FROM YAQIN SANDLEBEN

Dear Friends,

This is sad news indeed. My heart is full of emotion, sadness and
beauty mixed together, as I believe Shanti's heart was. I am
heartbroken. She was my friend, my music teacher.

I first met her at a house concert at La Sagrita in New Delhi. I was
mesmerized by her art, her deep feeling, and her beautiful voice.
After a few years, she shared some of her deep feelings of life with me.

She allowed me to be present when she took Bayat with Shabda, the late
afternoon Indian sun angling across the Dargah of Inayat Khan- the
sound of birds mingling with the sounds of children of the basti in
the background.

  She gently corrected me when I made a cultural gaff, or sang a note
wrong. She showed me her wit, her sharp insights into life and into
others.

She trusted me when I took her into the wilderness of New Mexico, so
different from her home in Delhi! She wanted to leave the first
night, but agreed to stay at least that first night. Each day was a
challenge, but she stayed, even after finding the foot long lizard in
her small bedroom. She opened up so beautifully to our sufi family on
that visit, and also to my own family, my daughters and my wife.

One evening, she looked up at the night sky in that remote place, and
she was like a child in wonder at the millions of stars overhead.
That same innocent wonder appeared again as we watched sunset over the
Grand Canyon, and as she first bit into chocolate cake.

She invited me to sing with her during her concert in Prescott, and
who could refuse that? We sang back and forth, a musical
conversation; I, a child, she, the kind and wise teacher.

I offer all these memories in gratitude for the time and life we
shared together, all too brief, yet a priceless gift, nevertheless.

When Shanti was at the Southwest Sufi Community, she wanted to offer a
gift to her new-found sufi brothers and sisters. She rather prided
herself on English translations of Urdu, so she stayed up late at
night, with the single bulb burning in her room, silence all around,
and translated some verses of Mirza Ghalib, the Urdu Poetry Master of
late 19th century Delhi. I pass this gift along

with Love,

Yaqin

EXISTENCE

There's a whirlpool in each wave-
crocodiles with jaws open in each;
let us see the changes to the drop
by the time it turns into a pearl.

CALLING OUT

It takes a lifetime for a sigh to communicate,
and who lives long enough to caress the length
of the Beloved's Locks?
Who can say how long the Beloved's hair is?

PAIN

It's only a heart, not a stone or a brick-
Why should it not overflow with pain?
I will weep a thousand times-
Why should anyone trouble me about it?

When the Brilliant Beautiful One,
like the dazzling Sun at mid-day,
is Himself the One who sheds light,
Why should He hide His face behind a veil?

Not a Mosque, or a Temple,
Not a Shrine, nor a Holy Place
It's the roadside I sit by-
Why would anyone drive me away?

Even without the broken-hearted Ghalib,
The work of the world, does it stop?
Why weep in torrents?
Why lament on and on?

ANNIHILATION

The drop finds its bliss
     being annihilated in the Ocean,
pain becomes a cure
    when it overflows its boundaries.