One Swaying Being

One Swaying Being

Love is not condescension, never 

that, nor books, nor any marking

on paper, nor what people say of 

each other. Love is a tree with

branches reaching into eternity

 and roots set deep in eternity,

and no trunk! Have you seen it? 

The mind cannot. Your desiring
cannot. The longing you feel for

 this love comes from inside you.

When you become the Friend, your
longing will be as the man in

the ocean who holds to a piece of 

wood. Eventually, wood, man, and

ocean become one swaying being, 

Shams Tabriz, the secret of God.

From The Book of Love

Translated by Coleman Barks

The Man of God

The Man of God

The man of God is drunken without wine,
The man of God is full without meat.
The man of God is distraught and bewildered,
The man of God has no food or sleep.
The man of God is a king beneath a dervish-cloak,
The man of God is a treasure in a ruin.
The man of God is not of air and earth,
The man of God is not of fire and water.
The man of God is a boundless sea,
The man of God rains pearls without a cloud.
The man of God has hundred moons and skies,
The man of God has hundred suns.
The man of God is made wise by the Truth,
The man of God is not learned from book.
The man of God is beyond infidelity and religion,
To the man of God, right and wrong are alike.
The man of God has ridden away from Not-being,
The man of God is gloriously attended.
The man of God is concealed, Shamsi Din;
The man of God do you seek and find!

Translated by 

Coleman Barks

Who Are You

Who Are You

Who are you? The inner vision of consciousness? 

The heart? A sacred half-light, are you that?

Do you grow gatherings? Are you a friend 

of the sun, who comes and goes so quickly?

Do not forget your vertical passage,

 the night of power,

and don’t hide from the one 

for whom all our secrets are down in the pillow under 

his head, doctor of lovers, soul for

 this thick world,

the one who spirals iron

 like dough and makes the body lightedness.

No belief is necessary to enter this tent

 where one love story changes to another.

I remember that with these words brought here

 by a falcon from the wrist of Shams.

From The Book of Love

Translated by Coleman Barks

He Is The First And The Last

He Is The First And The Last

He is the first, He is the last, He is the outward, He is the inward;
I know none other except "Ya Hu" [Yahweh]
 and "Ya man Hu" ["O He who is"].
I am intoxicated with Love's cup,
 the two worlds have passed out of my ken;
I have no business save carouse and revelry.
If once in my life I spent a moment without you,
From that time and from that hour I repent of my life.
If once in this world I win a moment with you,
I will trample on both worlds, I will dance in triumph for ever.
O Shamsi Tabriz, I am so drunken in this world,
That except of drunkenness and revelry I have no tale to tell.

Translated by 

Coleman Barks

The Root of The Root of Your Self

The Root of The Root of Your Self

Don’t go away, come near.
Don’t be faithless, be faithful.
Find the antidote in the venom.
Come to the root of the root of yourself.

Molded of clay, yet kneaded
from the substance of certainty,
a guard at the Treasury of Holy Light –
come, return to the root of the root of your Self.

Once you get hold of selflessness,
You’ll be dragged from your ego
and freed from many traps.
Come, return to the root of the root of your Self.

You are born from the children of God’s creation,
but you have fixed your sight too low.
How can you be happy?
Come, return to the root of the root of your Self.

You were born from a ray of God’s majesty
and have the blessings of a good star.
Why suffer at the hands of things that don’t exist?
Come, return to the root of the root of your Self.

You are a ruby embedded in granite.
How long will you pretend it’s not true?
We can see it in your eyes.
Come to the root of the root of your Self.

You came here from the presence of that fine Friend,
a little drunk, but gentle, stealing our hearts
with that look so full of fire; so,
come, return to the root of the root of your Self.

Our master and host, Shamsi Tabrizi,
has put the eternal cup before you.
Glory be to God, what a rare wine!
So come, return to the root of the root of your Self.

