The Candle

O Candle! I am also an afflicted person in the world assembly Constant complaint is my lot in the manner of the rue

Love gave the warmth of internal pathos to you It made me the florist selling blood-mixed tears

Whether you be the candle of a celebrating assembly or one at the grave In every condition associated with the tears of sorrow you remain

Your eye views all with equity like the Secret’s Lovers My eye is the pride of the tumult of discrimination

Your illumination is alike in the Ka’bah and the temple I am entangled in the temple and the Haram’s discrimination

Your black smoke contains the sigh’s elegance Is some heart hidden in the place of your manifestation?

You burn with pathos due to distance from Tajalli’s Light Your pathos the callous ones consider your light

Though you are burning you are unaware of it all You see but do not encompass the internal pathos

I quiver like mercury with the excitement of vexation As well I am aware of vexations of the restless heart

This was also the elegance of some Beloved Which gave me perception of my own pathos

This cognition of mine keeps me restless Innumerable fire temples are asleep in this spark

Discrimination between high and low is created by this alone! Fragrance in flower, ecstasy in wine is created by this alone

Garden, nightingale, flower, fragrance this Cognition is Root of the struggle of ‘I and you’ this Cognition is

At creation’s dawn as Beauty became the abode of Love The sound of “Kun” taught warmth to the spirit of Love

Do not ask me of the nature of the veil of being The eve of separation was the dawn of my being

Gone are the days when unaware of imprisonment I was That my abode the adornment of the tree of Tur was

am a prisoner but consider the cage to be a garden This exile’s hovel of sorrow I consider the homeland

Memories of the homeland a needless melancholy became Now the desire for sight, now Longing for search became

O Candle! Look at the excessive illusion of thought Look at the end of the one worshipped by celestial denizens

Theme of separation I am, the exalted one I am Design of the Will of the Universe’s Lord I am

He desired my display as He designed me When at the head of Existence’ Divan He wrote me

The pearl likes living in a handful of dust Style may be dull the subject is excellent

Not seeing it rightly is the fault of shortsighted perception The universe is the show of effulgence of taste for Cognizance

This network of time and space is the scaling ladder of the Universe It is the necklace of the neck of Eternal Beauty

I have lost the way, Longing for the goal I am O Candle! Captive of perception’s illusion I am

I am the hunter as well as the circle of tyranny’s net! I am the Haram’s roof as well as the bird on Haram’s roof

Am I the Beauty or head to foot the melting love am I? It is not clear whether the beloved or the Lover am I?

I am afraid the old secret may come up to my lips again Lest story of suffering on the Cross may come up again.