لطفا منتظر باشید ...
PROLOGUE
| WHEN the world-illuming sun rushed, upon Night like a brigand, | |
| My weeping bedewed the face of the rose. | |
| My tears washed away sleep from the eye of the narcissus, | |
| My passion wakened the grass and made it grow. | |
| The Gardener tried the power of my song, | 5 |
| He sowed my verse and reaped a sword. | |
| In the soil he planted only the seed of my tears | |
| And wove my lament with the garden, as warp and woof. | |
| Tho'' I am but a mote, the radiant sun is mine: | |
| Within my bosom are a hundred dawns. | 10 |
| My dust is brighter than Jamshid''s cup-23 | |
| It knows things that are yet unborn in the world. | |
| My thought hunted down and slung from the saddle a deer. | |
| That has not yet leaped forth from the covert of non-existence. | |
| Fair is my garden ere yet the leaves are green: | 15 |
| Unborn roses are hidden in the skirt of my garment. | |
| I struck dumb the musicians where they were gathered together, | |
| I smote the heart-string of the universe, | |
| Because the lute of my genius hath a rare melody: | |
| Even to comrades my song is strange. | 20 |
| I am born in the world as a new sun, | |
| I have not learned the ways and fashions of the sky | |
| Not yet have the stars fled before my splendour, | |
| Not yet is my quicksilver astir; | |
| Untouched is the sea by my dancing rays, | 25 |
| Untouched are the mountains by my crimson hue. | |
| The eye of existence is not familiar with me; | |
| I rise trembling, afraid to show myself. | |
| From the East my dawn arrived and routed Night, | |
| A fresh dew settled on the rose of the world. | 30 |
| I am waiting for the votaries that rise at dawn; | |
| Oh, happy they who shall worship my fire! | |
| I have no need of the ear of To-day, | |
| I am the voice of the poet of To-morrow | |
| My own age does not understand my deep meanings, | 35 |
| My Joseph is not for this market. | |
| I despair of my old companions, | |
| My Sinai burns forsake of the Moses who is coming. | |
| Their sea is silent, like dew, | |
| But my dew is storm-ridden, like the ocean. | 40 |
| My song is of another world than theirs: | |
| This bell calls other travellers to take the road, | |
| Many a poet was born after his death, | |
| Opened our eyes when his own were closed., | |
| And journeyed forth again from nothingness, | 45 |
| Like roses blossoming o''er the earth of his grave. | |
| Albeit caravans have passed through this desert, | |
| They passed, as a camel steps, with little sound. | |
| But I am a lover: loud crying is my faith | |
| The clamour of Judgment Day is one of my minions. | 50 |
| My song exceeds the range of the chord, | |
| Yet I do not fear that my lute will break. | |
| Twere better for the water drop not to know my torrent, | |
| Whose fury should rather madden the sea. | |
| No river will contain my Oman:24 | 55 |
| My flood requires whole seas to hold it. | |
| Unless the bud expand into a bed of roses, | |
| It is unworthy of my spring-cloud''s bounty. | |
| Lightnings slumber within my soul, | |
| I sweep over mountain and plain. | 60 |
| Wrestle with my sea, if thou art a plain; | |
| Receive my lightning if thou art a Sinai. | |
| The Fountain of Life hath been given me to drink. | |
| I have been made an adept of the mystery of Life. | |
| The speck of dust was vitalised by my burning song: | 65 |
| It unfolded wings-and became a firefiy. | |
| No one hath. told the secret which I will tell | |
| Or threaded a pearl of thought like mine | |
| Come, if thou would''st know the secret of everlasting life | |
| Come, if thou would''st win both earth and heaven. | 70 |
| Heaven taught me this lore, | |
| I cannot hide it from comrades. | |
| O Saqi arise and pour wine into the cup! | |
| Clear the vexation of Time from my heart | |
| The sparkling liquor that flows from Zemzen25 | 75 |
| Were a beggar to worship it, he would become a king. | |
| It makes thought more sober and wise, it makes the keen eye keener, | |
| it gives to a straw the weight of a mountain, | |
| And to foxes the strength of lions. | 80 |
| It causes dust to soar to the Pleiades | |
| And a drop of waters well to the breadth of the sea. | |
| it turns silence Into the din of Judgment Day, | |
| it makes the foot of the partridge red | |
| with blood of the hawk. | |
| Arise and pour pure wine into my cup, | 85 |
| Pour moon beams into the dark night of my thought, | |
| That I may lead home the wanderer | |
| And imbue the idle looker on with rest less impatience; | |
| And advance hotly on a new quest | |
| And become known as the champion of a new spirit: | 90 |
| And be to people of insight as the pupil to the eye, | |
