The Mystic Way - Jalaluddin Rumi
PLUG thy low sensual ear, which stuffs like cotton
Thy conscience and makes deaf thine inward ear.
Be without ear, without sense, without thought,
And hearken to the call of God, "Return!"
Our speech and action is the outer journey,
Our inner journey is above the sky
The body travels on its dusty way;
The spirit walks like Jesus, on the sea.
In the grand scheme of things this is what finding a dusty, coverless book in a backroom in Pakistan leads to. Badly printed as it was, my uncle - when he heard me reading the poems to his children kindly pointed out that they were from Rumi, and although, clearly it was in english, there was no indication of the author. He also proceeded to recite them in urdu, and put the english to shame. (Things like this happen a lot in Pakistan.) Anyways, no idea who the pakistani translator was, enjoy the poem!
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