Without A Trace  

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While attempting to unveil the splendid beauty of Your Face
Looking closer discovered I am the very veil concealing Your Face!
 
With one goblet of wine emancipated ‘I’ from my ‘Self’ [1]
Since only the wine rescues one from the bondage of Self
 
Dear brothers what other than the cool breeze from the East [2]
Can carry the scent of my gown from the kingdom of Egypt
 
If I could divulge any secrets of the two daffodils spoken [3]
The listeners shall intoxicate with my few words drunken
 
If you offer me not the tulips and jasmines too [4]
Take not the world around my garden for a tour
 
Once the nightingale of soul flying off the cage
I shall sing the frolic songs of happiness forever
 
And that moment when they raise me from the grave’s dust
The legend of Your love scribbled all over my cerecloth  [5]
 
If one day a thought of yours came to mind I may say a word [6]
Other than in dreams finding no trace of my body in the world
 
Always my head upon the palms of my hands thrilled
Hoping to throw it under the hoofs of Your steed
 
Fetching a fiery sigh upon my head like a candle burning
Flames of Your love gushing out of my mouth blazing
 
I might have cut (my Self) off like a lock of hair from Khajoo
Doubtful I can ever cut myself completely off from You  [7]
 
 
End.
 
 

Apercu  
 
When ‘I’ is drawn by the gravitation of love towards That Beloved to unveil that which obstructing my vision to behold the Creator, I find my own ‘Self’ to be the very shroud that veils the most splendid beauty in the cosmos. I cannot elucidate the gravitational force of love that pulls me towards the Beloved, I cannot explicate any description of the Creator but I am moved by love but I can unveil Hus (ITs) beautiful face.
 
I do not believe ideologically in the Creator. I experience the Creator. When somebody says, “I do not believe in the Creator” He is describing an experience. The same experience I have had when saying, “I believe in a Creator”.
 
The words coming out of our mouths with regards to the Creator, are not beliefs indeed they are descriptions of experiences we sensed while facing That Beloved Creator. Just like a daffodil I have come across in a garden, I do not believe in the daffodil and its beauty. I describe an experience of sight and scent in my words to convey to others what I experienced.
 
And like two people sincerely attempting to describe a common experience, certainly the accounts will be verbalized differently though the experience was the same. Such is the tale of Mankind and the Creator. We all face Hus (ITs) beautiful Face but we utter different words describing the same. The one saying, “I believe in the Creator” and the one saying, “I do not believe in the Creator” both are describing the same Face they experienced but in different words.
 
If there was no Creator, thus no experiences, then there would have not been any probability of utterances like, “I do not believe in the Creator”. The very fact that you gravitated towards an experience whereat the outcome was these words, means your heart as a lover came face to face with the Beloved the Creator of all things. But your ‘Self’ chose these words of denial.
 
Alas! You are the veil that blocks your own very eyes to behold the Creator as versed by Hafez (in response to Khajoo):
 
Veiling the face of Beloved by the dust of my body
Unveiling that Face, triumphant moment of jubilee
 
 


[1] You may read about the reference wine, please click here… for Rumi's use of wine/drink please see:

http://www.untiredwithloving.org/fihemafih_cup.html#sharaab 

Please see the Koranic usage as well as the Hadith usage of the term.
 
[2] This is referring to the story of Prophet Joseph and his brothers who betrayed him. To make a long story short his father Prophet Jacob lost his vision due to excessive sobbing for his son Joseph. When finally Joseph who was lost for years in Egypt found out where the father resides send his worn shirt for Jacob as a proof that it was him his son and when the shirt was thrown on Jacob’s face by the brothers, Jacob’s eyes restored and he recognized the Joseph’s scent. I think Khajoo is using the imagery like this. The brothers, Joseph and Jacob they are all one person i.e. Khajoo. Khajoo says (posing as Jacob) dear brothers i.e. his own evil person who will bring the news of the shirt’s scent (Joseph) from Egypt. And the answer is the Eastern Breeze to mean mercy of Allah. I am not sure about all the interpretations of this one but this is the best I can figure out.
 
[3], [4] These are the Sufi code words I had to dig through Araqi and dictionaries to figure out what they mean:
 
  1. Daffodil: The eye or the ear of beloved in this verse 2 daffodils means the Seeing and hearing of the Beloved
  2. Tulip: Fruits of Orf (cognizance of Creator) plainly manifest for worldly eyes to see
  3. Jasmine: I did not find what it means so I assumed the same as #2
 
In [4] the poet means if you do not give me the flower-like beauty of 'Orf (cognizance of the Creator) then do not let the world to see me. But he used the imagery of being in a garden like flowers and the world would take a tour to see them. I am pretty sure this it the meaning but I could be wrong.
 
[5] Cerecloth is a fabric wrapping the dead prior to burial. The "legend of love" I think to mean Khajoo’s poems. So these poems Khajoo wrote are his cerecloth to be resurrected wrapped with from the grave in the Day of Judgment. This is very important to understand for future poets WHY to write?

I believe ‘they’ in the first verse refers to Angels in hereafter removing people from their graves guiding them towards the Creator.
 
[6] ‘your’ here refers to Khajoo himself in physical form. He says now that he cut his Self off, only in dreams his body may come to life and even then he may say a word or two.
 
[7] I am not exactly sure about the real meaning of this verse. But it seems to mean, even if I manage to cut my Self off from I, I can never cut my Self off from You (the Beloved). No matter what sins I do, no matter how much I deny It saying It does not exist… I cannot be away from my Beloved. Cutting off in this verse means to turn one’s back attempting to be afar.


© 2004-2002,  Dara O. Shayda