Saturday, April 27, 2024

Poem: ‘My Only Need’

  

You are my intimate friend

my aspiration

my joy

 




My heart

refuses

to love

other than you

 

O my dear

my aspiration

all I desire . . .

 

My yearning for you

grows and grows

when can I see you?

 

I desire not

that Lofty Paradise

 

All I desire

is to see your face


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'Do not become intimate with the One whose sight you long for,

For you will be prevented from finding Him in the darkness.


Strive and persevere, and be in the night as one who sorrows,

And He will pour you a glass of love from His glory and generosity.'


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[The present poem and saying is attributed to Rayhaanah 'al- Majnuna' - literally, one who is divinely-possessed/'enraptured'; an Iraqi female mystic from the eighth century.  Apparently, this ascetic from Basra had this poem inscribed inside her collar. Cited from al-Sulami’s Dhikr al-muta‘abbidat al-sufiyyat, ed. by R. E. Cornell, Early Sufi Women, USA: Fons Vitae (1999), p.95].