Rumi's deevané shō

Hello and welcome to part 4 of the discussion of Rumi’s beautiful poem deevāné shō! We’ve learned half of the poem already- this is quite an accomplishment! Today we’re going to go over the next two lines of the poem. So let’s listen to what we’ve learned so far, and our two new lines as read by Fared Shafinury:

heelat rahā kon āsheghā, deevāné shō deevāné shō

vandar del ātash darā, parvāné shō parvāné shō

ham kheesh rā beegāné kon, ham khāné rā veerāné kon

vāngah beeyā bā āsheghān ham khāné shõ ham khāné shõ

roo seené rā chon seenehā haft āb shoo az keenehā

vāngah sharābé esgh rā paymāné shō paymāné shō

Ok, so those last two lines are the ones we’re going to focus on. Let’s go ahead and listen to them one more time:

roo seené rā chon seenehā haft āb shoo az keenehā

vāngah sharābé esgh rā paymāné shō paymāné shō

Now that first line is the first time we’ve broken with the pattern of having a line of poetry end with a command. Let’s go over what command’s we’ve had so far. I’m going to say them, and I want you to repeat them after me.

deevāné shō

(deevāné shō)

parvāné shō

(parvāné shō)

ham khāné shō

(ham khāné shō)

The second line of this poem ends with a command, so let’s learn that before we do anything else- the command is paymāné shō

(paymāné shō)

So this follows the same structure as some other commands we’ve learned. Shō as we know means ‘become’ and it’s addressing second person singular. So you become. And what is paymāné? It means a chalice, or a container for wine. Paymāné

(paymāné)

So it’s a container or chalice. So become a chalice. Paymāné shō

(paymāné shō)

Now let’s go back to the first line of the poem. Let’s listen to it as read by Fared:

roo seené rā chon seenehā haft āb shoo az keenehā

So first the word roo mean on. roo

(roo)

and seené is the word for chest. It can also mean heart. Or think of the word ‘breast’ in English- on your breast, on your heart, or chest. All these words are synonyms. Seené

(seené)

So roo seené is on your chest or heart. Roo seené

(roo seené)

next  is the word chon. Now, in contemporary conversational Persian, you would use this word to say because. Chon. 

(chon)

For example, you’d say ‘chera? chon ke meekhastam’. Why? because I wanted to. In this case, chon means like. Another way to say this in conversational Perisan is mesle

(mesle)

so, just like in English poetry, you have similes by using the word like, in this poem, he’s creating a simile using the word chon. So, your eyes are like the night sky. Here- chon roo seené rā chon seenehā- seenehā is just plural of seené- so one chest vs. many chests. seenehā

Next, lets look at this phrase as a concept- haft āb shoo. Ok, so this literally means seven waters wash. Haft is the word for seven. Haft

(haft)

āb means water. āb

(āb)

and finally shoo means wash, and it’s in the command form- you informal command- you wash. shoo

(shoo)

So haft āb shoo, wash seven times. You may know, the number seven is a holy number- it shows up in religion a lot. Seven days, seven sins, seven lots of things. The concept of washing seven times is to purify something. Haft āb shoo

(haft āb shoo)

and finally, the word keenéhā. Keené means grudge. keené

(keené)

so keenehā- just like seenehā is plural of seené, so chests vs. chest, keenehā is plural of grudges. So keené is grudge, and keenehā is grudges. keenehā

(keenehā)

so haft āb shoo az keenehā literally means wash seven times from grudges, but it means purify of grudges. So wash your chest like the chests that are washed seven times from grudges- so rid your heart of all of its grudges. az is the word for from. so haft āb shoo az keenehā- purify from grudges. haft āb shoo az keenehā

(haft āb shoo az keenehā)

and back to the first part of the phrase: roo seené rā chon seenehā

again we see that word rā in there, the direct object marker. So on the chest, like the chests haft āb shoo az keenehā that are washed seven times from grudges. So let’s this together. 

roo seené rā chon seenehā 

(roo seené rā chon seenehā)

And then is the phrase haft āb shoo az keenehā. 

(haft āb shoo az keenehā)

So like I said earlier, this is the first line that breaks from the pattern of every other line of this poem to have a command as the last part of the line. The command in this line comes in the middle when he says ‘haft āb shoo’ so intead of kon, do or shō, become, the command is shoo, wash. shoo

shoo

So again, let’s say this all again together one more time:

roo seené rā chon seenehā 

(roo seené rā chon seenehā)

haft āb shoo az keenehā

(haft āb shoo az keenehā)

Wonderful- now let’s listen to the second part

vāngah sharābé eshgh rā paymāné shō paymāné shō

So we’ve covered that last command paymāné shō- become the chalice. paymāné shō

(paymāné shō)

So we’re back to having a command as the last part of the line- paymāné shō

paymāné shō

To start the line, we have the line vāngah- we had this in the last lesson, where we heard vāngah beeyā bā āsheghān, and then come with the lovers. so v’āngah again is a combination of va and āngah, spoken quickly and means and then v’āngah

(vāngah)

And as we said in the last lesson, in conversation today we wouldn’t vangah, we would oonvakht

(oonvakht)

which means the same thing. and then. So it’s giving us a timeline here, saying first, wash yourself of grudges AND THEN, sharābé eshgh rā. So sharāb means wine. sharāb

(sharāb)

and eshgh is the word for love. eshgh

(eshgh)

and this is one of those words that’s so hard to say because it has that gh sound that isn’t in English- gh, and it combines it with another consonant sh which is hard. So you just have to really practice this word over and over again until you can say it. eshgh eshgh eshgh

(eshgh eshgh eshgh)

And of course it’s an important word that you hear all the time. Love, eshgh

(eshgh)

so sharābé eshgh- the wine of love. sharābé eshgh

(sharābé eshgh)

and we have rā in there as the direct object marker signifying- what should we become a chalice for? For the wine of love. sharābé eshgh. So the full line is vāngah sharābé eshgh rā paymāné shō paymāné shō. All right, let’s repeat this all together- 

vāngah sharābé eshgh rā 

(vāngah sharābé eshgh rā) 

paymāné shō paymāné shō

(vāngah sharābé eshgh rā)

Ok wonderful! We’re going listen to Fared read this line again, and hopefully this time you’ll understand the whole thing! 

roo seené rā chon seenehā haft āb shoo az keenehā

vāngah sharābé esgh rā paymāné shō paymāné shō

All right, and hopefully you understood all those words!

We have only one lesson left to cover the words in this poem. Remember to try to memorize this as we’re going along. At the end of the next lesson, I’m going to ask you to record yourself saying this poem in a beautiful location and submitting a video of it to me. This poem has so much beautiful repetition, so it’s such a pleasure to recite it, and to know it by heart too.

When you do learn these words and phrases in the poem, when you memorize the poem, the words become a part of you, and you’ll be able to more easily use them in conversation. So keep that in mind, and join me on part 4, the thrilling conclusion of the discussion of Rumi’s deevāné shō. Thank you for listening, and until next time, khodāhāfez from Leyla.