In Praise of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him)

The arching sky eyes our small possessions; my Joseph finds no buyer better than a wolf. How could I not be scarred by the heavens, when for a lifetime the sun's rays have burned my heart and the stars have set it smoldering. The camphor balm of the moon turns to a blade of diamond on my wound; how is it that starlight becomes a dagger in my eye? The four elements have blocked my path from all four sides; these six directions have boxed me in like a trapped game piece. How can I face an opponent as strong as the sky, when even the ant ties its belt to mock my thinness? After this I expect no kindness from the heavens; how can one who nurtures scoundrels ever nurture decent people? If you doubt the sky's blindness to true worth, just watch the greater malefic set above the greater benefic. Decency has been leveled with the dust by the cruelty of time; this base age, being base by nature, has shattered the value of all jewels. From now on substance accomplishes nothing in this world; perhaps only worthlessness can produce a worthy man. The goods of art bring nothing but regret; the merchandise of knowledge finds no buyer but oblivion. The mother of the age, with such cruelty in her nature, has weaned the child of knowledge from the milk of learning. Humanity flees these people the way Adam fled the demon; decency bolts from these human demons as a fairy flees. Dear friends, the water of honor is found nowhere but in the well of the heart; to my Joseph these brothers are a mother's love. Until a thing bends, no plan ever comes out straight; you cannot strike the ball without a curved mallet. If anyone could rest easy in greatness, then why does the sky bear the burning marks of stars across all seven of its limbs? My heart, you never lift your head from the sleep of desire for even a breath, to see the emperor's palace standing in the path of the flood. How can anyone sleep secure upon the throne of glory and fortune? The scaffold of death waits behind the seat of rule. This royal pomp has dust in its mouth; this Sanjar's court has nothing but wind within. How long must we cower like women beneath the sky? How long will the heavens drape their veil over the heads of men? Like the light of the eye, if you step out of yourself for a moment, you can easily pass through this prison of glass. You keep carving fine images of thought in your imagination; Muslim's child, how long will you go on making idols? The gathering of the heart's people has darkened with the sky's chatter; where is the radiance of an opening line bright as the eastern sun? My companions, by good fortune my market runs hot; love is the broker, and grief brings a hundred buyers from every side. Telling the story of the voiceless is not for every tongue; one cannot take up the pen carelessly for such a tale. If you crush my letter like a tulip petal, blood of longing will trickle from its every pore. My candle is in love with burning moths tonight; I would give my life freely, but I have no wings to lose. You see me changing in form, like an ember in my breast: now silk of flame, now ashen wool. I lay my face on the dust of love and my heart upon the beloved's blade; the goldsmith knows the worth of gold, the jeweler the worth of jewels. The ember in my palm turned to molten gold, so fiercely did my tears' moisture make fire master my nature. Only my blood knows the worth of the sword of cruelty; flame has no better customer than rich oil. I am a lover, yet the beloved's nature comes from me: the seductive magic of the glance, the plundering of the eyes. If the color of love does not fade, I can show the charms of seduction in the dress of lovemaking. When my beloved's face blooms like a flower in a hundred springs, it is a single rose for the hand of power in the field of artistry. If the partridge boasts of its strut against my beloved's grace, it steps far beyond its measure. For longing of her face, faith casts its prayer beads from its hand; before a single strand of her hair, the unbeliever ties on his pagan girdle. Had her eyelashes not taught it how to pierce, the thorn of grief would never have lanced the vein of my heart. My breast is torn in a hundred places like a bud, yet my collar is whole; what can I do, having no hand to rend my shirt like the rose? Now I am stripped of feather and wing; where is the time when my ambition proudly spread its plumage over the Simurgh's body for a lifetime? For ages I flew level with the Anqa in my splendor; now even an ant shrinks from me, ashamed to be called my equal. How could my days not be dark, when my fortune turns my nature, born of flame, into the shape of ashes? I am freed from the trouble of the Huma's wing's headache, now that the shadow of black fortune has crowned my head. How could the hand of disaster reach the goods of misfortune? The moon only bleaches the indigo linen of night. When the fat of existence melts in the fire of grief, the thin waist laughs at the plump hips. If friendship is delicate, befriend it with a hundred harsh trials; the thorn becomes a pillow for the fresh rose petal in the garden. If you gather lightness of spirit from the dust of love's road, you can fly off like the color from a lover's face. Break your feet so you can take a step on this road; pass beyond your own head if this journey demands a head. There is much pain and little cure before me; beware, do not count pain itself as the lesser remedy for pain. Whomever you see, the sky has deceived in some way; with me it has played the woman, with others the man. The field of my ambition drinks the water of contentment; the elixir of contentment has turned the dust in my hand to gold. I feast on the blessing of poverty as my pride, off this dry and wet world, the bounty of the King who rules all land and sea. The sovereign of the realm of possibility, who at the sacred mint has made the coin of existence gold for the stamp of his command. He has made the ten pure intellects the steps of his pulpit, and the nine vaulted heavens the platform for his sermon. Ahmad the messenger, who on the highway of faith, for the heart's sake, has made a bright guiding lamp of every footprint. The palm of his fortune casts its shade above the sky; the rosebush of his justice runs its roots beneath the earth. Beneath the shade of his justice all dwell content, from the cosmic fish to the moon; from the seas to the lands all feed on the crumbs of his bounty's table. The universal essence has made a page for each part of his knowledge; the thread of the soul has ruled the lines for the words of his wisdom. To describe his worth, this scroll, in nine folds, has coiled within itself for ages, longing to be a book. While Adam was still hidden in the mold of water and clay, he was already showing his prophethood in the hall of revelation. He was, like a lantern in the loins of the pure messengers; the candle of his light kept safe from this whirling storm. The ship of existence would have feared the storm of annihilation, had the majesty of his worth not served as its anchor. Through the trust of his light's existence upon Abraham, the very nature of Azar's idol-making was given a new disposition. Each night, with the strap of the Milky Way, fate beats the drum of the night watch in his name upon the roof of this rounded dome. Wherever the sun of his judgment casts its rays, the golden bird of the sky becomes like Jesus' bird, a bat of the night. When the rays of his judgment stretch out their skirt, the sun flees behind a mote for shelter from its veil. When the sea of his hand raises the wave of generosity, the ocean, abashed, shrinks into the narrowness of a single drop. To adorn the maidens of his bounty, the sun, every dawn, works the goldsmith's forge in the mine. When the cloud's hand stirs the foam from the sea of his abundant generosity, the raindrop turns to a jewel in the beggar's hand. It turned its own dust to gold yet found no welcome from his hand; this much wretchedness is enough for the child of the world. On the road to his worth, those longing souls who have fallen, the print of their feet vies with the heavens in greatness. Each spring, the fragrance of his character plays Khizr, guiding the scent of the rose to the nostrils of the nightingales. On the branch of his nurture, the molting nightingale lays the egg of the Anqa beneath its featherless wing. When the fearless sword of his law leaves its sheath, sedition trembles and flees for shelter into headlessness. Since the wine flask has felt the blow of his prohibition on its neck, the daughter of the vine can no longer veil herself. I fear that when his kindness spreads the skirt of intercession, the unbeliever will sit shoulder to shoulder with the Muslim. See the heart's strength that lay in the battle of brave warriors: the lion-like charges of Ali leaned their backs on the wall of his protection. The sun of his praise has shown me an opening line, through which the joy of composing praise has grown young again in my heart.