“Rumi’s poems are food and drink, nourishment for the part that is hungry for what they give. Call it ‘soul’.” ~ Coleman Barks

I’ve been reading Rumi for a while now.

The truth is, I’ve been transported to another realm by Rumi.

You see, I am a lover of words. I consider words to be the bridge between souls.

Amongst all the matters in the world, I reckon love is the hardest to be put into words.

Love is not something that we can touch, or see. It is something that we feel and for this reason, we mostly fail at expressing it. We verbally express it, however, words alone cannot express love’s birth and depth.

I see love as a higher state of consciousness that dwells between our body and soul. We spend our lives in an absurd attempt to make love make sense. I have read compelling musings on love written by great poets but for me, no one could ever put love into words the way Rumi did.

This 13th-century poet excelled at describing God, death and emptiness. But mostly, he excelled at explaining love. Known for his mysterious friendship and love with Shams Al-Tabrizi, Rumi became a poet after suffering from Shams’ death. And although we know neither Rumi or Shams, we can sense their electric connection through Rumi’s poems.

Through these words, we see that love is ethereal. Rumi shows us that love is a universe by itself that springs from a different dimension. Rumi shows us another perspective on love—one that includes selflessness and gravity. Not only does he describe the joy of living it, but he also describes the agony of separation, reminding us that sometimes, great art comes from our deepest wounds.

As far as I’m concerned, I know that we all have a longing for that one person who keeps our emotions trapped inside our pens. Our feelings sometimes transcend the ink that’s waiting to be spilled. We all know that one person whom we wish to tell a thousand words, but instead, remain silent.

To read Rumi is to find these words that are caged inside our souls. Never before has someone took the words out of my heart like Rumi did; every time I read them, my soul is filled with ecstasy.

“I am fish. You are the moon.
You cannot touch me, but your light
can fill the ocean where I live.”

“Now that you live in my chest,
anywhere we sit is a mountaintop.”

“There’s nothing worse than to walk out along the street
without you. I don’t know where I’m going.
You’re the road and the knower of roads,
more than maps, more than love.”

“The way the night knows itself with the moon,
be that with me. Be the rose
nearest to the thorn that I am.”

“I have phrases and whole pages memorized,
but nothing can be told of love.
You must wait until you and I
are living together.
In the conversation we’ll have
then…be patient…then.”

“In your light I learn how to love.
In your beauty, how to make poems.
You dance inside my chest,
where no one sees you,
but sometimes I do,
and that sight becomes this art.”

“The minute I heard my first love story
I started looking for you, not knowing
how blind that was.
Lovers don’t finally meet somewhere.
They’re in each other all along.”

“You would rather throw stones at a mirror?
I am your mirror, and here are the stones.”

“Love has taken away my practices
and filled me with poetry.”

“There was a dawn I remember
when my soul heard something
from your soul. I drank water
from your spring and felt
the current take me.”

“Anywhere you put your foot, feel me
in the firmness under you.
How is it with this love,
I see your world and not you?”

“If you find me not within you,
you will never find me.
For I have been with you,
from the beginning of me.”

“I am yours.
Don’t give myself back to me.”

“Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing
there is a field.
I’ll meet you there.”

“Come,
even if you have broken your vows a thousand times.
Come, yet again, come, come.”

~

Source: The Essential Rumi. ~
~

Relephant: 

One Whole Heart: What Rumi Taught me about Life & Love.

~

Author: Elyane Youssef

Image: Wikimedia Commons

Editor: Caitlin Oriel