Divan #256
This is my adaptation of a poem from Jalal al-Din Rumi’s Divan-e Shams, based on the translation by Professor A.J. Arberry. Obviously, nothing matches Professor Arberry’s version, but I just had to give it a try.
256
I heard that you were going away: please don’t. That you love someone else: no, don’t.
You are a stranger to the world, but why be a stranger to me? My heart is already wounded, and you wound it further still: I ask you, don’t.
I catch you stealing glances at other boys. Please don’t. I don’t know what’s up or down. You make me crazy like the moon: don’t.
Don’t promise this or swear by that, don’t let your promises hold back something you can’t give.
You have led me to this paradise. But don’t let anyone turn it into a curse for the wicked.
For the sweetness between us can make sugar seem like poison. Don’t let anyone turn it to poison.
My soul burns and burns and burns. If you leave I will smolder to nothing the way fire melts gold: please don’t.
All right, go ahead and leave. Let me lie awake moonstruck in the gloom of your eclipse: or don’t.
My lips are dry, my eyes flood with tears. All because of you: don’t.
Love is a fetter, you chafe at it, but do you really think logic can untangle this confusion? Just don’t.
You don’t feed a fever, you can’t hurt me any further when I am sick with the fever that is you. Don’t.
I am criminal, my eyes have stolen away with your beauty. Beloved, you want my eyes to keep on stealing you: I beseech you, don’t.
Go, my friend, I have nothing more to say. You can keep resisting this bewilderment called love. But don’t.
