In the Presence of Shah-i Hamadan

I seek from you the key to the secret of God: He sought from us obedience, and created Satan.

So to adorn the hideous and unlovely and to demand of us comeliness of works;

I ask you, what is this magic-mongering, what this dicing with an evil adversary?

A handful of dust, against yon revolving sphere – tell me now, did it beseem Him so to do?

Our labour, our thoughts, our anguish is but to bite our hands in despair.

Shah-i Hamadan The man who is fully aware of himself creates advantage out of loss.

To sup with the Devil brings disaster to a man; to wrestle with the Devil brings him glory.

One must strike oneself against Ahriman; you are a sword, he is the whetstone;

Become sharper, that your stroke may be hard, else you will be unfortunate in both worlds.

Under the heavens man devours man, nation grazes upon another nation.

My soul burns like rue for the people of the Vale; cries of anguish mount from my heart.

They are a nation clever, perceptive, handsome, their dexterity is proverbial,

Yet their cup rolls in their own blood; the lament in my flute is on their behalf.

Since they have lost their share of selfhood they have become strangers in their own land;

Their wages are in the hands of others, the fish of their river in other men’s nets.

The caravans move step by step to the goal; but still their work is ill-done, unformed, immature.

Through servitude their aspirations have died, the fire in the veins of their vine is quenched.

But do not think that they were always so, their brows ever lowered thus to the dust;

Once upon a time they too were warlike folk, valiant, heroic, ardent in battle.

Behold her mountains turbaned in white; behold the fiery hands of her chenars;

In springtime rubies leap down from the rocks, a flood of colour rises from her soil;

Stippled clouds cover mountain and valley like cotton-flocks strewn from a carder’s bow.

Mountain and river, and the setting of the sun: there I behold God without a veil

I wandered with the zephyr in Nishat chanting as I roved, ‘Listen to the reed’

A bird perched in the branches was singing: ‘This springtide is not worth a penny.

The tulip has blossomed, the dark-eyed narcissus is in bloom, the breeze of Nauruz has torn their skirts;

For many ages from this mountain and valley have sprung daisies purer than the light of the moon,

For many ages the rose has packed and unpacked her baggage, yet our earth has not begotten a second Shihab al-Din.’

The passionate lament of that bird of dawn filled my heart with new fire and fever.

Presently I beheld a madman, whose threnody robbed me of all endurance and reason.

‘Pass us by, and seek not an impassioned lament, pass from the rose-twig, that talisman of colour and scent.

You said that dew was dripping from the tulip’s petals; nay, it is a feckless heart weeping beside the river.

What have these few feathers to do with such a chant? It is the spirit of Ghani mourning the death of desire.

Zephyr, if you should pass over Geneva speak a word from me to the League of Nations:

They have sold farmer and cornfield, river and garden, they have sold a people, and at a price how cheap.’

Shah-i Hamadan I will tell you a subtle mystery, my son: the body is all clay, the soul a precious pearl.

The body must be melted for the sake of the soul; the pure must be distinguished from the clay.

If you cut off a part of the body from the body, that slice of the body will be lost to you;

But the soul which is drunk with vision – if you give it away, it will return to you.

The soul’s substance resembles nothing else; it is in bonds, and yet not in bonds;

If you watch over it, it dies in the body, and if you scatter it, it illuminates the gathering.

What, noble sir, is the soul ‘drunk with vision’? What does it mean to ‘give the soul away’?

To give away the soul is to surrender it to God, it means melting the mountain with the soul’s flame.

‘Drunk with vision’ means discovering one’s self, shining like a star in the night-season:

Not to discover one’s self is not to exist, to discover is to bestow the self on the Self.

Whosoever has seen himself and has seen naught else has drawn forth the load from the self’s prison;

The ‘drunk with vision’ who beholds himself deems the sting sweeter than the honey;

In his eyes the soul is cheap as the air, before him the walls of his prison tremble;

His axe shivers the granite rock so that he takes his share of the universe.

When he gives up the soul, his soul is truly his, otherwise his soul is his guest but for a moment or two.

