Spiritual Poetry on Love

Tao Te Ching, by: Stephen Mitchell
(From a beautiful Goddess friend's book named Emily Nussdorfer- Dance & Movement Arts Therapist. In our conversation, she had told me this is who I am, and I thanked her, and copied the poem.)

The Master has no mind of her own.
She works with the mind of the people.

She is good to people who are good.
She is also good to people who aren't good.
This is true goodness.

She trusts people who are trustworthy.
She also trusts people who aren't trustworthy.
This is true trust.

The Master's mind is like space.
People don't understand her.
They look to her and wait.
She treats them like her own children.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Excerpts from the poetry of
Mevlâna Jalâluddîn Rumi

Versions by Coleman Barks
From Unseen Rain,

Quatrains

Don't let your throat tighten
with fear. Take sips of breath
all day and night. Before death
closes your mouth.

There's no love in me without your being,
no breath without that. I once thought
I could give up this longing, then thought again,
But I couldn't continue being human.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Excerpts from
Love is a Stranger

Poetry of Mevlâna Jalâluddîn Rumi
Translated by Kabir Helminski

The Intellectual

The intellectual is always showing off;
The lover is always getting lost.
The intellectual runs away, afraid of drowning;
the whole business of love is to drown in the sea.
Intellectuals plan their repose;
lovers are ashamed to rest.
The lover is always alone, even surrounded with people;
like water and oil, he remains apart.
The man who goes to the trouble
of giving advice to a lover
gets nothing. He's mocked by passion.
Love is like musk. It attracts attention.
Love is a tree, and lovers are its shade.