles, but they managed to push you six miles. Their lies... they were lying, but their lies were out of compassion. And that's why I was laughing. I was not laughing at you, I was laughing because this is what I have been doing my whole life.

"When people ask, How far is enlightenment? - just two miles; just a few steps more, and you have already reached. And it remains always two miles. But this is how people go on progressing. They go on coming closer and closer and closer, but those two miles... they remain always there. So the people of this area are very compassionate and they understand human psychology."

The masters have to lie, because sometimes truth may be too hard for you to accept. They have to make it a little dilute, they have to put a few lies in it. Sometimes truth may be too bitter, and some sugar cubes of lies may help you to drink even the bitterest medicine. Lies can certainly be used to bring you closer to the truth; they are not necessarily against it. They are not true, that is true, but they are not enemies of the truth - not necessarily at least.

DO YOU NOW BELIEVE THAT HE SPOKE THE TRUTH?... Zarathustra is saying, "I said that the poets lie too much, and now I say, I am also a poet."

DO YOU NOW BELIEVE THAT HE SPOKE THE TRUTH? WHY DO YOU BELIEVE IT?' Why do you believe me?

THE DISCIPLE ANSWERED: 'I BELIEVE IN ZARATHUSTRA.' His answer is also immensely beautiful. He is saying, "I don't care what you say, I don't care what you deny. My trust in you does not depend on your statements - my trust depends on your presence, on your very being."

I believe in Zarathustra. It does not matter what he says, I believe in his individuality, in his crystal- clear eyes, in his authoritative voice; not in his words, but in his silences.

BUT ZARATHUSTRA SHOOK HIS HEAD AND SMILED.

BELIEF DOES NOT MAKE ME BLESSED....

A master always demands more. That is the only way he can go on pulling you higher and higher. He says, BELIEF DOES NOT MAKE ME BLESSED. I need some more proof; just belief is not enough.

You have to be something of which Zarathustra is nothing but a dream, of which Zarathustra is nothing but a longing, of which Zarathustra is nothing but a message.

You have to be a superman; just believing in Zarathustra won't do. There are so many believers in the world - everybody is a believer. Believers have not changed even a single inch of human consciousness. I need a little more proof, least of all belief in myself. You cannot persuade me because I don't have any ego to fulfill through your belief. I demand that you prove - prove that Zarathustra is right. And the proof has not to be just intellectual gymnastics, it has to be an actualization of your potential.

BUT GRANTED THAT SOMEONE HAS SAID IN ALL SERIOUSNESS THAT THE POETS LIE TOO MUCH: HE IS RIGHT - WE DO LIE TOO MUCH.

This needs courage, great courage, to say, WE DO LIE TOO MUCH. But there is a necessity. You cannot speak the truth unpolluted, pure. It is too abstract - you cannot catch hold of it. Lies belong to this world, your world, your language; but they can be used to create a device, and perhaps a glimpse of truth may happen.

I have always used a small story: A house catches on fire and there are only three, four small children inside the house. The mother has died, and the father has gone to the market. The whole neighborhood is trying, shouting to the children, but they are playing inside and nobody is courageous enough to enter the house, catch hold of the children and run out. It seems to be too dangerous - the house is almost surrounded by fire from all sides.

Just then the father arrives, and the people say, "We have tried our best, but your children are strange, they don't listen. They are in fact enjoying the flames all around. They are very small, they have never seen such a beautiful scene. They are not afraid at all." The father runs into the house, through the flames, and says to the children, "What are you doing here? I have brought all you children all the toys that you had asked for - they are waiting outside. Come with me."

He took hold of all the children, and ran out of the house with them. They would not have come out; they were really enjoying themselves. They said to their father, "It is so beautiful here. We have never seen so much fire all around, dancing flames...." And the father said, "We will talk outside, you just come. Your toys are waiting there." And just for toys they came out; although there were no toys. The father had promised, but had forgotten to bring them. He said, "Forgive me, tomorrow I will bring more toys than you have asked for, but today you have to forgive me."

