Coleman Barks
Coleman Barks is an American poet. Despite the fact that he admittedly speaks no Persian, he is world-renowned as a translator of Rumi and other mystic poets of Persia. Barks taught literature at the University of Georgia for three decades. He makes frequent international appearances and is well-known throughout the Middle East. Barks's work has contributed to an extremely strong following of Rumi in the English-speaking world. Due to his work, the ideas of Sufism have crossed many cultural boundaries over the past few decades. Coleman Barks received an honorary doctorate from Tehran University in 2006.
“In the front yard lives the oldest thing around, a white oakThat I used to say is my love for the world, That I now would just call love as it is.Belonging to nobody, no metaphor, the very.”
Coleman Barks
“…the work of the (Muslim Sufi) dervish community was to open the heart, explore the mystery of union,to fiercely search for and try to say the truth,and to celebrate the glory and difficulty in being in human incarnation.”
Coleman Barks
“Beyond our ideas of right-doing and wrong-doing,there is a field. I’ll meet you there.When the soul lies down in that grass,the world is too full to talk about.Ideas, language, even the phrase ‘each other’doesn’t make sense any more.”
Coleman Barks
“From 'A Bowl Fallen From the Roof'Be quiet now and wait.It may be that the ocean one,the one we desire so to move into and become,desires us out here on land a little longer,going our sundry ways to the shore.-Rumi”
Coleman Barks