Let the Deaf Listen to the Mute

By Yunus Emre

Let the deaf listen to the mute.

A soul is needed to understand them both.

Without listening we understood.

Without understanding we carried it out.

On this Way, the seeker’s wealth is poverty.

We loved, we became lovers.

We were loved, we became the beloved.

When all is perishing moment by moment 

who has time to be bored?

God divided His people into Seventy-two languages 

and borders arose.

But poor Yunus fills the earth and sky, 

and under every stone hides a Moses. 

Yunus Emre, tr. Kabir Helminski and Refik Algan in The Drop That Became The Sea: Lyric Poems of Yunus Emre (Shambhala, 2000). Copyright © 1989