Every wondrous sight will vanish,
Every sweet word will fade.
But do not be disheartened,
The Source they come from is eternal –
Growing, branching out,
giving new life and new joy.

Why do you weep? –
That Source is within you,
And this whole world
is springing up from it.

The Source is full,
Its waters are ever-flowing;
Do not grieve,
drink your fill!
Don’t think it will ever run dry –
This is the endless Ocean.

From the moment you came into this world
A ladder was place in front of you
that you might escape.

From earth you became a plant,
from plant you became animal.
Afterwards you became a human being,
Endowed with knowledge, intellect, and faith.

Behold the body, born of dust-
How perfect it has become!

Why should you fear its end?
When were you ever made less by dying?

When you pass beyond this human form,
No doubt you will become an angel
And soar through the heavens!

But don’t stop there,
Even heavenly bodies grow old.

Pass again from the heavenly realm
and plunge into the vast ocean of Consciousness.
Le the drop of water that is you
become a hundred mighty seas.

But do not think that the drop alone
Becomes the Ocean –
the Ocean, too, becomes the drop!

Rumi (1207 – 1273) is a mystic within the Sufi tradition and has been called the greatest mystical poet of any age. The general theme of Rumi’s thought is essentially union with his beloved from which/whom he has been cut off and become aloof and his longing and desire to restore it. Rumi believed passionately in the use of music, poetry and dance as a path for reaching God.

Rumi believed that the spirit after devolution from the divine Ego undergoes an evolutionary process by which it comes nearer and nearer to the same divine Ego. All matter in the universe obeys this law and this movement is due to an inbuilt urge (which Rumi calls “love”) to evolve and seek enjoinment with the divinity from which it has emerged. (condensed from Wikipedia)

“If I am evil will I be reborn as a frog, a spider, a snake?” The concept of transmigration believes that souls can move up and down in species/consciousness depending on the quality of life lived in the current incarnation. With Rumi, it seems that this journey is first one of devolution – from the Divine to the mundane – and then upward through the evolutionary chain, the soul drawn by the magnetism of love to return to the Divine.

But this urge for creation and evolution is not exclusive to the creature but is shared with the Creator, Who, too, is said to be irresistibly drawn back into matter and experience from the Unmanifest. It is the undeniable call of love which pulls the Divine into form, as it is the undeniable call of love which pulls form back into being.

I have often wondered why God bothered to create mankind and have read that it was because God was ‘lonesome’ and wanted someone/thing to share in life and creation. That answer was always a bit unsatisfactory to me for how could God be God and lack anything – even companionship.

But if what we call God is in turn governed by that quality called love (that may be the true Divinity) then this drive to and for creation seems to make more sense. This great inbreath and outbreath of Brahma is eternal and unceasing, the endless Ocean whose tides swing universes in and out of shores.