You have spoken of the wisdom of foul and fair; learned sage, expound a further subtlety.

You were the guide of those who behold the inner meanings you were the confidant of the secrets of kings.

We are poor men, and the ruler demands tribute; what is the origin of the sanction of throne and crown?

Shah-i Hamadan What is the origin of Kingship in East and West? Either the consent of the peoples, or war and violence.

Exalted sir, I will speak with you plainly; it is forbidden to pay tribute save to two persons:

‘Either those in authority as being among you, whose proof and demonstration is the verse of God,

Or else a hero swift-rising like a hurricane who seizes cities, and stakes himself in the battle,

On the day of war conquering the land by force of arms, on the day of peace by the winning ways of love.

You might indeed purchase Iran and India, but kingship cannot be bought from any man;

Virtuous friend, the Cup of Jamshid none shall procure from the glassmaker’s shop,

Or if he procures aught, all he owns is glass, and glass has no other property but to break.

Ghani Who gave to India this yearning for freedom? Who gave the quarry this passion to be the hunter?

Those scions of Brahmins, with vibrant hearts, whose glowing cheeks put the red tulip to shame;

Keen of eye, mature and strenuous in action whose very glance puts Europe into commotion.

Their origin is from this protesting soil of ours, the rising-place of these stars is our Kashmir.

If you suppose our earth is without a spark, cast a glance for a moment within your heart;

Whence comes all this ardour you possess, whence comes this breath of the breeze of spring?

It is from the selfsame wind’s influence that our mountains derive their colour and scent.

Do you not know what one day a wave said to another wave in Lake Wular?

‘How long shall we strike at each other in this sea? Rise up; let us break together against the shore.

Our child, that is to say, yon Ancient River fills with its roar valley and mountains and meadow;

Continually it smites the rocks on its path until it uproots the fabric of the mountains.

That youth who seized cities, deserts and plains took his nurture from the milk of a hundred mothers;

Its majesty strikes terror into mortal hearts; all this is from us, not from any other.

To live in the bounds of the shore is a sin; our shore is but a stone in our path.

To accommodate oneself to the shore is eternal death, even though you roll in the sea morning and evening;

Life is to leap amidst mountain and desert – happy is the wave that has transgressed the shore!’

You who have read the lines on the brow of Life, you who have given to the East the tumult of Life,

You who have a sigh that consumes the heart, stirring you to restlessness and us still more,

From you the birds in the meadow learned their threnody; in your tears the grasses make ablution;

Out of your genius the field of roses blossomed, out of your hope many souls are filled with hope.

Your cry is a bell urging the caravans; why then do you despair of the dwellers in the Vale?

Their hearts are not dead in their breasts; their embers are not extinguished under the ice;

Wait till you see, without the sound of the Trumpet, a nation rising out of the dust of the tomb.

Do not grieve then, visionary; breathe out that sigh consuming all, dry and moist alike;

Many cities beneath the turquoise heaven have been consumed by the flame of a dervish heart.

Dominion is frailer than a bubble and can be destroyed by a single breath.

The destinies of nations have been shaped by a song, by a song nations are destroyed and rebuilt.

Though your lancet has pierced men’s hearts, none has perceived you as you truly are;

Your melody springs from a poet’s song, but what you utter transcends poesy.

Stir up a new tumult in Paradise; strike up an intoxicating air in Paradise!

Habituate yourself to the dervish wine and quaff it continuously; when you become riper, hurl yourself at the dominion of Jamshid.

They said, ‘This world of ours-does it agree with you?’ I said, ‘It does not agree’. They said, ‘Then break it to pieces’.

In the taverns I have seen there is not one worthy adversary; grapple with Rustam-i Dastan, have done with Magian boys!

Tulip of the wilderness, you cannot burn alone; strike this heart-enflaming brand upon the breast of man;

You are the ardour of his bosom, the heat of his blood – do you not believe me? Then tear apart the flesh of the world.

Is reason your lamp? Set it on the path to shine; or is love your cup? Quaff it with the intimate.

I pour forth from my eyes the bloody gouts of my heart; my ruby of Badakhshan – pick it up, and set it in your ring.