stream(water

 

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I drink streamwater and the air

and everything I do becomes clearer.

I become a waterwheel,

turning and tasting you, as long

as water moves.

—Rumi

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look at the Water of the water

 

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Day and night there is movement of foam on the Sea.
You see the foam, but not the Sea. Amazing!
We are dashing against each other like boats:
our eyes are darkened though we're on clear water. 

O you who've gone to sleep in the body's boat,
you've seen the water,
but look at the Water of the water.
The water has a Water that is driving it;
the spirit has a Spirit that is calling it. 


—Rumi

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drawer of water

 

 .

The reflection cast from good friends is needed

until you become, without the aid of any reflector,

a drawer of water from the Sea.

Know that the reflection is at first just imitation,

but when it continues to recur,

it turns into direct realization of truth.

Until it has become direct realization,

don't part from the friends who guide you—

don't break away from the shell

if the raindrop hasn't yet become a pearl.

—Rumi

Mathnawi II: 566-568

Helminski version

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The Gift of Water

  .

Someone who doesn't know the Tigris River exists
brings the caliph who lives near the river
a jar of fresh water. The caliph accepts, thanks him,
and gives in return a jar filled with gold coins.

"Since this man has come through desert,
he should return by water." Taken out by another door,
the man steps into a waiting boat
and sees the wide freshwater of the Tigris.
He bows his head, "What wonderful kindness
that he took my gift."

Every object and being in the universe is
a jar overfilled with wisdom and beauty,
a drop of the Tigris that cannot be contained
by any skin. Every jarful spills and makes the earth
more shining, as though covered in satin.
If the man had seen even a tributary
of the great river, he wouldn't have brought
the innocence of his gift.

Those that stay and live by the Tigris
grow so ecstatic that they throw rocks at jugs,
and the jugs become perfect!

They shatter.
The pieces dance, and water...

Do you see?
Neither jar, nor water, nor stone,
nothing.

You knock at the door of reality,
shake your thought-wings, loosen
your shoulders,
and open.


—Rumi
Mathnavi 1: 2850-70
Version by Coleman Barks

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all are stars of heaven reflected in flowing water

 

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Consider the creatures as pure and limpid

water, within which shine the Attributes of the Almighty.

Their knowledge, their justice, their kindness – 

all are stars of heaven reflected in flowing water.

Kings are a locus of manifestation of God's

Kingliness, the learned a locus for His Knowledge.

Generations have passed, and this is a new

generation. The moon is the same, the water different.

Justice is the same justice, learning the same

learning, but peoples and nations have changed.

Generation upon generation has passed, oh

friend, but these Meanings are constant and everlasting.

The water in the stream has changed many times, 
but the reflection of the moon and the stars remains the same . . .

All pictured forms are reflections in the water

of the stream; when you rub your eyes, indeed, all are He.

—Rumi 

William C. Chittick version

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story-water

 

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A story is like the water
you heat for your bath.

It takes messages between the fire
and your skin. It lets them meet,
and it cleans you!

Very few can sit down
in the middle of the fire itself
like a salamander or Abraham.
We need intermediaries.

A feeling of fullness comes,
but usually it takes some bread
to bring it.

Beauty surrounds us,
but usually we need to be walking
in a garden to know it.

The body itself is a screen
to shield and partially reveal
the light that's blazing
inside your presence.

Water, stories, the body,
all the things we do, are mediums
that hide and show what's hidden.

Study them,
and enjoy this being washed
with a secret we sometimes know,
and then not.


Rumi 
Coleman Barks version

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Nathan Bauman

.

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We can’t help being thirsty,
moving toward the voice of water.

—Rumi

.

.

The thirsty man longs for water.

The water calls for him to drink.

This thirst in our souls is the magnetism
of the Water:

We are It's, and It is ours.

–Rumi

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