Original content

English translation

What is love? Making a sea out of a drop, Making the intellect the horseshoe of the shoe of madness. What is thought? Resolving all mysteries, Digging a mountain to enter the heart of a mustard seed. What is spiritual taste? Becoming aware of meaning, Arriving neither by piety nor by a fatwa. What is sobriety? Finding the way from oneself to oneself, Then finding oneself purified from oneself. What is effacement? Coming out of oneself without oneself, Then becoming destitute of both. What is rapture? Becoming joyful from the true dawn, Becoming fire without the presence of the sun. What is loss? Coming from morning with the evening, And falling into a trap from one's own love. What is a flaw? Making a veil out of the essence, Making oneself a living dead. What is gratitude? Considering the thorn a rose, Considering the part as the whole without seeing it. What is the essence? Becoming the mirror of oneself, Encountering oneself without oneself. What is yearning? Coming out of oneself, Coming into blood in hope of musk. What is grace? Becoming a speck of a speck, Becoming proud of the apology of a lesser speck. What is wrath? Imagining an ant as an elephant, Imagining a mosquito as Gabriel. What is expansion? Rearing the head from both worlds, Casting oneself upon a hundred other worlds. What is contraction? Making a body out of soul and heart, Making a house in the eye of a needle. What is proximity? Entering the embrace of fire, Or becoming like a moth to become joyful. What is distance? Imagining the soul from the body, Imagining the bottom of hell as heaven. What is fear? Becoming free from security, Becoming unhappy in the Garden of Eden. What is life? Living beyond death, Putting death behind and living in the now. What is pleasure? Becoming dead from life, Retreating behind the veil before every pain. What is the moment? Coming from the tip of a single hair, A hundred calamities coming to the face like hair. What is the state? Hiding from the carnal soul, Then going to welcome the Almighty. What is the path? Finding a refuge from the soul, Finding a way having stolen the treasure. What is the journey? Going out of one's part, Leaving atom-hood and becoming the firmament. What is affection? Rising from before the soul, Rising before the Beloved, offering the soul. What is intimacy? Finding liberation from oneself, Finding familiarity in the black core of the heart. What is kindness? Making breasts out of stone, Making both universes one's own child. What is union? Coming to existence from non-existence, Then coming out of both, intoxicated. What is the breath? Becoming from 'there is no god but He', Then both worlds becoming the navel of one deer. What is explanation? Coming from adulteration to realization, The hair becoming like a gourd and alembic. What is shame? Not mixing out of grace, Seeing one's own shadow and fleeing. What is the remedy? Coming to non-existence from existence, Then becoming content with nothing from everything. What is effort? Pouring a sea from the eyes, In walking, raising dust from the water. What is attraction? Becoming a speck from a single glance, Getting on Gabriel's wing to the Lote Tree. What is generosity? Coming from all to nothing, Nothing coming without complexity in all. What is justice? Wanting fairness for oneself, Not wanting any fairness from anyone. What is grace (favor)? Becoming intimate with secrets, The soul becoming less than the form for eternity. What is taste? Having dew from the promise, Having the eye on the supreme sea. What is the command? Having a soul from servitude, Having every speck effaced in the command. What is prohibition? Coming to the monastery from pain, Seeing others and coming in friendship with others. What is beauty? Becoming bewildered by a trickle, Becoming amazed at the face of a model. What is ugliness? Becoming the back of the mirror, Coming with one finger from the whole body. What is benefit? Learning the work from the candle, Igniting everything and burning oneself. What is patience? Having a fiery temperament, Burning, dying, leaving everything behind. What is earnestness? Coming loyal from the soul, Coming into work with just one single hair. What is jest? Spilling the water of sagacity, Or pouring rosewater on impurity. What is oversight? Remaining at the door from the veil, Sleeping under the rain and remaining wet. What is forbearance? Coming from the summit of the throne, The cow and fish becoming a carpet together. What is repentance? Striking all these together, Pitching the tent from this world to that world. What is prostration? Going into the mud from one's own disgrace, Obtaining the throne of the soul in the heart of the mud. What is intention? Making blindness from the eyes, Making the pupil the hole of an ant. What is pilgrimage? Going out of foot and head, Seeking the Kaaba of the heart and entering blood. What is forgiveness? Enduring the torment of the soul, Considering the sins of people as one's own sin. What is pride? Pounding