Song of The Flute

by

Mevlana Jelal al-Din Rumi
 

Versified translation:

Prof.Dr. Erkan Türkmen

Near East University

Faculty of Arts and Sciences

North Cyprus.
 

Song of the Flute

بشنو اين نى چون شكا يت مى كند از جدا ئها حكايت مى كند 

1- Listen to this flute while it is complaining,

The story of separation from God it"s explaining.

كز نيستان تا مرا ببر يده اند در نفير م مرد و زن نا ليده اند

2- “Ever since I"ve been plucked from my real ground,

Men and women, all cry with my yearning sound.

سينه خواهم شرحه شرحه از فرا ق تا بگويم شرح درد اشتيا ق 

3- I want a breast torn away like mine with pains of separation,

Only to that breast I can tell the story of my lamentation.

هركسى كه كو دور ماند از اصل خويش باز جويد روزگار وصل خويش

4- If anyone from his own origin falls away,

He looks for a chance to find again his missing way.

من بهر جميعتى نالان شدم جفت بد حالان و خوش حالان شد م

5- In every company I cry and forever I moan,

Both the happy and the unhappy are moved by my tone.

هر كسى از ظن خود شد يار من از درون من نجست اسرار من 

6- According to their own opinions people try to be my friend,

Little do they bother to discover my esoteric trend?

سر من از ناله من دور نيست ليك چشم و گوش را ﺁن نور نيست

7- However, my secret is not concealed from my painful cries,

But some fail to have the comprehensive ears and eyes”.

تن ز جان و جان ز تن مستور نيست ليك كس را ديد جان دستور نيست

8- The soul and the body are not from each other concealed,

But to many ears and eyes this fact is not revealed.

ﺁ تش است اين بانگ نى و نيست باد هر كه اين ﺁ تش ندارد نيست باد 

9- The breath to the flute is not a simple blow, it"s fire,

He who has no such fire, let him perish and expire.

ﺁ تش عشقست كاندر نى ا فتا د جو شش عشقست كاند ر مى افتا د

10- It is the fire of love that has turned the flute demented,

And it the love-desire that keeps the wine fermented.

نى حريف هر كه ا ز يارى بر يد پردها ش پردهاى ما دريد

11- The flute is friend for those who loose their companions,

My chest is also perforated like the flute"s divisions.

همچو نى زهرى و ترياقى كى ديد همچو نى دمساز و مشتا قى كى ديد

12- Who has ever seen an antidote and poison like the flute?

Who can ever find a healing friend like the flute?

نى حديث راه پر خون مى كند قصهاى عشق مجنون مى كند 

13- The flute is telling stories of dangerous ways and coils,

And the love stories of Majnun and his blood-stained toils.

محرم اين هوش جز بيهو ش نيست مر زبانرا مشترى جز گو ش نيست

14- The knower of this feeling is none but the insensible one,

As only an ear can hear the speaking of the tongue.

در غم ما روز ها بيگاه شد روزها با سوزها همرا ه شد 

15- With our sorrows days have lost sense of time to pass away

Accompanied with pains they make us their prey.

روزها گر رفت گو با ك نيست تو بمان اى ﺁنكه چون تو پا ك نيست

16- If the days are passing by say, “Let them pass away”

Yet Thee! The Only Pious One with me, prolong Thy stay.

هر كه جز ماهى ز ﺁ بش سير شد هر كه بى روز يست روزش دير شد

17- If you are not fish, in water soon you will be tired,

If you have no daily bread, time shall be undesired.

در نيابد حال پخته هيچ خا م پس سخن كوتاه بايد و سلا م

18- For an immature man the stage of mature man is high,

So cut a long story short and say to him “Good bye”. 
 

Note: In the above lines “the reed flute” (the Nay) means a Godly man who feels separation from his primeval homeland where God"s Presence protected and appeased him. It refers to the Quranic verse, “I breathed into him My Spirit” XV/28. Thus, it is the trust of God that man carries in him as God says in the Koran, “We did indeed offer the trust to the heavens and the earth and the mountains; but they refused it, being afraid of thereof, but man undertook it- he was indeed ignorant and foolish (33/72). It is this trust (breath of His Soul) that is within the body of man and is not concealed from him if he may bother to discover. However, many fail to discover it. “Fish” means the lover of God who is happy within the ocean of divine love; and he who is not, his time in this world is unbearable and without a prime goal.