O one who wants to experience the world and everything in it,
you are a day laborer.
O one who dreams of heaven, you are far from the Truth.
O one who enjoys both those worlds because of ignorance,
you haven’t tasted the pleasure of His sorrow.
You are excused, and you may leave.
Rubailer (2016), Rubai 2, page 438.
The Rubaiyat of Rumi, The Ergin Translations (apprx.pub. 7/2023), Rubai 933, volume 3.
In a group meeting with Hasan Shushud back in the 1970’s, Jonathan Boulting related that this was one of the bits of wisdom Shushud shared, with the caveat that his English might need some reconsideration: GRIEF: Our contract with Eternity. Mr. Shushud spoke often about our inborn nostalgia, our longing “to go home,” our separation from our Essence… the source of true grief. Nevit Ergin referred constantly in his translations of Rumi’s poetry to “His sorrow.” When some begin the practice of fasting, they are able to begin to taste that sorrow, and it is one of the greatest gifts. Our self doesn’t want to feel it, which is its impetus for surrounding itself with an infinite number of distractions. As for the contract, it might be more of a promise that we made and need to keep. As Rumi says, “The purpose of Existence is to reach Absence.”
My life has passed in the great sweet pain in my heart.
My heart isn’t concerned about that sorrow.
It simply recognizes and accepts it.
I was sitting, waiting, until I came to understand what my heart wanted.
Then, I started leaping with joy.
My heart had been running away from the circle of religion,
because his place is in the curls of Beauties.
I had been turning around the one who spins my heart.
He is the only one who can hear the yells
resulting from my heart’s struggles.
At night He took sleep away.
I waited until morning so I could see the heart’s face.
My body seemed destroyed,
as if it had dried up from bowing its head in prayer.
But then, I saw the height and stature of the heart.
That world is a spark of splendor from the heart’s sun.
This world is a drop from the sea of the heart.
Close your lips, because the yells and screams of my heart
are ascending to the sky without lips or tongue.
Divan-i Kebir, Volume 9, Ghazal 74, verses 738-745, page 113.
You are the divine light of the sky.
The place where you belong is the throne.
If you were to go faster on the way to God,
you would rise to the sky.
Aren’t you ashamed of dragging yourself
like a shadow on the ground?
Rubailer (2016), Rubai 2, page 423.
The Rubaiyat of Rumi, The Ergin Translations (apprx.pub.7/2023), Rubai 913, volume 2.
I will be sad if You give me less grief.
If You pour sorrow and troubles over my head,
I will be embraced by the joy of troubles. Continue reading “The Joy of Troubles (4/19/2020)”
Every moment, Your kindness follows after sorrow.
If this were not so, no one could stand this suffering.
Make me constantly drunk with the wine which gives no hangover.
I don’t want any other wine. Continue reading “The Only Way to Reach Eternity (9/22/19)”
My Beloved whose scattered hair makes everyone confused,
whose sweet ruby lips scatter sugar and honey,
that Beloved asked me, “Are you sorry about our separation?”
I answered, “O my soul, so much so that all the world’s sorrows are in that sorry.”
Rubailer (2016), Rubai #3, page 33.
I said to the heart, “When You see the Beloved,
tell Him, if you can, about my situation, my sorrow.”
The heart answered, “When I see the Beloved,
I become so absorbed by His beauty that I can’t talk. I just keep looking at Him.”
Rubailer, Page 337, Rubai #1