The soul’s Sultan pushes us from one play to another
as if we were pawns in a chess game.
I wonder if He wins. I wonder if He is ever checkmated.
After all, aren’t we the ones on trial?
He picked up our particles, gathered them together,
then kneaded them with the universe to make a paste.
He pierced our noses and inserted reins made of greed and lust
in order to pull us around the world like camels.
Who are we?
He put an oxen’s bell on the neck of the sky
and keeps crushing us under that sky as if we were sesame.
How lucky is that camel who has been tied by the halter of God’s Love.
He makes us drunk and excited while we are among the other camels.
Divan-i Kebir, Volume 15, Ghazal 6, verses 48-52, page 11.