From Love Is A Stranger

Translated by Kabir Helminski

Remember Me

Remember Me

Remember me.
I will be with you in the grave
on the night you leave behind
your shop and your family.
When you hear my soft voice
echoing in your tomb,
you will realize
that you were never hidden from my eyes.
I am the pure awareness within your heart,
with you during joy and celebration,
suffering and despair.
On that strange and fateful night
you will hear a familiar voice --
you'll be rescued from the fangs of snakes
and the searing sting of scorpions.
The euphoria of love will sweep over your grave;
it will bring wine and friends, candles and food.
When the light of realization dawns,
shouting and upheaval
will rise up from the graves!
The dust of ages will be stirred
by the cities of ecstasy,
by the banging of drums,
by the clamor of revolt!
Dead bodies will tear off their shrouds
and stuff their ears in fright--
What use are the senses and the ears
before the blast of that Trumpet?
Look and you will see my form
whether you are looking at yourself
or toward that noise and confusion.
Don't be blurry-eyed,
See me clearly-
See my beauty without the old eyes of delusion.
Beware! Beware!
Don't mistake me for this human form.
The soul is not obscured by forms.
Even if it were wrapped in a hundred folds of felt
the rays of the soul's light
would still shine through.
Beat the drum,
Follow the minstrels of the city.
It's a day of renewal
when every young man
walks boldly on the path of love.
Had everyone sought God
Instead of crumbs and copper coins
They would not be sitting on the edge of the moat
in darkness and regret.
What kind of gossip-house
have you opened in our city?
Close your lips
and shine on the world
like loving sunlight.
Shine like the Sun of Tabriz rising in the East.
Shine like the star of victory.
Shine like the whole universe is yours!

From Rumi - In The Arms of The Beloved

Translated by Jonathan Star

I Have A Fire For You

I Have A Fire For You

I have a fire for you in my mouth, but I have a hundred seals
on my tongue.
The flames which I have in my heart would make one mouth-
ful of both worlds.
Though the entire world should pass away, without the world
I possess the kingdom of a hundred worlds.
Caravans which are loaded with sugar I have in motion for
the Egypt of nonexistence.
The drunkenness of love makes me unaware whether I have
profit of loss therefrom.
The body’s eye was scattering pearls because of love, till now
I have a pearl-scattering soul.
I am not housebound, for like Jesus I have a home in the fourth
Heaven.
Thanks be to Him who gives soul to the body; if the soul
should depart, yet I have the soul of the soul.
Seek from me that which Shams-e Tabrizi has bestowed, for
I have the same.

From The Mystical Poems of Rumi: Second Selection

Translated by A.J. Arberry

Confused And Distraught

Confused And Distraught

Again I am raging,
I am in such a state by your soul that every
bond you bind, I break, by your soul.
I am like heaven, like the moon, like a candle by your glow;
I am all reason, all love, all soul, by your soul.

My joy is of your doing, my hangover of your thorn;
whatever side you turn your face,
I turn mine, by your soul.
I spoke in error;
it is not surprising to speak in error in this state,
for this moment I cannot tell cup from wine, by your soul.
I am that madman in bonds who binds the
"divs"; I, the madman,am a Solomon with the "divs",
by your soul.

Whatever form other than love raises up its head from my
heart, forthwith I drive it out of the court of my heart,
by your soul.
Come, you who have departed, for the thing that departs
comes back; neither you are that,
by my soul, nor I am that, by your soul.

Disbeliever, do not conceal disbelief in your soul, for I will recite
the secret of your destiny, by your soul.
Out of love of Sham-e Tabrizi,
through wakefulness or nightrising,
like a spinning mote I am distraught, by your soul.

From http://allpoetry.com/poem/8534527-Confused_and_Distraught-by-Mewlana_Jalaluddin_Rumi

An Intellectual

An Intellectual

An intellectual is all the time showing off.

Lovers dissolve and become bewildered.


Intellectuals try not to drown,
while the whole purpose of loves
is drowning.

                     Intellectual invent
ways to rest, and then lie down~
in those beds.

                        Lovers feel ashamed
of comforting ideas.

                                    You’ve seen a glob
of oil on water? That’s how a lover
sits with intellectuals, there, but alone
in a circle of himself.

                                    Some intellectual
tries to give sound advice to a lover.

All he hears back is, I love you.

I love you.

            Love is musk. Don’t deny it
when you smell the scent!

                                    Love is a tree.

Lovers, the shade of the long branches.


To the intellectual mind, a child must learn
to grow up and be adult.

                                    In the station of love,
you see old men getting younger and younger.


Shams chose to live low in the roots
for you. So now, he soars in the air
as you sublimely articulating love!