But they said, "Why did you lie?" He said, "You don't understand, you are too small. The house is on fire; it would have burnt you alive. You would have been dead - then for whom would I bring the toys?"

Would you call this a lie? Something unvirtuous? It is simply a device. Your house is also on fire, and somehow you have to be brought out of your burning house. And the master has to say many things to you, just to persuade you to come out of your dark cave, to come out of your burning house, to come out of your misery, to come out of your anger, jealousy, hate.

He promises many toys to you, although today he has not brought them. But once you are out, you will understand that toys don't exist. They were lies, fictions, but very helpful, immensely helpful; without them, you would not have come out.

Zarathustra says, WE KNOW TOO LITTLE AND ARE BAD LEARNERS: SO WE HAVE TO LIE.

Even our greatest wise men know too little - existence is too big, too mysterious. And if they say to you that they know too little, perhaps you will find somebody else who knows more. Anybody who says he knows more, he knows all, may be lying, but he will be helpful.

Once you also arrive in the same space, you will understand why he was lying. You will feel grateful for his lies. You will understand that existence is so vast, nobody can know it in its totality. Even to know just a small part of the mystery of existence is enough. Just a small flame is enough and you can travel thousands of miles in darkness. That small flame will throw light only four feet around you, but that's enough; as you move, the circle of light will go on moving with you.

AND WE BELIEVE IN THE PEOPLE AND ITS 'WISDOM' AS IF THERE WERE A SPECIAL SECRET ENTRANCE TO KNOWLEDGE WHICH IS blocked TO HIM WHO HAS LEARNED ANYTHING. The man who has come to know something about truth finds himself in many difficulties.

First: he cannot express it; it is elusive. Second: if he tries to express it, he has to use lies. Thirdly:

even if somehow he manages, he says something, you understand something else, because you are full of the so-called wisdom of the people, the traditional wisdom.

Whenever you hear something new, you immediately convert it according to your prejudices. You destroy its newness, you destroy its freshness.

People are very averse to learning - so much so, that it seems in their minds they believe that the masses... the greater the masses are, the greater is their wisdom. And anybody who tries to learn individually, who goes away from the crowd, is not only a stranger, he is dangerous.

So many people cannot be wrong. But the reality is, so many people are wrong. Only individuals have rarely reached to the peaks. The crowd has always remained in the dark valleys of ignorance, but believing that whatever they know is wisdom. They have to believe it is wisdom; otherwise, it will become very uncomfortable. You cannot go on reminding yourself that you are ignorant - it will be a pain, a continuous ache in the heart.

It happened... I used to stay in Bhopal, in one of my friends' houses. He is a doctor, and he lives in the medical college campus. The day I was staying with him... it must have been in the middle of the night.... We were talking - he was my childhood friend, we had been through school, through college, through university together - and somebody knocked on the door. It was a man who said, "I am very tired. And there is some kind of fair going on in the city" - Bhopal is a Mohammedan city, it used to be a Mohammedan state - "so thousands of Mohammedans have gathered here and there is no place anywhere to stay. I have knocked on many hotel doors, and I am utterly tired. If you can allow me just to sleep, I will sleep on the floor.

My friend said, "No, there is no need, there is a bed empty in the patients ward." He took me aside and he said, "There is a problem - a woman has died. Should we tell him that a dead woman is lying nearby, on another bed?"

I said, "You are mad! If you tell him, then it is finished." I said, "Keep quiet; he does not know. And one thing is certain, that that woman is dead, she cannot say anything to him. So let him sleep; at least he will have a good sleep in the night."

It was a female ward, and that was the only empty bed. The doctor did not think anything about the fact that it was a female ward, and the man read when he entered: This is a female ward. He went to his bed, and just within ten minutes, he came running. He could not speak, he was trembling, and whatever was coming out of him was all gibberish.

The doctor told him, "Cool down, what is the matter?"

He said, "That woman is dead!"

