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    Rumi: Bridge to the Soul: Journeys into the Music and Silence of the Heart
    Rumi: Bridge to the Soul: Journeys into the Music and Silence of the Heart
    Rumi: Bridge to the Soul: Journeys into the Music and Silence of the Heart
    Ebook184 pages1 hour

    Rumi: Bridge to the Soul: Journeys into the Music and Silence of the Heart

    By Coleman Barks

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    About this ebook

    Originally released in 2007, "Year of Rumi," to coincide with the poet's 800th birthday, by the pre-eminent Rumi poet Coleman Barks.

    In Rumi: Bridge to the Soul, Coleman Barks—who holds an honorary doctorate in Persian language and literature by the University of Tehran for his decades-long translations of Rumi—has collected and translated ninety new poems, most of them never published before in any form. The "bridge" in the title is a reference to the Khajou Bridge in Isphahan, Iran, which Barks visited with Robert Bly in May of 2006—a trip that in many ways prompted this book. The "soul bridge" also suggests Rumi himself, who crosses cultures and religions and brings us all together to listen to his words, regardless of origin or creed.

    Open this book and let Rumi's poetry carry you into the interior silence and joy of the spirit, the place that unites conscious knowing with a deeper, more soulful understanding.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins
    Release dateOct 13, 2009
    ISBN9780061753398
    Rumi: Bridge to the Soul: Journeys into the Music and Silence of the Heart
    Author

    Coleman Barks

    Coleman Banks is the author of The Essential Rumi.

