A Mountain Nest - Rumi

Have you seen a fish dissatisfied
with the ocean? Have you seen a lover?

Have you seen an image
that tries to avoid the engraver?
Have you seen a word emptied of meaning?

You need no name.
You are the ocean.
I am held in your sway.

Fire in your presence
turns into a rosebush.

When I am outside you,
life is torment.

Then Solomon walks back into Jerusalem,
and a thousand lanterns illuminate.

The divine glory settles
into a mountain nest.

The emperor and the source of light,
Shams Tabriz, lives here,
with no location in my chest.

Translation by Coleman Barks

Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Balkhī (Persian: جلال‌الدین محمد بلخى), also known as Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī (Persian: جلال‌الدین محمد رومی), and popularly known as Mowlānā (Persian: مولانا) but known to the English-speaking world simply as Rumi (30 September 1207 – 17 December 1273)