The phial of perfume is finally unsealed
And you may sip from out the holy grail
These assembled elements of delight
Will launch a new star in the starlit night.
KINGS AND SLAVES
(A Tribute to Arabi)
All kings are only servants to their slaves
Humans ready to die for Him who saves
Them from death. Traps are there to serve the bird
And sons of Adam, captives of the Word
So lose your hearts to the idea of loss
The lowest number always wins the toss.
BEHIND THE VEIL
My beloved is hidden by that veil
Try and conjure her face and you will fail
What your eyes cannot conjure my heart sees
Her perfume is the scent upon the breeze.
THE TRANCE
I fell into a trance
And was in my beloved’s garden
I was drunk through dance
And incoherently begged her pardon
The flowers of existence
Had burst in peacock bloom
But then I woke up sober
Locked within a room.
The garden’s gone and there’s
A pain inside my head
And though I’m separated from
The dream, it isn’t dead.
LAND OF LOVE
This fairyland of love
Is a country to cry for
Getting lost in you
Is a loss to die for
I said, “I will make love to you
Then fade upon the air.”
She was appalled and said,
“Don’t you even dare!”
CATASTROPHES
Catastrophes, contrivances
The latest heinous crime
Are passing shows, the real news
Is the stillness beyond time.
AT THE PARTY
The party was crowded—
Of our secret love
I could give you no token.
They started a game of whispers,
I put my cheek to yours,
My heart was broken.
SOUNDS
The winds of the deserts
Set up a wail
To match the songs
Of the nightingale
Each sound was the message
She sent today
Echoing over rooftops
And far away.
THE PEARL
Death holds no terror for the one who can
See beyond this life’s short and fitful span
The knock of rocks, the churning ocean’s swell
Do not affect the pearl inside the shell.
ISSAH AND THE FOOLS
Issah the healer
(To him all praise)
Had the Word from God
Which was able to raise
The dead and breathe
Life into a wraith
Not to crowd the planet
But to bring us to faith
In the living God. But he
Walked with men who were
Self-seeking in their depth
And deeply insincere
They pressed him for the formula
They begged him for the word
The mantra that would raise the dead
And by Him be heard
So Issah in his innocence
Whispered it to those
Jackals who were present
When Lazarus arose
And gave to all of us,
The doubting human race,
Faith in the eternal
Life, faith in Allah’s grace.
These jackals, jubilating, went
Through a desert full of stones
And came across a scattered pile
Of whitened, sun-bleached bones.
When one of these self-seekers
More foolish than the rest
Thought he’d put the formula
And Issah to the test.
He uttered the dreaded word of life
While facing to the East
And from the bones there came alive
A predatory beast,
Who ate the entire company
The miracle-maker too
Now Rumi that’s the story
But the moral must come through.
Issah was no magician
His miracles weren’t magic
The fools who deny Allah
Their ends will be farcical, tragic.
THE WANDERER
It isn’t aimlessly through streets
And bazaars that I wander
It’s for a glimpse of her, my love
Intoxicated, I squander
My time like a vagabond
Weaving idle rings
Around my lover’s haunts
And yet consciousness clings
To that one purpose. I beg
You, have mercy on me Lord
A sinful wretch distraught,
How can broken hearts afford
To be still? A million souls
Delved in this ocean’s swell
Searching in their hearts
For the pearl inside the shell
So come, my love, be kind to him
They call the Maulana of Rome
Who is but the slave of Shams-e Tabrizi
A wanderer without a home.
BUTTERFLY WINGS
The air is hardly moved
By butterfly wings that flutter.
O mortal, leave your prayers and seek
The one whose name you utter!
ONLY IN THE DEAD OF NIGHT
Only in the dead of night
Will she lift the veil
The laws of light and modesty
Inevitably prevail
In the harsher light of day.
Did not the burning bush
Appear to Moses in the night?
Lover, do not push
Me into daylight’s brutal glare,
It’s only in the night
That lovers who by day are blind
Attain their radiant sight.