| And sink into the ear of the world, like a voice; | |
| And exalt the worth of Poesy | |
| And sprinkle the dry herbs with my tears."26 | |
| Inspired by the genius of the Master of Rum.27 | 95 |
| I reherarse the sealed book of secret lore. | |
| His soul is the flaming furnace, | |
| I am but as the spark that gleams for a moment. | |
| His burning candle consumed me, I the moth; | |
| His wine overwhelmed my goblet. | 100 |
| The master of Rum transmuted my earth to gold | |
| And set my ashes aflame. | |
| The grain of sand set forth from the desert, | |
| That it might win the radiance of the sun. | |
| I am a wave and I will come to rest in his sea, | 105 |
| That I may make the glistening pearl mine own. | |
| I who am drunken with the wine of his song. | |
| Draw life from the breath of his words, | |
| ''Twas night my heart would fain lament. | |
| The silence was filled with my cries to God. | 110 |
| I was complaining of the sorrows of the world. | |
| And bewailing the emptiness of my cup. | |
| At last mine eye could endure no more, | |
| Broken with fatigue it went to sleep. | |
| There appeared the Master, formed in the mould of Truth, | 115 |
| Who wrote the Koran in Persian.28 | |
| He said, "O frenzied lover, | |
| Take a draught of love''s pure wine. | |
| Strike29 the chords of thine heart and rouse a tumultuous strain. | |
| Dash thine head against the goblet and thine eye against the lancet! | 120 |
| Make thy laughter the source of a hundred sighs. | |
| Make the hearts of men bleed with thy tears | |
| How long wilt thou be silent, like a bud? | |
| Sell thy fragrance cheap, like the rose! | |
| Tongue-tied, thou art in pain: | 125 |
| Cast thyself upon the fire, like rue! | |
| Like the bell, break silence at last, and from every limb. | |
| Utter forth a lamentation! | |
| Thou art fire: fill the world with thy glow! | |
| Make others burn with thy burning! | 130 |
| Proclaim the secrets of the old wine seller;30 | |
| Be thou a surge of wine, and the crystal cup thy robe! | |
| Shatter the mirror of fear, | |
| Break the bottles in the bazaar | |
| Like the reed-flute, bring a message from the reed-bed | 135 |
| Give to Majnun a message from the tribe of Laila!31 | |
| Create a new style for thy song, | |
| Enrich the assembly with thy piercing strains | |
| Up, and re-inspire every living soul | |
| Say ''Arise !'' and by that word quicken the living | 140 |
| Up, and set thy feet on another path | |
| Put aside the passionate melancholy of old ! | |
| Become familiar with the delight of singing; bell of the caravan, awake!" | |
| At these words my bosom was enkindled | 145 |
| And swelled with emotion like the flute; | |
| I rose like music from the string | |
| To prepare a Paradise for the ear. | |
| I unveiled the mystery of the Self | |
| And disclosed its wondrous secret. | 150 |
| My being was an unfinished statue, | |
| Uncomely, worthless, good for nothing. | |
| Love chiselled me: I became a man. | |
| And gained knowledge of the nature of the universe. | |
| I have seen the movement of the sinews of the sky. | 155 |
| And the blood coursing in the veins of the moon. | |
| Many a night I wept for Man''s sake | |
| That I might tear the veil from Life''s mysteries. | |
| And extract the secret of Life''s constitution | |
| From the laboratory of phenomena. | 160 |
| I who give beauty to this night, like the moon, | |
| Am as dust in devotion to the pure Faith (Islam) | |
| A Faith renowned in hill and dale. | |
| Which kindles in men''s hearts a flame of undying song: | |
| It sowed an atom and reaped a sun, | 165 |
| It harvested a hundred poets like Rumi and Attar. | |
| I am a sigh: I will mount to the heavens; | |
| I am but smoke, yet am I sprung of fire. | |
| Driven onward by high thoughts, my pen | |
| Cast abroad the secret behind this veil, | 170 |
| That the drop may become co-equal with the sea | |
| And the grain of sand grow into a Sahara. | |
| Poetising is not the aim of this Masnavi. | |
| Beauty-worshipping and love-making is not its aim. | |
| I am of India: Persian is not my native tongue; | 175 |
| I am like the crescent moon: my cup is not full. | |
| Do not seek from me charm of style in exposition. | |
| Do not seek not from me Khansar and Isfahan.32 | |
| Although the language of Hind is sweet as sugar, | |
| Yet sweeter is the fashion of Persian speech. | 180 |
| My mind was enchanted by its loveliness. | |
| My pen became as a twig of the Burning Bush. | |
| Because of the loftiness of my thoughts, | |
| Persian alone is suitable to them. | |
| O Reader I do not find fault with the wine-cup. | 185 |
| But consider attentively the taste of the wine. |