I said, "But what was the need for you to go to that woman?"

He said, "When I saw it is a female ward, I just I wanted to be acquainted with the person who is sleeping by my side. And you are dangerous people... the woman is dead. I shook her, I tried hard, I opened her eyes, and then suddenly I realized, my God, she is dead!"

I said, "We have given you a place to sleep. She was dead in her bed; you need not have tried to introduce yourself to her." I told him, "Now you know that she is dead, she cannot do any harm. A living person can do some harm - now you can sleep perfectly, without any fear."

He said, "I cannot even enter the room. I am going!"

I said, "Where are you going?"

He said, "Wherever. I will sleep on the street, but I cannot enter that room. And I cannot think that...

you should have at least told me before."

I said, "Do you think, if we had told you before, you would have even entered the room?"

He said, "That's right, I would not have entered; but you should have at least tried to hide the board which says it is a female ward. Then I would have slept - if somebody is sleeping let him sleep - but a woman is asleep, just by the side... I tried just to have a look at what kind of face she has. And she is a beautiful woman, so I tried to wake her up to say, "I am feeling thirsty, do you have any idea where I can get water?" but she remained silent. I shook her hard, I tried to open her eyes, and then suddenly it dawned on me that, my God, this is a dead woman!

"I am going. You have to go and fetch my suitcase; I cannot enter that room again. The face of that woman, I will not be able to forget my whole life. Even when I close my eyes, I immediately see her."

I had to go to fetch his suitcase. The doctor was hiding inside the room; he was afraid that if the chief medical officer comes to know, then he will be in trouble. In the first place, it was a female ward, so why did you allow a male to enter there? And when you knew perfectly well that the woman was dead, and that in the morning she had to be removed, you should have warned him. So he told me, "Just get rid of him."

I gave him his suitcase and he went down the street, looking back again and again to see if I was standing there. Sometimes... if I had known that it was a female ward, I would have covered the board up. There was no need... I could just have put the light off on the veranda, where the board was. Just a small light and he would have slept the whole night beautifully.

Lies are not always unvirtuous. They can be a virtue, and sometimes they are absolutely necessary.

ALAS, THERE ARE SO MANY THINGS BETWEEN HEAVEN AND EARTH OF WHICH ONLY THE POETS HAVE LET THEMSELVES DREAM! Although they are only dreams, one day they become realities; so what was a lie one day turns into a truth. But only the poets have been courageous enough to dream.

For example, there are ancientmost scriptures where they are dreaming about flying in the sky. Up until the Wright brothers it had remained a lie; but it has turned out to be a truth. There are fictions about other planets, and man reaching there, or people from other planets coming to the earth. They are all fictions, but poets have dreamt about them, and one day there is every possibility that those dreams may come true.

A poet has a heart which is sensitive even about that which has not happened yet. All their dreams have turned out, some time or other, to be true. So don't ever call somebody just a dreamer - he may be only a prophet.

AND ESPECIALLY ABOVE HEAVEN: FOR ALL GODS ARE POETS' IMAGES, POETS' SURREPTITIOUSNESS!

TRULY IT DRAWS US EVER UPWARD - THAT IS, TO CLOUDLAND: WE SET OUR MOTLEY PUPPETS ON THE CLOUDS AND THEN CALL THEM GODS AND SUPERMEN.

ALAS, HOW WEARY I AM OF THE UNATTAINABLE THAT IS SUPPOSED TO BE REALITY. ALAS, HOW WEARY I AM OF THE POETS!

THIS SPEECH MAKES ZARATHUSTRA'S DISCIPLES ANGRY AND THEY ARE SILENT - SILENT TOO IS ZARATHUSTRA, UNTIL AT LENGTH HE SIGHS AND SAYS:

I AM OF TODAY AND OF THE HAS-BEEN... BUT THERE IS SOMETHING IN ME THAT IS OF TOMORROW AND OF THE DAY-AFTER-TOMORROW AND OF THE SHALL-BE.