POUR OUT THE WINE
Pour out the wine that He alone dispenses
Enrich my soul by soaking all my senses
Give it defiance, teach my soul to fly
Pour one more cup, O Saki, one more sigh
May coax the wine out from the heart of stone
Leave him that way who lives by bread—alone.
For bread is that which makes the body whole
But leaves unnourished the flowering soul
Open for me, Saki, the flask divine
Pour me a measure of celestial wine
And shut the eye that only evil sees
And open that which apprehends the breeze
Let temples and mosques crumble into dust
I am content to drown in divine lust.
EVIDENCE
Once in Hindustan some sages took
An elephant into a pitch-dark room
They wanted scientifically to look
At the ways in which human beings assume
That they discern the spirit from the clues
Their senses can pick up and misdirect
Their judgement, which is how we all abuse
Our senses and God-given intellect.
The first man came and with an outstretched hand
Touched the elephant on his trunk and cried,
“I’ve got it now, I clearly understand,
This beast is like a pipe that’s one foot wide.”
Then the sages brought in the second man
Who gestured blindly till he felt an ear
“I know!” he said. “This beast is like a fan
Floppy and stiff, I think that much is clear.”
The third fellow to enter touched the leg
Of the elephant though he could not see
He leaned back saying, “No, no, no, I
beg
To differ from my friends, obviously
The beast is nothing but a pole.”
The fourth man came and grabbed the beast’s tail
And said, “At last an idea of the whole
Beast has formed, my instincts never fail.”
He declared the elephant was a rope.
So my friends do not count the evidence
Of hand or eye or ear and ever hope
That these can lead beyond the realm of sense.
THE KING AND THE SLAVE GIRL
There was a king in olden times
Who ruled this world and half the next
An amorous individual,
Today we’d call him oversexed.
This king went hunting with his men
And on the road he saw a slave
Girl who took his fancy so
He raised a hand and by this gave
The order to forego the hunt.
He commanded the girl be brought
To him. The price her owners asked
They should be paid. Thus she was bought.
The king with no care for the girl
Indulged his lust and had his way
But that poor child began to fade
And became haggard day by day.
The king felt like the man who bought
An ass and saddle at the fair
And lost the ass to wild beasts,
Was left with the saddle, riding air.
The king called all his doctors to
Attend to the girl and find a cure.
But despite all their efforts she
Withered as the moon before
The darkening nights till she became
As thin as the breadth of a hair.
The proud physicians had not called
On God. The king was in despair
And went barefoot and humble to
The mosque. He touched the floor in prayer
And soaked the mat in royal tears
He prayed and begged that God would spare
The girl he had possessed in lust.
The king collapsed into a faint
And in that fit a vision came
A man would arrive and acquaint
The king and his court physicians
With the secret of the cure
And sure enough when he awoke
The first person whom he saw
Was that promised man of dreams
Sent to him in token of
God’s answer to his heartfelt plea
God’s return for his professed love.
The king took him into the harem
Took him to where the sick girl lay
The physician examined her
And said, “These medicines that they,
Your court physicians, ministered,
And all the cures that they have tried
Have made the girl’s condition worse
The poor patient might have died.
They gave her draughts to heal her flesh
Using all their craft and art
This sickening is not of the flesh
She’s dying of a broken heart.”
The illness of the heart is ever
Far worse than the body’s pain
To cure its painful consequence
The patient must be born again
Into the love beyond preferring.
This love transcendent has no name
It renders all definition
Inadequate, sterile, lame.
All the pens that pen the verses
Poets singing songs of praise
To this mysterious emotion
Are like men who try to gaze
Straight into the sun at noon
Blinding their eyes to see its face,
Instead, they should study shadows
And so comfortably trace
Where the sun is and how bright,
Be satisfied with oblique clues
We know the spirit by the body
Suns and shadows interfuse
Our world. Then that dream physician
Asked the king if he might see
The slave girl and extract her story,
Interview her privately.
The king agreeing, the good doctor
Asked the girl where she was born
And other questions, like a needle
Probing for the painful thorn
That was causing her distraction
The arrow that had torn apart
The breast of this benighted maiden
Piercing her bleeding heart.
