When I was drinking wine in Your tavern one day,
I ripped off this cloak of mine, this cloak made of clay.
In Your now-ruined tavern,
I saw the harmony in its workings
and in the workings of the universe.
There was such balance of creation and destruction.
I was amazed.
Rubailer (2016), Rubai 2, page 326.
A Rubaiyat of Rumi, The Ergin Translations (November 2021), Rubai 692 (Volume 2)
The parrot came to the tree to share sugar’s prayer.
The rose asked the nightingale to read poetry.
Receiving a revelation, the tall green cypress said,
“As long as your soul stays in your body,
put a belt on your waist. Serve day and night.
That brings results. Continue reading “That Brings Results (4/25/2021)”
I don’t know how I became annihilated from that wine.
I don’t know where I am because of the beauty of placelessness.
Once I was at the bottom of the sea.
but then I rose like the sun. Continue reading “The Light Calling Out (1/3/2021)”
I come slowly like water under straw
and carry away the mountain as if it were a piece of straw.
I drip from the gutter, drop by drop.
But, like a flood, I pick up and carry away hundreds of palaces. Continue reading “From the Breath of Love (12/13/2020)”
Tonight, the cupbearer is serving wine
not by the glass, but by the pitcher.
He has plundered every heart and seized all faith.
He has served so much wine
that a flood has taken away the house of the mind.
Rubailer (2016), Rubai 4, page 159.
O soul who has been caught in the hook of the body,
look at the fisherman.
Don’t look at the fish hook. Continue reading “Look (11/1/2020)”
O cupbearer, you are the one who satisfies my need.
Serve me wine. Make me happy.
I have become so drunk
that I can’t separate signs from words. Continue reading “I Gave Up Yesterday (9/20/2020)”
Come. Today is a day of celebration for us.
From now on, joy and pleasure will keep growing. Continue reading “Today is a Day of Joy (8/23/2020)”
An eye which gazes upon that rose, that tulip
fills the whirling sky with wails and cries.
The intoxication you get from a one-year-old Love
you could never get from a thousand-years-old wine.
Rubailer (2016), Rubai #1, page 186.
This solitude is better than the company of thousands.
This freedom is sweeter than owning the whole world.
Being in God’s vicinity for even a short time
is worth more than the soul, more than the universe,
more than all of this, more than all of that.
Rubailer (2016), Rubai #4, page 167.