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Masnavi of Rumi — The Spiritual Couplets

c. 1258–1273 CE · Medieval Islamic World (13th century CE) · Konya, Anatolia (Rum Sultanate, present-day Turkey)

Book I — The Song of the Reed

1Hearken to this Reed forlorn,
2Breathing, ever since it was torn
3From its rushy bed, a strain
4Of impassioned love and pain.
5"The secret of my song, though near,
6None can see and none can hear.
7Oh, for a friend to know the sign
8And mingle all his soul with mine!
9"'Tis the flame of Love that fired me,
10'Tis the wine of Love inspired me.
11Wouldst thou learn how lovers bleed,
12Hearken, hearken to the Reed!"

The Merchant and the Parrot

13There was a merchant, and he had a parrot,
14Fair, sweet-voiced, imprisoned in a cage.
15When the merchant made ready for a journey,
16to trade in the land of India,
17he asked each servant and each slave:
18"What shall I bring thee from that distant place?"
19To each he gave promise of a gift.
20Then said the parrot: "When thou seest the parrots there,
21tell them how I fare, imprisoned in this cage.
22Tell them: 'A friend of yours, exiled in a far country,
23longs for you and sends you greeting.'"
24The merchant journeyed, and in India he saw a flock of parrots
25in a meadow, and he spoke the message.
26When he had spoken, one parrot trembled, fell — and died.
27The merchant regretted his words, and returned home sorrowful.
28To his own parrot he told the tale.
29When the parrot heard, she trembled, fell — and lay motionless.
30The merchant, weeping, took her out and cast her upon a bough.
31She flew off, alive and free, and cried from a distant tree:
32"Master! That parrot showed me the way of freedom.
33She said: 'Cease to sing — die to your former life —
34and only then may you escape the cage.'"

The Man Who Fled from Death

35One morning at daybreak a certain man went to the palace of Solomon,
36and stood there pale as ash, with face contorted.
37Solomon asked, "Why art thou stricken with fear?"
38He answered, "I have seen the Angel of Death.
39He looked upon me with a gaze of anger and menace.
40"I pray thee, O prophet of God, command the wind to bear me
41to the land of India, far, far from here."
42Solomon commanded, and the wind bore him to India.
43The next day Solomon met the Angel of Death.
44"Why," he asked, "didst thou look with anger on my servant yesterday?"
45"Not with anger," said the Angel. "But with wonder.
46For God had commanded me to take his soul this day in India,
47and I marveled to see him in Jerusalem, so far from where he needed to be.
48Even had he wings of a bird, he could not have reached India by tomorrow's dawn."
49Solomon smiled. "The man himself, in fleeing, hastened to the very place appointed."

The Elephant in the Dark

50Some Hindus were exhibiting an elephant in a dark room.
51Many people gathered, but the room was so dark that none could see the elephant.
52Each felt with his hand the beast, and each formed a different idea of what it was.
53One touched the trunk and said, "This creature is like a water-pipe."
54Another touched the ear and said, "It is like a great fan."
55Another touched the leg and said, "It is like a pillar of stone."
56Another touched the back and said, "It is like a throne."
57Had they carried a candle into the dark room, all differences would have vanished.
58The eye of the senses is like the palm of the hand;
59it cannot grasp the whole.
60The eye of the sea is one thing; the eye of the foam is another.
61Give up the foam, and see with the eye of the sea.

The Lover Knocks at the Door of the Beloved

62One knocked at the door of his beloved.
63The Voice from within asked, "Who is there?"
64He replied, "It is I."
65The Voice said, "There is no room in this house for me and thee."
66The door remained closed.
67The lover departed into the wilderness, and remained there in solitude for many years.
68He fasted, he prayed, he burned in the fire of separation.
69After years he returned, and knocked again.
70The Voice within asked, "Who is there?"
71He answered, "It is Thou."
72The door was opened.

The Value of Love

73Whosoever knows Love knows me, and knows my Lord.
74Love is the astrolabe of God's mysteries.
75Whether love be from this side or from that side,
76it will draw us in the end to that side.
77Whatever I say in exposition and explanation of Love,
78when I come to Love itself, I am ashamed of that explanation.
79Although the commentary of the tongue makes clear,
80yet love unexplained is still clearer.
81While the pen was making haste in writing,
82when it came to Love, it split in twain.
83Reason, in setting forth Love, becomes helpless
84as an ass in the mire.
85Love itself, and lover's state, only Love has expounded.
86Someone asked, "What is love?" I answered:
87"Marry Love, and thou shalt know."

notes

Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi (1207–1273), known simply as Rumi in the West, is regarded as one of the greatest mystical poets of the Islamic tradition and one of the most-read poets in the modern United States. He lived and taught in Konya, in the Sultanate of Rum (Anatolia, present-day Turkey), where his tomb is a major pilgrimage site. The Masnavi-i Ma'navi ("Spiritual Couplets") is Rumi's magnum opus — a poem in six books, approximately 25,000 couplets, composed in Persian and completed shortly before his death. It is often called "the Quran in Persian." Its opening lines — the Song of the Reed (Book I, 1-12 above) — are among the most famous in all Persian literature: the reed torn from its bed and made into a flute is an image of the human soul, separated from its divine source and singing of its exile. The Masnavi is structured as a series of stories with commentary — parables, folk tales, Quranic exegeses, and mystical teachings woven together without formal division. The reader is expected to enter it as one enters a river: not from the beginning necessarily, but wherever one stands. Translation: E.H. Whinfield, "Masnavi-i Ma'navi: The Spiritual Couplets of Maulana Jalalu-'d-din Muhammad-i Rumi," abridged verse translation, London: Trübner, 1898. Public domain.

MysticalPoetrySufiIslamicPersian

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