Poetry · Chapter
Badruddin explained
A mystical address to Badruddin, urging a spiritual quest for hidden divine jewels and transformation through love.
What happens
A mystical address to Badruddin, urging a spiritual quest for hidden divine jewels and transformation through love. The speaker offers an eyewash of spring dew that turns sandals to gold and a staff into a fruitful tree, symbolizing inner alchemy. The beloved's words are praised as healing and intoxicating, while worldly wealth is dismissed as a mirage. The speaker approaches the beloved with trembling humility, fearing unworthiness.
Themes in this chapter
Spiritual Quest
The entire poem is a call to seek hidden jewels of the soul and mind, with transformation through divine love.
Desire and Restraint
The speaker trembles at the threshold, fearing unworthiness, balancing intense desire with humble restraint.
Characters to notice
- Unknown Narrator
The speaker who addresses Badruddin and the Beloved, expressing longing and spiritual transformation.
- Beauty
Personified as a maid cooking sesame under the transformed tree, dispelling human woe.
Key passages
“Seek what you shall e’er possess, O Badruddin, Although it be a will-o’-the-wisp Of the Unseen”
Pursue what you will always have, even if it seems like an elusive phantom of the invisible world.
Encourages a quest for eternal spiritual truths beyond material appearances.
“And every jewel shall reveal Things divine Even in a Sufi’s logic wheel, Yea, even in the lowing kine.”
Each discovered treasure will show divine truths, whether in mystical reasoning or in ordinary life like cattle lowing.
Highlights the presence of the divine in both esoteric and mundane realms.
“Thy words are to mine eyes a healing kohl, Musk to my nostrils, balm to my soul, Strengthening ointments to my feet.”
Your words heal my sight like kohl, scent my senses like musk, soothe my soul, and fortify my steps.
The beloved's speech is portrayed as a comprehensive remedy for body and spirit.