Derek Jones

“WOODEN CAGES

I may be clapping my hands, but I don't
belong to a crowd of clappers. Neither

this nor that, I'm not part of a group
that loves flute music or one that loves

gambling or drinking wine. Those who
live in time, descended from Adam, made

of earth and water, I'm not part of that.
Don't listen to what I say, as though

these words came from an inside and went
to an outside. Your faces are very

beautiful, but they are wooden cages.
You had better run from me. My words

are fire. I have nothing to do with
being famous, or making grand judgments,

or feeling full of shame. I borrow
nothing. I don't want anything from

anybody. I flow through human beings.
Love is my only companion. When union

happens, my speech goes inside toward
Shams. At that meeting all the secrets

of language will no longer be secret.”
― Rumi, The Soul of Rumi: A New Collection of Ecstatic Poems – Coleman Barks's Sublime Renderings of the 13th-Century Sufi Mystic's Insights into Divine Love and the Human Heart