Hazrat Inayat Khan now explores the imagery used in Sufi poetry to describe the suffering of the lover. The previous post in the series is here.

The imagery of the Sufi poets portrays the nature of love, lover, and beloved with such a delicacy of metaphor, complexity, and convention in its expression that their poetry makes a true picture of human nature.

The lover is always imagined to be the victim of the tyranny of the cold-hearted and vain beloved, who gives no heed, revels with his rivals, pays no attention to his sufferings, gives no hearing to his appeal, and when she responds, responds so little that instead of being cured the malady is increased. The lover holds his unruly heart for mercy before the beloved, taking it on his palms. He places his heart at the feet of the beloved, who coldly treads upon it, while he is crying, ‘Gently, beloved, gently! It is my heart, it is my heart.’ The heart of the lover sheds tears of blood. The lover presses his heart, keeping it from running away to where the beloved is. The lover complains of his heart being so faithless as to have left him and gone to the beloved. The love begs of the beloved to give his heart back if it be of no use. The abode of the heart is in the curls of the beloved.

The lover is restless, uneasy, and unhappy in the agonies of separation. Nights pass, days pass, all things change but the pain of the lover. The pain of love is his only companion through the nights of separation. The lover asks the weary night of separation, ‘Where wilt thou be when I am dead?’ The lover expects the coming of death before the coming of the beloved. He begs of the beloved to show herself to him once before he dies. He prays the beloved to visit his tomb, if not for love, at least for appearances’ sake.

The lover only wishes the beloved to understand him, to know how much he loves and what sufferings he is going through. The lover wishes constantly that either the beloved would come to him or he might be called to the beloved. Even the sight of the messenger of love makes the beloved cross. The good and ill of the world is naught to the lover. The lover complains of being robbed of ease, patience, and peace, and of having lost his religion, morals, and God. The lover is seen without hat and shoes, and regarded as crazy by his friends. He tears his garment in the agony of pain. He is tied in chains for his madness. He has lost honor before all.

The wound in his heart is as a rose to the lover, the soreness in it is its bloom. He weeps in order to sprinkle salt water upon it to make it smart, that he may fully enjoy the sweet agony. The lover is jealous of the attentions his rivals bestow on his beloved. When the lover tells the story of love to his companions of love they all begin to weep with him. The lover kisses the ground where the beloved walks. He envies the privilege of the beloved’s shoes. The lover spreads his carpet at the gate of the beloved. The eyebrows of the beloved are the mihrab, the archway in the mosque. The patch on the cheeks of the beloved is the magic spot that reveals to him the secrets of heaven and earth. The dust under the feet of the beloved is to him as the sacred earth of Kaba. The face of the beloved is the open Quran, and he reads Alif, the first and symbolical letter of Allah’s name, in the straight features of the beloved. The lover drinks kauthar, wine, out of the eyes of the beloved. Her overflowing glance intoxicates him. The sound of the beloved’s anklets makes him alive. The lover is satisfied to see the beloved even in the dream, if not in the waking state.

When the lover speaks of dying the beloved disbelieves him. The lover is so wasted that even Munkir and Nakir, the recording angels, cannot trace him in his grave. Fear of the lover’s approach makes the beloved gather up the train of her garment and lift it when walking past his grave, lest the lover’s hand may reach it.

To be continued…