Rumi Songs: a day in the Two Worlds

Rumi Songs: a day in the Two Worlds is an album I wrote and recorded featuring the poetry of Rumi as translated by Coleman Barks.

I wanted to present the poems in a way which showed that a Sufi poet working in Iran and Afghanistan in mediaeval times still experienced both the transcendent and the everyday the same as we do now in the Western world.

There is no room for fear of the other. This is what creates war and unneccesary tragedy. We need to see the same human experience in faces of any culture, colour, place, or indeed time.

I hope my offering contributes to this understanding.

The album is available on iTunes.

The Turn

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The Turn
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Lyrics by Rumi translated by Coleman Barks adapted by Unjay; Music by Unjay
except tracks 2 &5: Music by Unjay ©2008 Unjay. All rights reserved worldwide.
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~after midnight~

You have said what you are.
I am who I am.
You are here in my head,
my head here in my hands

Keep walking, though there’s no place go.
Don’t try to see through the distance.
That’s not for you and I.
Move within, but don’t move in fear.

A secret turning in us makes the universe turn.
Head unaware of feet,
and feet of head.
Neither cares. They keep turning.

This moment this love comes to rest in me,
many beings in one being.
In one wheat grain a thousand sheaf stacks.
In the needle’s eye a turning night of stars.

Inside water, a waterwheel turns.
A star circles with the moon.
We live in the night ocean
wondering, What are these lights?
What are these lights?

Something opens our wings.
Something makes boredom and hurt disappear.
Someone fills the cup in front of us.
We taste only sacredness…

I have lived on the lip of insanity,
wanting to know reasons,
knocking on a door.
It opens. I’ve been knocking from the inside!

Dance, when you’re broken open.
Dance, if you’ve torn the bandage off.
Dance in the middle of the fighting.
Dance in your blood. Dance, when you’re perfectly free.

I am so small I can barely be seen.
How can this great love be inside me?
Look at your eyes. They are small, they are small
but they see the greatest things.

You have said what you are;
I am who I am.
You are here in my head,
My head here in my hands…

lyrics used by kind permission of the author

You dance inside my chest

You dance inside my chest

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Lyrics by Rumi translated by Coleman Barks adapted by Unjay; Music by Unjay
©2008 Unjay. All rights reserved worldwide.

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~night falls~

In your light I learn how to love
In your beauty how to make poems
you dance inside my chest
where no-one else sees you
but sometimes I do
and that sight becomes this art
You dance
Inside my chest

Lyrics used by permission

Only Breath

Only Breath
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Music by Unjay Lyrics by Rumi trans Coleman Barks adapted Unjay ©2008 Unjay
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Not Christian or Jew or Muslim or Hindu, not Buddhist or Sufi, or Zen.~ not any religion~ I am not from the East
or from the West, not out of the ocean or up from the ground,
not natural or ethereal~ I am not made of elements at all.
I do not exist,
in this world or the next,
I did not descend from Adam and Eve or any creation story.
My place is placeless,
a trace of the traceless.
Neither body or soul.
I belong to the beloved
I have seen the two worlds as one
and that one call to and know,
first, last, outer and inner,
only that breath
only that breath
only that breath breathing human
being

Sky Circles

Sky Circles

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Lyrics by Rumi translated by Coleman Barks adapted by Unjay; Music by Unjay ©2008 Unjay. All rights reserved worldwide.
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The way of love
is not a subtle argument
the door there
is devastation
birds make great sky circles
of their freedom~ how do they learn it?
They fall, and falling they are given wings

Lyrics used by permission

Some Kiss: lyrics

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Some Kiss
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Music by Unjay Lyrics by Rumi trans Coleman Barks adapted Unjay ©2008 Unjay
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The minute I heard my first love story I started looking for you
Not knowing how blind that was~lovers don’t finally meet somewhere: they’re in each other all along
There is some kiss we want
with our whole lives
the touch of spirit
on the body
Stay here, quivering~with each moment like a drop of mercury
Longing is the core of mystery
Longing itself brings the cure
The only rule is suffer the pain
If you could untie your wings
And free your soul of jealousy
You and everyone around you
Would fly up like doves~
People want you to be happy
There is some kiss we want
The touch of Spirit on the body
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Video: Today like every other day

Today like every other day

Today, like every other day
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Music by Unjay Lyrics by Rumi trans Coleman Barks adapted Unjay ©2008 Unjay

Today, like every other day, we wake up empty and frightened.
Today, like every other day
Don’t go back to your work leave your study
Take down your guitar
Take down your drum
~ Let the beauty we love be what we do.
There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground
kiss the ground
~ Out beyond ideas of right and wrong, there is a field.
I’ll meet you there.
When the soul lies down in that grass, the world is too full to say
Ideas don’t make any sense.
We can’t even think of “you” and “I”
~ The breeze at dawn has secrets to show you.
Would you like to see the moon split in half with just one throw?
~ Don’t go back to sleep.
You must ask for what you really want.
Don’t go back to sleep.
They are going back and forth across the doorway where the two worlds touch.
Don’t go back to sleep.
The door is round and open.
Don’t go back to sleep.
Don’t go back to sleep.
The door is round and open

Lyrics used by permission