I am drunk and you are insane tell me, who will lead us home .....by Rumi

I am drunk and you are insane 
tell me, who will lead us home? 

How many times have I asked you not to drink so much 
for I see no sober soul in town. 

Come to the tavern my dearest and taste the wine of love
for the soul is joyous only in the company of lovers.

The tavern of love is your livelihood
your income and expenses, the wine.

Be careful, not to trust a sober soul
with even one drop of this wine.

Go on playing your lute, my drunken gypsy but tell me,
between the two of us, who is more drunk?

As I left my house a Sufi approached me,
in his glance I saw a hundred gardens.

He swayed from side to side like a ship without an anchor,
while a hundred reasonable men watched on enviously.

Where are you from? I asked him.
He replied, "Half from Turkistan and half from Farghaneh,
half from water and clay and half from soul and heart,
half from the edge of the sea
and half from the depths of the coean."

~ Rumi
Ghazal (Ode) 2398
Translated by Azima Melita Kolin
and Maryam Mafi
Rumi: Hidden Music
HarperCollins Publishers Ltd, 2001

You are drunk and i'm intoxicated...by Rumi

You are drunk
and i'm intoxicated
no one is around
showing us the way home

Again and again
i told you
drink less
a cup or two

I know in this city
no one is sober
one is worse than the other
one is frenzied and
the other gone mad

Come on my friend
step into the tavern of ruins
taste the sweetness of life
in the company of another friend

Here you'll see
at every corner
someone intoxicated
and the cup-bearer
makes her rounds

I went out of my house
a drunkard came to me
someone whose glance
uncovered a hundred
houses in paradise


rocking and rolling
he was a sail
with no anchor but
he was the envy of all those sober ones
remaining on the shore

Where are you from i asked
he smiled in mockery and said
one half from the east
one half from the west
one half made of water and earth
one half made of heart and soul
one half staying at the shores and
one half nesting in a pearl


I begged
take me as your friend
i am your next of kin
he said i recognize no kin
among strangers

I left my belongings and
entered this tavern
i only have a chest
full of words
but can't utter
a single one

~ Rumi
Ghazal 2309
Translated by Nader Khalili
Rumi, Fountain of Fire
Cal-Earth, September 1994

But Drunk with this Love, I can’t tell if its a profit or loss ~ Rumi

You’ve put fire in my mouth
and a hundred seals on my tongue.

The Flames inside me
would roast many universes.

If this whole world were destroyed
I’d still have a hundred more worlds after this one

Even now caravans loaded with sugar
are approaching from the Lands of Nonexistence.

But Drunk with this Love,
I can’t tell
if its a profit or loss

~ Rumi
Art by Mario Perez

I wait to be light.......by Rumi

When I see you and how you are,
I close my eyes to the other.

For your Solomon's seal 
I become wax
throughout my body. 

I wait to be light.
I give up opinions on all matters.
I become the reed flute for your breath.

You were inside my hand.
I kept reaching around for something.
I was inside your hand,
but I kept asking questions
of those who know very little.

I must have been incredibly simple or drunk or insane
to sneak into my own house and steal money,
to climb over my own fence and take my own vegetables.

But no more.
I have gotten free of that ignorant fist
that was pinching and twisting my secret self.

The universe and the light of the stars
come through me.

I am the crescent moon
put up over the gate
to the festival.

~ Rumi
A Year with Rumi
Daily Readings
By Coleman Barks