And when a man like Zarathustra speaks, all these are reflected in his words.

I AM OF TODAY AND OF THE HAS-BEEN...; BUT THERE IS SOMETHING IN ME THAT IS OF TOMORROW AND OF THE DAY-AFTER-TOMORROW AND OF THE SHALL-BE. Naturally, you cannot expect such a man to be absolutely factual. He is the past, he is the present, and so much in him is aware of the future - and all that is mixed. His past, his present, his future are so mixed; much will appear to you as lies.

But when a man like Zarathustra lies, it is far better than when an unconscious man speaks the truth. His truth is ordinary, his truth is not going to raise human consciousness. But Zarathustra's lie is going to raise human consciousness to a point where the lie becomes true, where the dream is realized as fact.

I HAVE GROWN WEARY OF THE POETS, THE OLD AND THE NEW: THEY ALL SEEM TO ME SUPERFICIAL AND SHALLOW SEAS.

THEY HAVE NOT THOUGHT DEEPLY ENOUGH: THEREFORE THEIR FEELING - HAS NOT PLUMBED THE DEPTHS.

THE POET'S SPIRIT WANTS SPECTATORS, EVEN IF THEY ARE ONLY BUFFALOES!

He is making a difference between the poet and the mystic. The mystic can be a poet; the poet can be a mystic, but it is not necessarily so. A poet may be just a poet: when a poet is just a poet, he is an exhibitionist - he wants people to hear his poetry, his songs, he wants people to appreciate him.

It does not matter who the people are; even if they are buffaloes....

I have heard about a thief who was caught stealing, and brought into the court. The magistrate asked, "At what time did you enter that house?" He said, "It was, must have been nearabout ten o'clock at night." "Then what were you doing in that house till six o'clock in the morning?" He said, "Don't ask me that; I was caught there. I had no idea that a poet lives there. And he started... he said, 'Forget all about leaving, sit down.' And I, being a thief, was afraid, so I sat down, and he started reciting his latest poetry. I said many times that I have to go. He said, 'You can go in the morning, there is no hurry. But you will have to listen to all my poems. I know you are a thief and you had come into my house to steal. If you listen to my poems, I will not report you to the police.

You will be already punished enough.'

"And he was not going to report me; he even offered me tea. I was leaving, and the police arrived.

If you want to punish me, you can, but I have been punished, and I have not stolen anything. Just for entering his house.... If you want to punish somebody else, you can always tell him to go to that poet's house - he is such a torture. And to listen to his poetry the whole night... you can understand.

I have been in jails before, but I have never suffered so much."

The poets are continuously in search of somebody to appreciate them. Their only joy is a subtle ego fulfillment. Zarathustra is right, that he is weary, tired of the poets. But when a mystic speaks through poetry, it is a totally different thing.

His concern is not poetry, his concern is not your appreciation, his concern is not your applause. His concern is that through poetry perhaps something can reach into your heart as a seed.

BUT I HAVE GROWN WEARY OF THIS SPIRIT: AND I SEE THE DAY COMING, WHEN IT WILL GROW WEARY OF ITSELF.

ALREADY I HAVE SEEN THE POETS TRANSFORMED; I HAVE SEEN THEM DIRECT THEIR GLANCE UPON THEMSELVES.

I HAVE SEEN PENITENTS OF THE SPIRIT APPEARING: THEY GREW OUT OF THE POETS.

He is saying that if a poet gets weary of his own poetry and, rather than looking at somebody else to appreciate him he starts looking at himself, he is very close to the transformation of becoming a mystic.

The poet should not stop at being a poet; his destiny can be fulfilled only if he becomes a mystic. A poet is interested in others: a mystic is exploring his own being. The poet says things which you will appreciate: the mystic says things which he has found in the depth of his own being. And he says them in order that, perhaps they will create an urge for search and exploration in you.

... THUS SPAKE ZARATHUSTRA.

Okay, Maneesha?

Yes, Osho.