Cry Out in Your Weakness

By Jalaluddin Rumi

 

 

Translated by Coleman Barks with John Moyne

 

Give your weakness

to one who helps.

Crying out loud and weeping are great resources.

A nursing mother, all she does

is wait to hear her child.

 

Just a little beginning-whimper

and she’s there.

God created the child, that is, your wanting,

so that it might cry out, so that milk might come.

 

Cry out! Don’t be stolid and silent

with your pain. Lament! And let the milk

of loving flow into you.

 

The hard rain and wind

are ways the cloud has

to take care of us.

 

Be patient.

Respond to every call

that excites your spirit.

 

Ignore those that make you fearful

and sad, that degrade you

back toward disease and death.

Leave a comment