The Glow of Humble Longing

(image credit : HERE)

Everyone who delights in some act of devotion
can't bear to miss it,
even for a short while.
That disappointment and grief
are as a hundred prayers:
what is ritual prayer compared
with the glow of humble longing?


Mathnawi II: 2769-2770
Version by Camille and Kabir Helminski
"Rumi: Daylight", Threshold Books, 1994

Journeying god

 (image credit - Wyle Art Studio)

Journeying god,

pitch your tent with mine

so that I may not become deterred

by hardship, strangeness, doubt.

Show me the movement I must make

toward a wealth not dependent on possessions,

toward a wisdom not based on books,

toward a strength not bolstered by might,

toward a god not confined to heaven.

Help me to find myself as I walk in other's shoes.

(Prayer song from Ghana, traditional, translator unknown)