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      Book preview

      Rumi - Coleman Barks

      RUMI

      BRIDGE TO THE SOUL

      JOURNEYS INTO THE MUSIC AND SILENCE OF THE HEART

      Translations by Coleman Barks, with A. J. Arberry and Nevit Ergin

      Dedication

      For Robert Bly

      Contents

      Dedication

      Introduction

      TRAVEL NOTES

      The Poems

      1. A BOWL FALLEN FROM THE ROOF

      2. A STORY THEY KNOW

      3. HARVEST

      4. INHALE AUTUMN, LONG FOR SPRING

      5. LEAVES ABOUT TO LET GO

      6. A LIGHT WITHIN HIS LIGHT

      7. A KING DRESSED AS A SERVANT

      8. AS THE SKY DOES IN WATER

      9. THE TIME OF DIVULGING

      10. EMPTY

      11. NICKNAMES

      12. NEW BLOSSOMS

      13. SPLIT THE SACK

      14. ANY SPRIG OF AN HERB

      15. SECRET PLACES

      16. DOORSILL

      17. FLIGHTPATHS

      18. MUSIC AND SILENCE

      19. EARSIGHT

      20. THE TALKING

      21. CURRENCY

      22. WATER FROM THE WELL OF THE SOUL

      23. ANOTHER INVITATION

      24. THE ONE WHO LEFT

      25. DISCIPLINES

      26. PIECES OF A BROKEN CUP

      27. SPILLED SPEECH

      28. SOUL HOUSES

      29. THE WAVE OF THAT AGREEMENT

      30. CALM IN THE MIDST OF LIGHTNING

      31. AVALANCHE

      32. PURE SILENCE

      33. WHAT FEAR OF LOSS

      34. A MOUNTAIN NEST

      35. MILES OF RIVERSIDE CANEBED

      36. SOLOMON AND THE WIND OF SPEAKING

      37. A MIXED-BREED APPLE

      38. NO EXPECTATIONS

      39. MOUNTAINTOP TROUGH

      40. WHAT YOU GAVE

      41. YOUR TURN AT DICE

      42. HOLIDAY WITHOUT LIMITS

      43. OUTDOORS AND THE PASSION OF THE GRASS

      44. A PREPOSTEROUS GUESS

      45. ASLEEP AND LISTENING

      46. PEARL

      47. GREEN WRIT

      48. LOOK AT A FOUNTAIN

      49. DESOLATION

      50. THE DANCE OF YOUR HIDDEN LIFE

      51. LET THE SOUP SIMMER

      52. THE ONLY OBLIGATION

      53. BUTCHER AND SHEEP

      54. I SEE THE FACE

      55. THE MEETING

      56. THE LIVING DOUBLENESS

      57. THE VALUE OF THIS MOMENT

      58. OCEAN LIGHT

      59. LIKE A FIG

      60. GONE FOR GOOD

      61. TWO LOVINGS

      62. TALKING TO THE LUCK-BIRD

      63. ALIVE WITH SCRIPTURE

      64. FAINT LAMENT OF FORM

      65. THIS HIGH MEADOW

      66. GRANTED

      67. SALADIN’S LEAVING

      68. WHAT YOU HAVE DESPISED IN YOURSELF

      69. WINTER OR SUMMER

      70. ABRAHAM AND ISAAC

      71. I ASK ONE MORE THING

      72. SEEDS AND RAIN

      73. ONE BEING INSIDE ALL

      74. STRUCK TENT

      75. OPEN WINDOW

      76. FULL SUN

      77. I ROCKED MY OWN CHEST

      78. YOU SHALL NOT SEE ME

      79. A BEAUTIFUL WALK INSIDE YOU

      80. LEAVING

      81. ENERGY YOU CAN SPEND

      82. ONE THING I DID WRONG

      83. A NORTHERN WIND

      84. MIDNIGHT AND SUNRISE

      85. THE CREATION WORD

      86. WE ARE THE SUN

      87. YOU MAKE YOUR OWN OIL AS YOU COOK

      88. A HUNDRED AND ONE

      89. WE CANNOT DECIDE

      90. A WAKING TOWN

      References

      Photo Credits

      About the Author

      Books by Coleman Barks

      Copyright

      About the Publisher

      Introduction

      BRIDGE, POEM, AWARENESS MOVING THROUGH

      Rumi’s place in the history of religions is as a bridge between faiths. The story of his funeral in 1273 is well known. Representatives came from every religion—Muslims, Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus. When questioned about this, they responded, He deepens us wherever we are. Rumi lives in the heart, the core (he might call it friendship) of our impulse to praise, to worship, to explore the mystery of union. Even his name is a bridge word.*

      But his meeting with Shams Tabriz is the key to his inclusivity. Shams operated beyond form and doctrine. He once said that if the Kaaba were suddenly lifted up out of the world, we would see that each person is really bowing (five times a day) to every other person. In other words, if the icons of religions could dissolve, we would be left with the radiance of each other, the one honoring the other as the same glory. Friendship. Namaste.

      My Love for Bridges

      I sometimes fall in love with bridges. One lazy spring when I was staying in a house in Kanlica, across from Istanbul, it was the Sultan Mehmet Bridge, with its Bosphoric procession of boats. The Clifton Suspension Bridge near Bristol, England. The lowly San Mateo Bridge across San Francisco Bay, and all those others across that body of water. The rickety old Walnut Street Bridge we drove over every morning going to elementary school in Chattanooga. I used to imagine places to live in lodged among the girders, or especially, not on that bridge but others, in the drawbridge lift operator’s room. So I was psychically primed for the Khajou Bridge in Isphahan.

      Rumi says:

      Lovers find secret places

      inside this violent world

      where they make transactions

      with beauty.

      #15, SECRET PLACES

      Image 1

      The Khajou Bridge during daylight.

      Isphahan is world famous for its bridges, but the Khajou Bridge is different from the others in style and decoration, and in the feel of it. The tiled plaques above each alcove have lovely variations. Khajou is a honeycomb of secret places, many of them out in the open, but perfectly suited for any transaction with beauty. The Khajou Bridge over the Zanayeh River in Isphahan is a vision of what a community made of such loverly nooks might look like. It is an encouragement for those sojourning through to rest awhile and deepen. Tarrying is the specialty of the Khajou Bridge. Whitman’s I loafe and invite my soul was written two centuries after this bridge took form, but it might serve as its motto. Surely no one uses this bridge just to get somewhere. It is as intricate and woven as a brain, a halved and opened labyrinth. The right brain is dominant here, with its artistic sensitivity and wisdom flow, but Khajou is also an image of balance, with its upper roadway, very practical and left-brain, and its lower level conducive to music and meditation, friendship and poetry.

      On the downriver side of the high-walled upper road (see the photo below) is an arcade of rooms each capable of holding eight to ten people. Poets in recitation, philosophers arguing, family reunions, the various uses human beings might devise for

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