Replying to Rumi

This provocative poem was forwarded to me by my friend Lynnette, shortly after I was recalling to her what I learned at the silent retreat - that instead of pushing our pain away (which only gives it energy) - just gently turn from it.  She agreed that you don't necessarily have to embrace the darkness, as Rumi's Guest House suggests:

A Reply to Rumi's Guest House 

Welcome all the visitors you say. Do not put bars on the windows Or locks on the doors. Do not close up the Chimney flue. Duct tape and plastic sheeting will not keep the visitors at bay. They'll pound on the doors, they'll break your windows, they'll create the barricades they'll storm the beach, swarm in like ants through cracks. They'll lead like water through the walls, and creep like mice, and curl like smoke and crack like ice against the window glass. Keep them out? It can't be done, don't try. Welcome all the visitors. Fine. There's all kinds Of welcoming, however. I do not have to throw a house party. I will not post flyers. There will be no open bar. No one will get drunk and lock themselves in the bathroom. No one will break the furniture, grind chips into the rug, throw anyone else in the pool, or lose an earring in the couch. I do not have to run a guest house, either There will be no crackling fire And no easy chairs. I will not serve tea to the visitors. I will not dispense ginger snaps and ask my guests about themselves: "Did my mother send you?" "Why must you plague me?" "Why not stay a while longer?" "Who are you really?" If I must welcome-and I am convinced I must- Let me build a great hall to receive my guests. Like a Greek temple, let it be open on all sides. Let it be wide, and bright, and empty. Let it have a marble floor. Beautiful and cold and hard. Let there be no sofas, no benches, no dark corners no ante-rooms and no coat closets No walls and not even a ledge to lean against. I'll welcome anyone who comes I'll show them my enormous empty all. Come in, come in, I'll say. I'll even smile perhaps make conversation for a while. And if someone settles on the floor, as if to stay, or circles round and round, as if they have lost their way, I'll be kind, extend my hand, and gently show them out again.