Mewlana Jalaluddin Rumi

Until you've found pain, you won't reach the
Until you've given up life, you won't unite with
the supreme
Until you've found fire inside yourself, like the Friend

emrôz chô har rôz, kharâb-êm kharâb ma-g'shâ dar andêsha-wo bar gîr rabâb Sad gôna namâz-ast-o rukû`-ast-o sujûd ân-râ ke jamâl-é dôst bâsh-ad
Hrâb Today, like every day, we are ruined, ruined (by "
wine").
Don't open the…

This aloneness is worth more than a thousand lives.
This freedom is worth more than all the lands on earth.
To be one with the truth for just a moment,
Is worth more than the world and life itself.

In love, aside from sipping the wine of timelessness, nothing else exists.
There is no reason for living except for giving one's life.
I said, "First I know you, then I die."He said, "For the one who knows Me, there is no…

Late, by myself, in the boat of myself,
no light and no land anywhere,
cloudcover thick.
I try to stayjust above the surface, yet I'm already under and living with the

There's courage involved if you wantto become truth. There is a broken- open place in a lover. Where are those qualities of bravery and sharp compassion in this group? What's theuse of old and frozen thought? I want a howling hurt. This is not a…

In the prologue to the Masnavi Rumi hailed Love and its sweet madness that heals all infirmities, and he exhorted the reader to burst the bonds to silver and gold to be free.
The Beloved is all in all and is only veiled by the…

A true lover is proved such by his pain of heart;
No sickness is there like sickness of heart.
The lover's ailment is different from all ailments;
Love is the astrolabe of God's mysteries.

If you want what visible realitycan give, you're an employee.
If you want the unseen world,
you're not living your truth.
Both wishes are foolish

Not Christian or Jew or Muslim, not
Buddhist, sufi, or zen.
Not any religionor cultural system.
I am not from the Eastor the West, not out of the ocean or upfrom the ground, not natural or ethereal, notcomposed of elements at all.

Thirst is angry with water.
Hunger bitter with bread.
The cave wants nothing to do with the sun.
This is dumb, the self- defeating way we've been.

How does a part of the world leave the world?
How does wetness leave water?
Dont' try to put out fire by throwing on more fire!
Don't wash a wound with blood.

Time's knife slides from the sheath,
as fish from where it swims.
Being closer and closer is the desire of the body.
Don't wish for union!

Love has nothing to do withthe five senses and the six directions:
its goal is only to experiencethe attraction exerted by the Beloved.
Afterwards, perhaps, permissionwill come from God:
the secrets that ought to be told will be…

This we have nowis not imagination.
This is not grief or joy.
Not a judging state,
or an elation

This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness

I see so deeply within myself.
Not needing my eyes,
I can see everything clearly.
Why would I want to bother my eyes

The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you.
Don't go back to sleep.
You must ask for what you really want.
Don't go back to sleep.

How long will you think about this painful life?
How long will you think about this harmful world?
The only thing it can take from you is your body.
Don't say all this rubbish and stop thinking.

Birdsong brings reliefto my longingI'm just as ecstatic as they are,
but with nothing to say!
Please universal soul, practicesome song or something through me!
Excerpts from the translation of Rumi by Coleman Barks.

What the material world values doesnot shine the same in the truth of the soul. You have been interestedin your shadow. Look instead directly at the sun. What can we know by justwatching the time-and-space shapes of each other? Someone half awake…

ay sâqî, az-ân bâda ke awwal dâd-î
Tlê dô dar andâz-o be-y-afzâ shâdî yâ châshniyê az-ân na-bâyast namûd yâ mast-o kharâb kon, chô sar be-g'shâd-î English TranslationO cupbearer, from that wine which you first gave,
Toss in two [more]…

Last night you left me and sleptyour own deep sleep.
Tonight you turnand turn.
I say,"You and I will be together till the universe dissolves."You mumble back things you thought ofwhen you were drunk.

If anyone asks youhow the perfect satisfactionof all our sexual wantingwill look, lift your faceand say,
Like this.
When someone mentions the gracefulnessof the nightsky, climb up on the roofand dance and say,
Like this.