[Sunlight] Milk and honey, sugar and halva -- Ghazal 236

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Here, Sunlight offers Rumi's Ghazal (Ode) 236, from the Diwan-e Shams, in a translation by Professor Franklin D. Lewis. Professor Lewis relates that this poem was, "Rumi's benediction, either on the occasion of the marriage contract, or the actual wedding celebration, of his son, Sultan Valad, and Salah al-Din's daughter Fateme Khatun".

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May the blessings which flow in all weddings
be gathered, God, together in our wedding!
The blessings of the Night of Power,
the month of fasting
the festival to break the fast
the blessings of the meeting of Adam and Eve
the blessings of the meeting of Joseph and Jacob
the blessings of gazing on the paradise of all abodes
and yet another blessing which cannot be put in words:
the fruitful scattering of joy
of the children of the Shayak
and our eldest!

In companionship and happiness
may you be like milk and honey
in union and fidelity,
just like sugar and halva.
May the blessings of those who toast
and the one who pours the wine
anoint the ones who said Amen and
the one who said the prayer.

-- Translation by Franklin D. Lewis
"Rumi -- Past and Present, East and West"
Oneworld Publications, Oxford, 2000

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[Sunlight] Milk and honey, sugar and halva -- Ghazal 236