We talked about how Rumi, an established preacher and lawyer with a growing reputation and audience, met with Shams of Tabriz. Shams is described as a strange, wild man, a mystic, a hermit, a wanderer. They become constant companions and he sets Rumi's heart ablaze with love for the Divine, but Shams disappears as mysteriously as he came. Rumi is transformed, he starts to write his poetry and starts to dance and whirl in longing for oneness. We read the poem "The Guest House" to the sound of the ney flute :
Darling, the body is a guest house;
every morning someone new arrives,
Don't say, "O, another weight around my neck!"
or your guest will fly back to nothingness.
Whatever enters your heart is a guest
from the invisible worl: entertain it well.
Every day and every moment, a thought comes
like an honoured guest into your heart.
My soul, regard each thought as a person,
for very person's value is in the thought they hold.
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