A Glimpse Into the Sublimity and Loftiness of Rumi’s Poetry - Monday's Inspiration, 21

“Good poetry”, says the illumined Seer Hafiz,

“Makes the Universe admits a secret:

I am really just a tambourine.

Grab hold; play me against your warm thigh.”

We tend to remember the sublime poetry of those who came before us. Whether it’s Emily Dickinson with her ‘Hope’:

“Hope is the thing with feathers,

That perches in the soul.’

Or Blake’s, Auguries of Innocence:

“To see a World in a Grain of Sand

And a Heaven in a Wild Flower

Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand

And Eternity in an hour ….”

These great poets tend to have a profound effect on our psyche and in a conscious or unconscious way, do influence our day to day environment and the spirit of the nation.

It has been said that Mevlana Jalal Uddin Mohammed, known lovingly as Rumi in the West, was perhaps the most prolific poet that ever lived. Some say that he wrote 60,000 poems!

Far less than my spiritual teacher, Sri Chinmoy, of course, but Guruji wrote for some forty three plus years and has only recently passed. Rumi was a 13^th century poet.

Still, Guruji says that it’s not really necessary to compare the God-souls, the Seers, for they all represent or manifest in different ways, the same one Source. It is the same Supreme who manifests in the form we call the Christ; in the personification of the Buddha and so forth.

Rumi was by all accounts, a God-intoxicated Soul. We can see this in the richness; the mystical depth, flow, vibrancy and authority of his poetry. A friend of mines once said that Rumi never wrote a single word which was out of place. I believe this whole heartedly. Let us examine just one of his poems:

The Light of Love

Both Light and shadow,

Are the dance of Love.

Love has no cause,

It is the Astrolabe of God’s secrets.

Lover and loving are inseparable and timeless.

Although I may try to describe Love,

When I experience it, I am speechless.

Although I may try to write about Love,

I am rendered helpless.

My pen breaks, and the paper slips away,

To that ineffable place where

Lover, loving and Love are one.

Every moment is made glorious,

By the Light of Love.

Rumi begins by saying that ‘both Light and shadow are the dance of Love’. For Rumi, there is only Love; light and shadow are aspects of the same Source. Our good and our evil; our day and night, however painful, all spring from Love, the only Source; the Light …

“Love has no cause,” says Rumi. “It is the Astrolabe of God’s secrets.” Love is the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end and at the same time, without an end. It is an immortal journey, according to Sri Chinmoy, the 21^st century visionary. It is a birthless and deathless ‘dance’, according to Rumi.

They call this a Lila (leela), in India, A Divine game, or one might say, the sacred play of the Absolute Supreme. Rumi likens it to the ‘astrolabe of God’s secrets.’ This is an astronomical instrument used for measuring the celestial spheres. One can say that the Divine Incarnations, are the astrolabes of God’s secret’s, just as Love also is. This equates to the fact that to know God, we have to embody that Love, God’s emissary of the New Jerusalem.

To continue, Rumi further tells us that Lover and loving, are inseparable and timeless. I have capitalised the word here, as in mystical philosophy, the true Lover is a man of God, a Christ, Buddha or Krishna. It is also used for a Seer or God-intoxicated seekers of Love. Nevertheless, the human lover, is also inseparable from God, but some are simply not conscious of this, because of the necessary veil, placed upon them by the Divine.

“Although I may try to describe Love,

When I experience it, I am speechless.

Although I may try to write about Love,

I am rendered helpless.

My pen breaks, and the paper slips away,

To that ineffable place where

Lover, loving and Love become one.”

Here Rumi tells us that Love is unspoken, speechless, unutterable… we cannot describe Love. He becomes helpless and his pen breaks,, whenever he tries to do so. Sri Ramakrishna, The great Paramahansa of Dakshineshwar, used to say that whenever he tried to describe it, he would get only so far and become lost in contemplation. Same thing happened to Rumi, as he says that ‘Lover, loving and Love, are One.’

They say in the East, in Yoga, that the Absolute in its highest aspect, is Silence; pure Existence, Consciousness and Bliss (Sat, Chit and Ananda).

Finally Rumi tells us, that it is the Light of Love that makes all things glorious. Light is synonymous with Love and vice versa. They cause all to manifest or unmanifest and create or project the wonder and awe in every aspect. Rumi calls this simply ‘glorious’, but it is an incredibly beautiful word, full of Light and Truth.

Rumi offers hope, solace and reassurance. For him, 'shadow' is a part of the 'dance' or only a lesser form of Light and as such, it is merely a question of degree. It also helps us and is a part of the divine plan.

Certainly Rumi’s poetry is a pinnacle of unprecedented beauty, and has been talking to us in the words of Robert Bly and Coleman Bark’s, two poetry scholars, for some time. He is also studied by many other authorities both East and West, with very favourable or powerful inspirations.

Still, the true teacher remains in the Heart of the God-lover; not the intellect of the mind, and as such more will be revealed as our Consciousness or Spirit unfolds, by the childlike simplicity of the Divine. Glory be!!

Manatita, The Lantern Carrier. 4^th December, 2017