Sometimes (10/20/2024)

Sometimes (10/20/2024)

O Sultan of our body and soul!

O One who makes us sometimes smile, sometimes grimace,

O One who puts salve on the eyes of our body and soul!

 

O Beautiful One, the moon is embarrassed

seeing Your light, Your height.

Let our blood be sacrificed to You.

When the heart sees You, it says,

“Divine fate has come. Divine fate has come.”

 

We become a ball for You,

in order to fit into the curved end of Your club.

Sometimes You put us to sleep.

Sometimes You send us to reason.

Sometimes You throw us into the world of existence,

sometimes into the desert of Absence.

 

The soul gives thanks to the Master.

Sometimes he yells and screams, “Alas!”

Sometimes he goes to serve his lover.

Sometimes he becomes God’s drunk, God’s crazy one.

 

You torment the soul, making him crazy, insane.

Sometimes You make him enjoy solitude.

Sometimes You make him fond of ostentation and hypocrisy.

 

Sometimes he wants gold,

but then other times spreads earth on his head.

Sometimes he thinks he’s Caesar.

Sometimes he wears old, patched, worn-out clothes.

 

What a strange tree he is.

Sometimes an apple is grown, sometimes a pumpkin.

Sometimes he yields poison, sometimes sugar.

Sometimes he causes trouble.

Sometimes he is the remedy.

 

What a strange river he is.

Sometimes he becomes water, sometimes blood.

He turns into ruby-colored wine or milk, or health-giving honey.

 

Sometimes he weaves knowledge into the heart.

Sometimes he destroys one’s knowledge.

Sometimes he achieves superiority.

Sometimes he encounters nothing but trouble and misfortune.

 

One day he becomes Master Muhammed.

One day he turns into a tiger, then a dog.

Sometimes he becomes a ferocious enemy.

Sometimes he becomes a father, mother, or close friend.

 

Sometimes he becomes a thorn, then a rose.

Sometimes he is the vinegar. Sometimes he is the wine.

Sometimes he plays the drum.

Sometimes he becomes a drum, hit constantly with a mallet.

 

Sometimes he falls in love with his five senses and the six diimensions.

Sometimes he prefers good spirits.

But sometimes, like a lost camel in the desert,

he just wanders around.

 

Sometimes his aims and hopes are as deep as a well-diggers.

Sometimes he is among the treasures of a rich man who hides his treasures.

Sometimes he is like Jesus and ascends to the sky.

 

In the end, when Your Grace opens his way, our soul sings one tune

and is saved from changing from color to color.

He becomes crazy and dips into one color like the early morning sun.

 

He dives into the sea like a fish.

His garden, his meadow, his country becomes the sea.

His coffin, his grave and everything else are dead,

a plague to him… everything except that sea.

 

When he slips out of those colors,

he slips into the jar of Jesus.

God’s color appears to do God’s wishes.

 

He is saved from malice, from modesty.

He is saved from running and stopping

like the millstone turning around the pin.

He is saved from “come” and “go.”

 

We open your door, really,

so you can keep your Friend next to you.

We merge your coming generation with you.

This is the reward of Love.

 

We tie your waist tightly. We forgive your sins.

You give thanks to God. That’s the reason.

Thanks brings contentment.

 

Mustef’ilun, Mustef’ilun, Mustef’ilun, Mustef’ilun,

The door of explanation is closed.

It is better for us to be silent.

Divan-i Kebir, Volume 1, Ghazal 5, verses 88-108, pages 16-19.

Break the Seal. Free Love (9/29/2024)

Break the Seal. Free Love. (9/29/2024)

That divine gift, the Water of Life,

is invisible, concealed in this clay body.

The self has put a seal on your heart,

and Love stays imprisoned there.

Break the seal. Free Love. What are you afraid of?

There is a secret path in your heart.

Follow that path to find the Beloved.

The Rubaiyat of Rumi, The Ergin Translations, Volume 3, rubai 1197, page 145.

One Moment for Me (7/21/2024)

One Moment for Me (7/21/2024)

When my Essence turns into a sea of infinity,

the faces of my particles shine.

I burn like a candle on the way of Love

so that all moments can become one moment for me.

Rubailer (2026), Rubai 1, page 31

The Rubaiyat of Rumi, The Ergin Translations, Volume 3 Rubai 1153, page 123.

When You Become a Friend… (6/9/2024)

When You Become a Friend… (6/9/2024)

When you become a friend of One whose heart is in God,

know that, just like your fate,

your soul will fall into Love’s fire.

Don’t worry. Don’t run away.

Know well that from then on,

it will be impossible to contain you anywhere.

Rubailer (2016), Rubai 1, page 444.

The Rubaiyat of Rumi, The Ergin Translations (pubJuly2024), Rubai 1130, Volume 3.

The Land of Truth (5/19/2024)

The Land of Truth (5/19/2024)

Hey, night guard, what kind of guard are you anyway?

A thief stole all of our belongings last night.

 

Slap cold water on your face.

Yell and scream.

Our gains became a loss because of your sleep. Continue reading “The Land of Truth (5/19/2024)”

Beyond the Hot & Cold of this World (2/11/2024)

Beyond the Hot & Cold of this World (2/11/2024)

As Hodja is my witness,

I swear I will not make any vows again.

The glass of the vow is broken

as soon as I drink Love’s wine.

 

I swear to Your peerless beauty,

Your wine which defeats and ruins lions.

I won’t even get close to repentance.

 

I swear to Your sweet lips,

to Your heart which knows the secrets,

I am neither fond of this world

nor obliged to colors, to red and yellow.

 

I swear to Your sun-like face

and to the true value of Your words

that I am a thousand years

beyond the hot and cold of this world.

 

I swear to Your mind

which resembles a dark chestnut horse,

Your insignia which offers Soul,

that no one knows what kind of man I am

except You.

 

I swear to the blessedness of Your morning

and the uproar which comes after morning wine

that I will roll up the sky before I go.

 

O immortal Sultan, tell the cupbearer

that if someone comes to the assembly with a sour face,

he should serve him the sedimented wine of my sorrow.

 

That way, duality will disappear.

So will the difference between old and new.

Because at the sacred place of drinking,

I am separated from the crowd.

I am all by myself.

 

The cupbearer should offer so much wine

that that person becomes drunk, becomes a lover.

That way, he won’t be bothered

by either the echo of my voice or my cool reception.

 

When he becomes like that,

neither self nor envy will remain within him.

He will come to my playground pure and clean.

 

He will fly outside of time.

He will free himself from bait and trap.

He will turn himself into a witness

at this gambling place, without quarrel.

 

He will play with a clean heart like Venus.

He will submit himself to fate like dice,

saying neither, “I won,” nor “I lost.”

 

I will remain silent from now on.

I am neither nightingale nor parrot.

I am sugar.

I am a rose sapling.

Divan-i Kebir, Volume 22, Ghazal 24, verses 216-228, pages 51-53.

On the Way to the Beloved’s Love (1/21/2024)

On the Way to the Beloved’s Love (1/21/2024)

You won’t taste ecstasy as long as you are sober.

You won’t know the soul if you stay in your body.

You will never reach the Truth

if you are not annihilated

like fire and water mixed together

on the way to the Beloved’s Love.

Rubailer (2016), Rubai 2, page 450.

The Rubaiyat of Rumi, The Ergin Translations (ApprxPubSpring2024), Rubai 1083, Volume 3.