XI. The Lion’s Hunt, in Company.
Project Gutenberg EPUB edition
Jalal al-Din Rumi, Maulana and Redhouse, James W. (James William), Sir
Myself am thine; the prey is thine; all,—every bit.
Exalt thy head above the spheres. For that thou’rt fit.
Thou’st taken warning from that wretched, selfish wolf.
No longer fox art thou, my lion, my own self!
A wise head ever lessons learns from others’ ills,—
Who sees his neighbours victims fall, knows what them kills.”
The fox now thanked his stars a hundred, thousandfold,
For that the lion first the wolf to share had told;105
And reasoned: “Had he given me first his high command
To share the prey, my life I had not kept in hand.
Then praise to Him who ’th placed me low in this world’s scale,
To follow after mightier ones when they regale.”
So have we heard God’s judgments wrought in ages past
On people of the eld;—set forth as mountains fast,
That we may learn from them,—the wolves of early days.
Then let us, as the fox, glean wisdom from those lays.
“God’s people sanctified” ’s the title on us cast,
By God’s own Prophet, truthful witness, and the last.110
The bones, the skeletons of all those old-world wolves,
Consider well, ye readers;—think upon yourselves.
Who’s wise will from his heart cast out all fond conceits
Of greatness, when he hears of ‘Ād’s337 and Pharaoh’s feats.
Unless he warning take from what on others fell,
Men shall a moral draw from his case, sad to tell.
Cried Noah: “Ye stiff-necked race! I am not I, indeed.
My self I’ve sacrificed; of God’s love have I need.
From every fleshly sense and wish I’m severed, quite.
God is my light, my mind, my visual organ’s site.115
I am not I. The breath I breathe is God’s own breath.
Whoe’er gainsays this word, blasphemes, courts his own death.
Within my form of fox there lurks the lion’s power;
Against this feeble fox ’tis useless now to lower.
Unless you lay aside scorn for my fox’s form,
You’ll hear the lion growl more fierce than raging storm.”
If Noah had not possessed the mighty aid of God,
Could he a world have upside down turned with a nod?
Within his form whole herds of lions, as one paw,
Lay hid. A fire was he; the world a stack of straw.120
That misled straw refused to pay its tithe to him.
Fire flashed. Forthwith the straw in smoke and flames sank grim.