From http://allpoetry.com/poem/8534537-Ode_1957_An__intellectual-by-Mewlana_Jalaluddin_Rumi

I Closed My Eyes To Creation

I Closed My Eyes To Creation

I closed my eyes to creation when I beheld his beauty, I became
intoxicated with his beauty and bestowed my soul.
For the sake of Solomon’s seal I became wax in all my body,
and in order to become illumined I rubbed my wax.
I saw his opinion and cast away my own twisted opinion; I
became his reed pipe and likewise lamented on his lip.
He was in my hand, and blindly I groped for him with my
hand; I was in his hand, and yet I inquired of those who were
misinformed.
I must have been either a simpleton or drunk or mad that
fearfully I was stealing from my own gold.
Like a thief I crept through a crack in the wall into my own
vine, like a thief I gathered jasmine from my own garden.
Enough, do not twist my secret upon your fingertips, for I have
twisted off out of your twisted fist.
Shams-e Tabriz, from whom comes the light of moon and
stars–though I am grieving with sorrow for him, I am like the
crescent of the festival.

From Mystical Poems of Rumi: Second Selection

Translated by A.J. Arberry

Your Face

Your Face

You may be planning departure, as a human soul

 leaves the world taking almost all its sweetness

 with it. You saddle your horse.

You must be going. Remember you have friends

 here as faithful as grass and sky.

Have I failed you? Possibly you’re 

angry. But remember our nights of conversation,

 the well work, yellow roses by ocean,

the longing, the archangel Gabriel

 saying So be it. Shamsi Tabriz, your face,

 is what every religion tries to remember.

From The Book of Love

Translated by Coleman Barks

I Crave To Hear You Say

I Crave To Hear You Say 

I crave the orchards and the flower fields,

Oh Beloved, reveal your face to me.

I crave loads upon loads of sweetness,

Oh Beloved, open up your lips for me.

I crave the face of the radiant Sun,

Oh the Sun of Tabriz, melt the clouds,

stop the rain, let me bathe in your beauty.

I crave to hear you say,

stop teasing me with these words.

I crave to hear you say,

the king is not in tonight, go home.

I crave to hear you say,

say anything.

I am white whale,

cannot be contained in this 

stream called life.

I crave the Sea of Oman.

I crave the healing visitation of Joseph,

I am Jacob, weeping endlessly. 

I crave to travel the mountains on bare foot,

fly over the deserts,

can not stay here any longer.

When you left me,

they changed the town's name to prison.

From Hush Don't Say Anything To God

Translated by Shahram Shiva

That Moon Which The Sky Never Saw

That Moon Which The Sky Never Saw

That moon which the sky never saw

 even in dreams

 has risen again.
 

 Bringing a fire

 that no water can drown.

See here where the body

 has its house

and see here my soul.

     The cup of love has made the one

drunk

 and the other a ruin.

 

When the tavern keeper

 became my heart's companion.
 

  Love turned my blood

 to wine
  and my heart burned on a spit.

 

When the eye is full of him

 a voice resounds,
 

 Oh cup

be praised

oh wine be proud.

Suddenly when my heart saw

the ocean of love,

   it leapt away from me calling
 Look for me.

The face of Shams-ud Din
  the glory of Tabriz

    is the sun that hearts follow

 like clouds.

From East Window: Poems from Asia,

 Translated by W. S. Merwin

A Moon Appeared

A Moon Appeared  

Suddenly, in the sky at dawn, a moon appeared,
Descended from the sky
Turned its burning gaze on me,
Like a hawk during the hunt seizing a bird,
Grabbed me and flew with me high into heaven.
When I looked at myself, I could not see myself
For in this moon, my body, by grace, had become soul.
And when I traveled in this soul, I saw nothing but moon,
Until the mystery of eternal theophany lay open to me.
All the nine heavenly spheres were drowned in this moon.
The skiff of my being drowned, dissolved, entirely, in that Sea.
Then, that Sea broke up into waves, Intelligence danced back,
And launched its song,
And the Sea covered over with foam,
And from each bubble of foam something sprang, clothed in form,
Something sprang from each light-bubble, clothed in a body.
Then each bubble of body-foam received a sign from the Sea,
Melted immediately and followed the flow of its waves.
Without the saving, redeeming help of my Lord,
Shams-ul-Haqq of Tabriz,
No one can contemplate the moon,

 no one can become the Sea.

From The Way of Passion: A Celebration of Rumi,

Translated by Andrew Harvey