water in a mortar, And pounding on friend and foe out of ego. What is conceit? Iron burning from heat, Teaching devilry to the demon. What is war? Having reins from the soul, Having a spear at every hair's tip. What is peace? Becoming hidden from one's own essence, Becoming a shadow, good and bad becoming the same. What is anger? Having an illusion of oneself, Having a hell on a potsherd. What is grudge? It is making a prison out of the chest, It is hiding a dragon in a casket. What is stinginess? It is giving up the soul from thirst, It is falling into the sea like a heron. What is cowardice? It is withering from a shadow, It is wilting from a breath like a blossom. What is deceit? It is making halva out of poison, And then eating that halva out of madness. What is safety? It is cutting off greed from the soul, It is seeing oneself lifeless like a shadow. What is abasement? It is falling away from the pure soul, It is falling like dirt under a dog's foot. What is glory? It is turning away from one's own good, It is seeing oneself in one's Glorifier. What is truthfulness? It is being good in honesty, It is being a bowstring from end to end in a bow. What is falsehood? It is boiling beer from ice, It is concealing the arrow in the bow. What is greed? It is gathering out of ignorance, When it becomes a mountain, it is dying beneath it. What is sin? It is turning the head away from the path, It is wrapping musk with impurity. What is severance? It is falling from the soul to the low, It is a glass falling from a child's hand. What is intuition? It is seeing the origin of godliness, It is seeing the truth of the dawn of familiarity. What is nature (disposition)? It is falling from mud to mud, It is standing in one manner like a donkey. What is despair? It is hurting the broken-hearted, It is also cutting off from all connections. What is weakness? It is falling under from weakness, It is giving the strength of an elephant to an ant. What is unveiling? It is leaping from dust into blood, And leaping out from inside the veil. What is piety? It is dying of one's own thirst, It is quenching everyone's thirst with kindness. What is preaching? It is a spring birthing from a mountain, Your speaking is giving that description. What is silence? It is escaping the trap of existence, It is closing both lips to everything other than Allah. What is character? It is making a bed out of dust, It is making it pleasant to share a bowl with dogs. What is profit? It is becoming absolute from the bond, It is becoming ephemeral of oneself and eternal of the Truth. What is loss? It is rubbing a gem out of ignorance, It is being occupied with existence for a single breath. What is patience? It is filing iron, It is making wool into iron in the eyes. What is gratitude? It is seeing perpetual blessing, Then seeing the Benefactor in that blessing. What is knowledge? It is making a Mount Qaf out of a speck, It is circumambulating it for eternity. What is asceticism? It is being free from the world, It is being the watchman of the path of the hereafter. What is poverty? It is making a path from misguidance, And shortening the hand from both worlds. What is hypocrisy? It is being still from a point, And being safe from one's own calamity. What is sustenance? It is bringing sugar out of poison, It is bringing the sky into a lasso. What is hunger? It is eating the essence of both worlds, It is also finally dying miserably of hunger. What is fasting? It is closing the door to other than Him, It is blocking the path from existence and non-existence. What is separation? It is joining in the world, It is tying every little thing into the soul. What is remembrance? It is taking the cure from pain, It is tunneling to the soul at the door of the heart. What is the Qibla? It is seeing the supreme signs, It is seeing the face of the Master in every speck. What is the Kaaba? It is falling into the neighborhood, It is being born fold by fold in the navel of the world. What is provision? It is being full of the whole of the whole, Then traversing the path on nothing while empty. What is speech (letter)? It is saying something out of pain, It is speaking of bravery before a coward. What is discourse? It is eating oil from the crust, It is eating the pitcher with the clear water. What is a trick? It is seeking resolve from the intellect, It is joining cotton and iron together. What is sorrow? It is not seeing the path from a blind man, It is not seeing black snow in Hell. What is a tale? It is being distressed by a difficulty, And saying what can never be said. What is poetry? It is opening this whole door, It is giving the explanation of so many wonders. Although this place was the arena of secrets, It was not expedient to lengthen the speech. I abbreviated it to these hundred couplets, Because if I speak, it will exceed a thousand. Every heart to which this much became known, Those others became softer than wax for it. Since there was no end to the attributes of the path, It was not possible for me to say more than this.