Rumi 2

"
I have five things to say, five fingers to give to your grace.
First, when I was apart from you, this world did not exist, nor did any other.
Second, whatever I was looking for was always you.
Third, why did I ever learn to count to three.
Fourth, my cornfield is burning.
Fifth, this finger stands for Rabia, and this is for someone else, but is there a difference?
Are these words or tears, is weeping but speech?
What shall I do, my love?
"
'Beloved' and 'Grace' are the universe.  So this is not a love poem for a fancy lad or lass (although it works well as one doesn't it?  Perhaps the two are the same), this is a man weeping for his life-- in joy and pain and all the wonderous phenomena of life.  Who is he apart from?  What are the two simultaneous worlds of which he speaks and is convinced are one?  The secret lies in the second finger-- so long as we remember what 'you' is.  Three is a poet's realization that the words he has spent a lifetime crafting will never be enough to speak his heart.  Four then immediately becomes a metaphor for his life.  Five commends his return to the source-- and the realization that he is connected to all others and is thus an immortally burning cornfield.  He weeps.  And he knows his weeps are the closest he will get to explaining his world.

"
How does a part of the world leave the world?  How can wetness leave the water?
Don't try to put out a fire by throwing on more fire-- don't wash a wound with blood.
No matter how fast you run, your shadow more than keeps up.  Sometimes it is in front!
Only full, overhead sun diminishes your shadow.
A great silence overcomes me, and I wonder why I ever thought to use language.
"
How, indeed, my friend?  I am wetness leaving the water.  I am a lost soul trying to escape the eternal battle of good and evil.  Both fighting for self preservation-- fire with fire, blood for blood.  Only full overhead sunlight diminishes your shadow?  I hate to say this, but Rumi agrees with me: pacifism, motherfucker.  Aaaand there's Rumi ending his poem like he does-- by speaking to Shams, the eternal silence.