"Introduction: The Mevlevi Turn originated with Rumi and is a practise of both surrender with great centered discipline. Rumi arrived at a place where ego dissolves and a resonance with the universal soul comes in. When the gravitational pull gets even stronger the two become one—a turning that is molecular and galactic and a spiritual remembering of the Presence at the center of the universe. Turning is an image of how the dervish becomes an empty place where human and Divine can meet."The photograph was taken by me when Rahima and I traveled to the Quaker meeting house in Putney, VT last December to attend a sema, in observance of the anniversary of the death of Rumi, the Sufi mystic (d. December 17, 1273). Rupa, the person in the foreground of the picture, was the dancer at Rahima's memorial service.
You have said what you are.
I am what I am.
I have no name for what circles so perfectly.
Walk to the well.
Turn as the earth and the moon turn,
Circling what they love.
Whatever circles comes
From the center.
A secret turning in us
makes the universe turn.
Hand unaware of feet,
and feet head. Neither cares.
They keep turning.
I am what I am.
I have no name for what circles so perfectly.
Walk to the well.
Turn as the earth and the moon turn,
Circling what they love.
Whatever circles comes
From the center.
A secret turning in us
makes the universe turn.
Hand unaware of feet,
and feet head. Neither cares.
They keep turning.
Source: The Essential Rumi by Coleman Barks, 1995
What is dancing to you?
