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When Abu Bakr met Muhammad, he said,
“This is not a face that lies.”
Abu Bakr was one whose bowl has fallen from the roof.
There’s no hiding the fragrance that comes from an ecstatic.
A polished mirror cannot help reflecting.
Muhammad once was talking to a crowd of chieftains,
princes with great influence,
when a poor blind man interrupted him.
Muhammad frowned and said to the man,
“Let me attend to these visitors.
This is a rare chance, whereas you are already my friend.
We’ll have ample time.”
Then someone nearby said,
“That blind man may be worth a hundred kings.
Remember the proverb,
Human beings are mines.”
World-power means nothing.
Only the unsayable, jeweled inner life matters.
Muhammad replied,
“Do not think that I’m concerned
with being acknowledged by these authorities.
If a beetle moves toward rosewater,
it proves that the solution is diluted.
Beetles love dung, not rose essence.
If a coin is eager to be tested by the touchstone,
that coin itself may be a touchstone.
A thief loves the night.
I am day.
I reveal essences.
A calf thinks God is a cow.
A donkey’s theology changes when someone new pets it
and gives what it wants.
I am not a cow,
or thistles for camels to browse on.
People who insult me are only polishing the mirror.”