Jalaluddin Rumi Balkhi

I

 Sometimes I forget completely

what companionship is.

Unconscious and insane, I spill sad

energy everywhere. My story

gets told in various ways: a romance,

a dirty joke, a war, a vacancy.

Divide up my forgetfulness to any number,

it will go around.

These dark suggestions that I follow,

are they a part of some plan?

Friends, be careful. Don’t come near me

out of curiosity, or sympathy.

II

Consider the difference

in our actions and God’s actions.

We often ask, “Why did you do that?”

or “Why did I act like that?”

We do act, and yet everything we do

is God’s creative action.

We look back and analyze the events

of our lives, but there is another way

of seeing, a backward-and-forward-at-once

vision, that is not rationally understandable.

Only God can understand it.

Satan made the excuse, you caused me to fall,

whereas Adam said to God, We did this

to ourselves. After this repentance,

God asked Adam, Since all is within

my foreknowledge, why didn’t you

defend yourself with that reason?

Adam answered, I was afraid,

and I wanted to be reverent.

Whoever acts with respect will get respect.

Whoever brings sweetness will be served almond cake.

Good women are drawn to be with good men.

Honor your friend.

Or treat him rudely,

and see what happen!

Love, tell an incident now

that will clarify this mystery

of how we act freely, and are yet

compelled. One hand shakes with palsy.

Another shakes because you slapped it away.

Both tremblings come from God,

but you feel guilty for the one,

and what about the other?

These are intellectual questions.

The spirit approaches the matter

differently. Omar once had a friend, a scientist,

Bu’l-Hakam, who was flawless at solving

empirical problems, but he could not follow Omar

into the area of illumination and wonder.

Now I return to the text, “And He is with you,

wherever you are,” but when have I ever left it!

Ignorance is God’s prison.

Knowing is God’s palace.

We sleep in God’s unconsciousness.

We wake in God’s open hand.

We weep God’s rain.

We laugh God’s lightning.

Fighting and peacefulness

both take place within God.

Who are we then

in this complicated world-tangle,

that is really just the single, straight

line down at the beginning of ALLAH?

Nothing.

We are

emptiness.

III

How does a part of the word leave the world?

How can wetness leave water?

Don’t try to put out a fire

by throwing on more fire!

Don’t wash a wound with blood!

No matter how fast you run,

your shadow more than keeps up.

Sometimes, it’s in front.

Only full, overhead sun

diminishes your shadow.

But that shadow has been serving you!

What hurts you, bless you.

Darkness is your candle.

Your boundaries are your quest.

I can explain this, but it would break

the glass cover on your heart,

and there’s no fixing that.

You must have shadow and light source both.

Listen, and lay your head under the tree of awe.

When from that tree, feathers and wings sprout

on you, be quieter than a dove.

Don’t open your mouth for even a cooooooo.

When a frog slips into the water, the snake

cannot get it. Then the frog climbs back out

and croaks, and the snake moves toward him again.

Even if the frog learned to hiss, still the snake

would hear through the hiss the information

he needed, the frog voice underneath.

But if the frog could be completely silent,

then the snake would go back to sleeping,

and the frog could reach the barley.

The soul lives there in the silent breath.

And the grain of barley is such that,

when you put it in the ground,

it grows.

Are these enough words,

Or shall I squeeze more juice from this?

Who am I, my friend?

IV

Who makes these changes?

I shoot an arrow right.

It lands left.

I ride after a deer and find myself

chased by a hog.

I plot to get what I want

and end up in prison.

I dig pits to trap others

and fall in.

I should be suspicious

of what I want.

Jalaluddin Rumi Balkhi