On the way to Love, each lover must either annihilate himself
or give up his life in death.
Some say,
“Love’s goal is to drink water from the Fountain of Life.”
These are just empty words, O lover, just empty words.
Rubailer (2016), Rubai #3, page 226.
A Rubaiyat of Rumi, The Ergin Translation (pub. 11/2021)
Endure your pain quietly. I am your remedy.
Don’t look at anyone except Me,
because I am your true friend.
Even if I kill you, don’t say, “I have been killed.”
Instead, be grateful,
because I am the compensation for your life.
Rubailer (2016), Rubai #3, page 307
A Rubaiyat of Rumi/The Ergin Translation (Nov. 2021), Rubai 654
Today, I am on the outside of a circle,
as if I am standing on the outside of a door.
I have become friends with the door knocker,
and I am holding onto it, knocking fearlessly.
Once I become a true companion of vision,
I will get through that door.
I will get into that circle,
and once I get in, I will stay there forever.
Rubailer (2016), Rubai #1, page 302.
How long will I be satisfied by the shapes and appearances of time?
How long will I watch and smell of existence?
I am tired of the materials and creatures of the present.
It is time to see that Beauty of Beauties.
But, when I look at Him, I see my image.
When I look at my image, I see His.
Rubailer (2016), Rubai #2, page 316.
The Beloved’s heart is burning for me.
Its flame has turned the Earth’s harvest into ashes.
A candle put a fire in the heart of this slave,
such a candle that it has made a soul of iron and stone
melt like a candle. Continue reading “Fire (3/14/2021)”
I rejoice when I suffer.
I flourish when I am ruined.
I look quiet and silent like the earth,
but my wailing reaches the sky like thunder.
Rubailer (2016), Rubai #1, page 294.
I am not the kind of lion which fights with the enemy.
I fight with my self. That’s enough for me.
I have become dirt for Love’s feet, but am settled in the knowledge
that I will rise from the ground like a rose, like an iris. Continue reading “I Will Rise (2/14/2021)”
I have been dissolved in the sea of purity like salt.
There is no belief, no heresy left in me.
Neither certainty nor doubt remains.
A shining star has appeared in my heart.
Even the seven levels of sky have disappeared into that star.
Rubailer (2016), Rubai #1, page 285.
I don’t know how I became annihilated from that wine.
I don’t know where I am because of the beauty of placelessness.
Once I was at the bottom of the sea.
but then I rose like the sun. Continue reading “The Light Calling Out (1/3/2021)”
I come slowly like water under straw
and carry away the mountain as if it were a piece of straw.
I drip from the gutter, drop by drop.
But, like a flood, I pick up and carry away hundreds of palaces. Continue reading “From the Breath of Love (12/13/2020)”