leave our selves behind

Essence and form don't mean we are apart:

Water unites with soil in a plant's heart;

Wind joins with fire in substance like its food;

Wine joins with humans and affects our mood.

Since we're not of the King's class or His kind,

To reach Him we must leave our selves behind.

The Lord remains alone once He removes

Our 'I'-ness, dust beneath His horse's hooves;

Souls turned to dust in which His signs are found

As hoof-prints which His horse left on the ground.

If you become the dust beneath His feet,

Then you will be the crown of the elite.

Lest my appearance drive you far from me,

Eat sweets before you hear my homily!

Form has caused many men to fall astray,

Though some chased form and reached God anyway.

Body and soul are joined to some degree,

Although they have no similarity:

The eyeball fills with light which gives it sight;

And drops of blood contain the heart's pure light;

Kidneys house joy, the liver grief and pain;

Intellect, candle-like, lives in the brain.

Of how they're all joined we are ignorant,

 To work out why our brain is impotent.

With human souls the Absolute's connected-

From Him, rare pearls each human heart collected.

Like Mary, we're make pregnant, through that touch,

With the Messiah we adore so much!

Not the Messiah who walks in this place, 

But that Messiah who's beyond all space.

The soul, once pregnant with the Holy One,

Then makes the whole world pregnant too,in turn.

Thus to a second world this world gives birth,

So resurrected souls see that world's worth.

If I discuss this till the Final Day,

There would remain a lot more left to say.

These words themselves are really just a prayer,

Which aims to catch a sweet breath He might spare.

Who can stay silent and not give his all

When 'Here I am!' He answers to Man's call?

This 'Here I am!'  you cannot hear, although

You can still taste it clearly, head to toe! 

 ~ Rumi

from The Masnavi - Book Two 

translation by Jawid Mojaddedi

art by Picasso, Fernande Olivier (Amélie Lang) his first muse.