The Arrival
What shall we call the presence that arrives?
Beloved, friend? Pride and joy, love-thief, gratitude, patience?
I have no patience anymore.
Go away, you names and mental formations.
A new shape has come that flies our flag upside down,
the form no door lets in.
Rather, the walls around us fall outward.
Floor and roof too drop away.
–Rumi (Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī)
How will you know the difficulties
of being human, if you’re always
flying off to blue perfection?
Where will you plant your grief seeds?
Workers need ground to scrape and hoe,
not the sky of unspecified desire.
The Soul of Rumi
~ a new collection of ecstatic poems
translations by Coleman Barks
This we have now
is not imagination.
This is not
grief or joy.
Not a judging state,
or an elation,
or sadness.
Those come and go.
This is the presence that doesn’t.
From Essential Rumi
by Coleman Barks
The way is full of genuine sacrifice.
The thickets blocking the path are anything
that keeps you from that, any fear
that you may be broken to bits like a glass bottle.
This road demands courage and stamina,
yet it’s full of footprints! Who are
these companions? They are rungs in your ladder. Use them!
With company you quicken your ascent.
Rumi
There is some kiss we want with
our whole lives, the touch of
spirit on the body. Seawater
begs the pearl to break its shell.
And the lily, how passionately
it needs some wild darling! At
night, I open the window and ask
the moon to come and press its
face against mine. Breathe into
me. Close the language-door and
open the love-window. The moon
won’t use the door only the window.
Rumi
transl. by Coleman Barks
