Jelaluddin Rumi, the 13th century mystic poet, was truly one of the most passionate and profound poets in history. Now, today his presence still remains strong, due in part to how his words seem to drip of the divine, and startle a profound rememberance that links all back to the Soul-Essence. Born in what is present day Afghanistan in 1207, he produced his master work the Masnawi which consists of over 60,000 poems before he died in 1273. The best way to fully say in words his impact, is that he has the ability to describe the Indescribable, Ineffable-- God.
I have included two different translators of his work. Coleman Barks on the first two pages, Shahram Shiva on the third. On the fourth page is a selection of Rumi love poems by both translators.
There is a community of the spirit.
Join it, and feel the delight
of walking in the noisy street
and being the noise.
Drink all your passion,
and be a disgrace.
Close both eyes
to see with the other eye.
From Essential Rumi
by Coleman Barks
This We Have Now
This we have now
is not imagination.
This is not
grief or joy.
Not a judging state,
or an elation,
or sadness.
Those come and go.
This is the presence that doesn't.
From Essential Rumi
by Coleman Barks
There is a way between voice and presence
where information flows.
In disciplined silence it opens.
With wandering talk it closes.
Moving Water
When you do things from your soul, you feel a river
moving in you, a joy.
When actions come from another section, the feeling
disappears. Don't let
others lead you. They may be blind or, worse, vultures.
Reach for the rope
of God. And what is that? Putting aside self-will.
Because of willfulness
people sit in jail, the trapped bird's wings are tied,
fish sizzle in the skillet.
The anger of police is willfulness. You've seen a magistrate
inflict visible punishment. Now
see the invisible. If you could leave your selfishness, you
would see how you've
been torturing your soul. We are born and live inside black water in a well.
How could we know what an open field of sunlight is? Don't
insist on going where
you think you want to go. Ask the way to the spring. Your
living pieces will form
a harmony. There is a moving palace that floats in the air
with balconies and clear
water flowing through, infinity everywhere, yet contained
under a single tent.
From The Glance
by Coleman Barks
Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
there is a field. I'll meet you there.
When the soul lies down in that grass,
the world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase each other
doesn't make any sense.
From Essential Rumi
by Coleman Barks
Light Breeze
As regards feeling pain, like a hand cut in battle,
consider the body a robe
you wear. When you meet someone you love, do you kiss their clothes? Search out
who's inside. Union with God is sweeter than body comforts.
We have hands and feet
different from these. Sometimes in dream we see them.
That is not
illusion. It's seeing truly. You do have a spirit body;
don't dread leaving the
physical one. Sometimes someone feels this truth so strongly
that he or she can live in
mountain solitude totally refreshed. The worried, heroic
doings of men and women seem weary
and futile to dervishes enjoying the light breeze of spirit.
From Soul of Rumi
by Coleman Barks
Late, by myself, in the boat of myself,
no light and no land anywhere,
cloudcover thick. I try to stay
just above the surface,
yet I'm already under
and living with the ocean.
From Essential Rumi
by Coleman Barks
The translations on this page from the books,The Essential Rumiby Coleman Barks with John Moyne, The Glance by Coleman Barks, and Soul of Rumiby Coleman Barks.
