کای رهاننده مرا از وصف زشت ** ای کننده دوزخی را تو بهشت
Singing, “O Thou that deliverest me from evil qualities! O Thou that makest a hell Paradise!
در یکی پیهی نهی تو روشنی ** استخوانی را دهی سمع ای غنی3290
Thou puttest light in a piece of fat; Thou, O Self-sufficing One, givest (the sense of) hearing to a bone.”
چه تعلق آن معانی را به جسم ** چه تعلق فهم اشیا را به اسم
What connexion have those concepts (e.g. sight and hearing) with the body? What connexion has the apprehension of things with (their) names?
لفظ چون وکرست و معنی طایر است ** جسم جوی و روح آب سایر است
The word is like the nest, and the meaning is the bird: the body is the riverbed, and the spirit is the rolling water.
او روان است و تو گویی واقف است ** او دوان است و تو گویی عاکف است
It is moving, and you say it is standing: it is running, and you say it is keeping still.
گر نبینی سیر آب از خاکها ** چیست بر وی نو به نو خاشاکها
If you see not the movement of the water through the fissures (channels) of earth—(yet it is moving): what are the sticks and straws (ever appearing) anew on it?
هست خاشاک تو صورتهای فکر ** نو به نو در میرسد اشکال بکر3295
Your sticks and straws are the forms (ideas) of thought: (these) virgin forms are always coming on anew.
روی آب جوی فکر اندر روش ** نیست بیخاشاک محبوب و وحش
The surface of the water and stream of thought, as it rolls, is not without sticks and straws, (some) pleasing and (some) unsightly.
قشرها بر روی این آب روان ** از ثمار باغ غیبی شد دوان
The husks on the surface of this rolling water have sped along from the fruits of the Invisible Garden.
قشرها را مغز اندر باغ جو ** ز انکه آب از باغ میآید به جو
Seek the kernels of the husks (not on the water, but) in the Garden, because the water comes from the Garden into the river-bed.