Once I cast off my existence
for the heart,
I became a stranger to the self
but acquainted with the heart.
Although the Kaaba in Mecca is the point of focus
for a whole world,
I focus only on the Kaaba
of the retreat of the heart.
I saw that the heart
is His divine sanctuary;
I have cast out all other than the Friend
from the space of the heart.
That which beats within the breast
is not the heart
that is the sublime throne,
the seat of the Lord of the heart.
On the heart’s path,
the lovers become drowned in their blood;
many a destitute soul has been sacrificed
at the threshold of the heart.
You are caught in the trap of lust
and therefore know nothing of the heart;
you won’t find the phoenix of the heart
in the sky of the carnal soul.
Since Nurbakhsh departed from the domain
of “I” and “you,”
he has been resting contentedly
in the sublime sanctuary of the heart.