Zinda-Rud departs from Paradise - The Houris' request

The glass of my patience and quietude was shattered; The Sage of Rum spoke in my ear, ‘Rise up’.

Ah, those words of love, that ecstatic certainty! Ah that court, that sublime palace;

heart bleeding, I reached its gate and beheld there a throng of houris,

on their lips, ‘Zinda-Rud, Zinda-Rud, Zinda-Rud, master of fire and melody!’

Clamour and tumult rose from left and right: ‘One or two moments sit with us. sit with us!’

Zinda-Rud

The traveller who knows the secrets of the journey fears the lodging place more than the highwayman.

Love reposes not in separation, nor in union, reposes not, without Eternal Beauty;

first beginning, falling down before idols, final end, freedom from all heart ravishers.

Love recks for nothing, and is ever on the move, a wayfarer in space and spacelessness.

Our creed, like the swift paced wave: abandon the halting place, choose the highway.

The Houris of Paradise

Your blandishments are like those of Time; grudge us not now one sweet song.

Ghazal of Zinda-Rud

You have not reached Man, so why do you seek God? You have fled from your self; why do you seek a friend?

Hang again on the rose twig and suck in the sap and the dew; faded blossom, what are you seeking from the zephyr?

What they call musk is two drops of the heart’s blood; gazelle of the Sanctuary, what are you seeking in Cathay?

Poverty’s assay is by sovereignty and world dominion; seek Jamshid’s throne—why do you seek a reed mat?

Men track it out from the garden of tulips; why do you seek from me the song drenched with blood?

The vision augments through the company of the enlightened of heart; why do you seek collyrium from the sorrow of the short—sighted?

We are calenders, and our miracle is world vision; seek vision from us—why seek the philosopher’s stone?