Suhrawardi - Three Treatises on Mysticism.pdf - Platonic Philosophy

24
He could not understand while at those "times" a happiness
involuntarily appeared in him.
Ah,
down of grace, though between us lay the
if but Lail4 once would send me a greeting
dust, and the flags of stone,
My greeting of joy should spring in answer, or
there should cry toward her an owl,
ill bird
that shrieks in the gloom of graves! 1
This ignorance of his was due to his having forgotten
himself and his country. "They forgot Allah, therefore He
caused them to forget their souls." 2 Every time when a
wind or a sound came from the garden he felt a desire
without discerning its cause or knowing
its reason.
"The lightning of Ma'arra travelled after the
middle of the night,
It
passed the night at K&ma^ describing its
weariness,
It deeply grieved riders, horses and came,ls
And increased till it was about to grieve the
saddles."*
He remained in that perplexity for many days,
till one
day the king ordered: "Bring the bird and set it free from the
basket and the leather." "There is but one shout 5 and lo !
1. These verses, taken from the Ham&sa, figure
in the fimous tale
which is told of the death of LaiLX, the beloved of Tmbah, son of
al-Humaiyir. Cf. the translation by Ch. J. Lyall, Ancient Arabian
Poetry, London 1885, p. 76.
2. Quran LIX, 20.
3. Name of a place.
W& 4. "From the beginning of Siqt ttz-zand by Abu 'l-'Ala, al-Ma'arri.
1
Cf. Shark at~tanwtr 'aid siqt az-zand, Cairo 1303, p. 23.
5, Quran XXVII, 19."