Observations placeholder

Rumi – the Mathwani

Then 'Omar said to him, "This wailing of thine
Shows thou art still in a state of ‘sobriety’.”
Afterwards he thus urged him to quit that state,
And called him out of his beggary to absorption in God:
"sobriety savours of memory of the past;
Past and future are what veil God from our sight.
Burn up both of them with fire. 

How long
Wilt thou be partitioned by these segments as a reed?
So long as a reed has partitions 'tis not privy to secrets,
Nor is it vocal in response to lip and breathing.
While circumambulating the house thou art a stranger;
When thou enterest in thou art at home.

Thou whose knowledge is ignorance of the Giver of knowledge,
Thy wailing contrition is worse than thy sin.
The road of the 'annihilated' is another road;
Sobriety is wrong, and a straying from that other road.

………

Like a soul he was freed from weeping and rejoicing,
His old life died, and he was regenerated.
Amazement fell upon him at that moment,
For he was exalted above earth and heaven,
An uplifting of the heart surpassing all uplifting;
I cannot describe it; if you can, say on!
Ecstasy and words beyond all ecstatic words;
Immersion in the glory of the Lord of glory!
Immersion wherefrom was no extrication,--