He asked her about all her trials
And the masters she had had
She gave him the honest answers,
Her life though so short, was sad
The doctor probed her to find
At what point her pulse would race
And when he named a far-off city
She was like a deer in chase
Frightened by the sound of pursuit
Or like a slave at the command
Of a strict and cruel master
The name he’d used was “Samarkand.”
Now he knew the thing that ailed her
That destroyed her heart and soul
He asked her where he lived. She answered,
“Ghatafar in Sar-e Pol.”
She told the doctor his professions;
Goldsmith, jeweler, artisan
The doctor determined that he
Would get the king, to find this man
And bring him thence from Samarkand
So that the king could execute
His rival in love. Now he said,
“This heartache that has grown acute
Will now become a wish fulfilled.
Promise me you’ll never say
The name Samarkand out aloud.”
And saying thus he went his way.
The doctor conferred with the king
Agreed a stratagem and planned
To send a delegation to fetch
That goldsmith from Samarkand
The king sent out his invitation
Luring him with gifts of gold
Feeling in his heart that men were
Cattle to be bought and sold.
With the embassy that set out
He sent the best his land could boast
The goldsmith accepting the gifts was
Impatient to meet his host.
Induced away from Samarkand
Innocent and unsuspecting
His party finally arrived
And demanded to see the king.
The goldsmith made his salutation
To the king. The doctor gave
Instructions to the court attendants
To go and fetch the young girl slave
Which they did and as was plotted
The doctor said the king should give
That poor girl to her lover
And thus united, let them live
Together and the healing process
Would contrive to resurrect
Her body back to all its beauty.
Neither lover did suspect
The king or doctor’s bona fides
The embers of their love flared up
Into the flame they had experienced.
The doctor fed a poisoned cup
To the goldsmith who, in her arms,
Withered like a sunburnt grape
And shrunk and shriveled by the poison
The victim lost his human shape.
As he turned ugly, pale and grim
He wasn’t what he was before
She couldn’t love this withered thing
His ugliness said, “Nevermore.”
He wished now he had gone his own way,
And never played love’s foolish game
His love had been a self-deception
Born in lust and burnt in shame.
The blood came to his eyes, red rivers
&nbs
p; Flowing down his sallow cheeks
“I am the fox killed for his fur
I am that deer the hunter seeks
For meat and musk. The wall does cast
A lengthy shadow as the night
Approaches, but it shortens as
The sun at noon is at its height.”
Is what he said before he died
And was erased from memory
The slave girl from her pain and pride
Found release and was set free.
The puzzle is that Rumi says
That though mankind may find it odd
For the murder of this man
The inspiration came from God.
For each one kills the thing he loves
Mortals will not understand
Prepare themselves for sacrifice
Or trust their lives into His hand.
ROOT OF PRIDE
Intelligence can be the root of pride
Your subtle thoughts can take you for a ride
Become a fool, as foolishness is pure
But not the kind of fool who’s immature
And makes his dignity a puerile jest.
Negate your intelligence and invest
All faith and reason in the loving Friend
Who is reason’s beginning and its end
Submit yourself to Him, the Friend’s caress
Can lead the damned out of their wilderness
TRUTH AND LIES
The false draws its sustenance from the true
The counterfeit coin’s deemed of no value
Only when you can weigh it in a scale
Against some real gold. Truth will prevail
By comparison, which is logic’s rule.
He who embraces falsehood is a fool.
THE IRON AND THE FLAME
Iron draws to itself the fiery breath
Of dragons which to humans would mean death.
We living things can only bear the glow
Of gentle suns. Our endurance is so
Much the creation of frailty. But then
The exception to this rule among men
Is the dervish who like iron glows
Red in flame under the hammer’s blows.
LOVE DIVINE
Afflicted hearts can seek only one cure
The retreat into love will serve as your
Introduction to Him who is the Friend
Before whom souls in supplication bend
And look beyond the endless space of sky