Rumi's beshnō een nay

Hello and welcome to Lesson 94 of Learn Persian with Chai and Conversation- this lesson is the last in our series about the poem beshno een nay by Rumi. If this is your first time hearing Chai and Conversation, make sure to go back and listen to Lesson 91 of this lesson, and work your way through this one. These poetry lessons are cumulative! And to get the bonus materials for this lesson, check out our website at chaiandconversation.com/lesson92. All right- let’s get right to the lesson!

Before we do anything else, we’re going to listen to a new recording we have of this poem by Aghayeh Karimzadeh, an amazing fiction writing teacher based in Dallas Texas. 

(listen to poem)

This recording gives me chills, and I thank Aghayeh Karimzadeh for taking the time to make it for Chai and Conversation. Hopefully we’ll be working with him more in the future! 

So hopefully by now, you understand a lot of the words and phrases in this poem. Today, we’re going to concentrate on the final section of the poem- the last four lines. Let’s now listen to my khaleh Farnaz’s reading of this section:

Man beh har jameeyatee nalan shodam

Jofteh badhalan va khoshhalan shodam

Har kasee az zaneh khod shod yareh man

Az darooneh man najost asrareh man

Wonderful- so let’s go through this section just as we did in the last couple lessons- word by word, phrase by phrase. Let’s listen to the first sentence of the poem:

Man beh har jameeyatee nalan shodam

So the first word man, means me. Man

Man

Or I. Man

Man

Next is be which means to. Beh

Beh

Next is the word har. Har means any. Har.

Har

Man beh har

Man beh ha

Me to any. Man beh har

Man beh har

Next is jameeyatee. Jameeyatee is a slightly longer word, and it means ‘population’. Jam is a crowd, jameeyatee is a population of people. So a community. Jameeyatee

Jameeyatee

A population of people. Let’s say this again since it’s a bit of a tricky word. Jameeyatee

Jameeyatee

Next we have the word nalan. Now this is the same as naleedan, which we had in the first section of the poem. We had said dar nafeeram mar o zan naleedan- meaning, men and women have cried into my head. Nalan is the same root of naleedan, but it’s an active use of the word, meaning currently crying- nalan shodam is saying I became cry-ee, or weepy. Weepy is a good translation of nalan. Nalan

Nalan

And shodam is I became. Shodam

Shodam

So together nalan shodam means I became weepy. Nalan shodam

Nalan shodam

So Muhammad Ali translates this as In every crowd, I cried out in despair. But literally it says man beh har jameeyatee nalan shodam- so me to every population became weepy, something like that. So whenever I was confronted with a group of people, I wailed. Which if you think about it, of course a reed is being played by people, and this reed is saying that it’s making a sound of sadness. So let’s try to say this again together- man be har

Man beh har

Jameeyatee 

Jameeyatee

Nalan shodam

Nalan shodam

And altogether- man beh har jameeyatee nalan shodam

Man beh har hameeyatee nalan shodam.

Ok great, next line:

Jofteh badhalan va khoshhalan shodam

Ok, so first the word ‘jofteh’. Joft is a pair. Joft

Joft

And we explained in Lesson 91 about the word hal in Persian. It means state of being. Hal

Hal

So what is badhalan- so bad is the same as in English. It means bad. Bad

Bad

But make sure to pronounce it in the Persian way. Not bad, but bad.

Bad

So badhalan is those who are in a bad state of being. Halan refers to a group of people in a state of being. So badhalan, is those in a bad state of being. Badhalan

Badhalan

Conversely, khosh means happiness or goodness. Khosh

Khosh

So khoshhalan is those in a happy state of being. Khoshhalan

Khoshhalan

And the two other words in this sentence we’ve covered before. Va is and. Va

Va

And shodam means I became- we saw this in the last part. Shodam

Shodam

So in the last sentence, Rumi says ‘nalan shodam.’ I became weepy. Nalan shodam

Nalan shodam

This time- jofteh khoshhalan va badhalan shodam- meaning, I became a pair with those in a bad state of being and those in a good state of being. So the e sound after joft in this case stands for with. Joft by itself means  a pair. So jofteh khoshahalan va badhalan, the e means with and it become a pair with happy and sad, and shodam at the end is ‘became’. So I became a pair with happy and sad people, basically, or as Muhammad Ali puts it, with happy and sad I became a pair. So let’s repeat it all together jofteh khoshhalan

Jofteh khoshhalan

Va badhalan

Va badhalan

Shodam

Shodam.

Great, now the whole thing- jofteh khoshhalan va badhalan shodam. Great, now let’s listen to these two lines and see if you can catch the whole thing: 

Man beh har jameeyatee nalan shodam

Jofteh badhalan va khoshhalan shodam

Wonderful, and hopefully now you understood all these words. And now the last two lines: 

Har kasee az zaneh khod shod yareh man

Az darooneh man najost asrareh man

Ok we are getting so close to the finish line! So now the first line: 

Har kasee az zaneh khod shod yareh man

So again we’ve seen the word har before, it means any. Har

Har

And kasee is the word for spirit or person. Kasee

Kasee

So put together, it means any person, or anyone. Har kasee

Har kasee

Again we have az, which means from. Az

Az

Next is zaneh khod. Khod as we’ve covered before means self. Khod

Khod

And zaneh khod means their own thoughts, their own suspicions. Zan is a word not commonly used in conversational Persian- it’s a different word and is spelled differently than zan we had before that means woman. So zaneh khod is their own thoughts or suspicions. Zaneh khod

Zaneh khod

Then shod means he or she or they became. Shod

Shod

So last sentence had shodam- that means I became. Shodam

Shodam

And shod means he she or they became. Shod

Shod

Next we have a very beautiful word- yar. Yar

Yar

Yar in Persian means many things, but basically, it means a love, a partner, a friend, a sweetheart, a fellow, a dear- all of these things, but basically, a dear friend, an intimate friend. Yar

Yar

So you can use it to refer to your lover or your friend- just whoever really understands you.

So yareh man means my friend- yareh man

Yareh man

So again, we have that e sound, the ezafe, that ties the two words together. Who’s yar? My yar- yareh man

Yareh man

So, this full sentence again is Har kasee az zaneh khod shod yareh man. Meaning, anyone in their own mind became a close friend of mine. So anyone who thought they had become close to me, or confided in me, or become intimate with me. Let’s say it bit by bit- har kasee

Har kasee

Az zaneh khod

Az zaneh khod

Shod yareh man

Shod yareh man

Ok, and the last sentence- Az darooneh man najost asrareh man

Again, we start with a word we’ve heard a lot- az, meaning from. Az

Az

Next is darooneh man. So Yareh man, my friend. Darooneh man, means my inside, my interior. Darooneh man

Darooneh man

Daroon by itself means inside. Darooneh ma

Darooneh man

My interior. So again we have that ezafe e sound that links daroon to man. So who’s interior? My interior. Darooneh man

Darooneh man

Next is the word najost. Najost means didn’t seek, and it’s in the third person. Najost, so he or she didn’t seek. Najost

Najost

And it’s referring to the har kasee from before. Har kasee meaning anyone, any person, whoever. Har kasee

Har kasee 

Najost again means he she or they did not seek, did not look for. Najost

Najost

Next it’s asrareh man. So this is an Arabic word- in Persian this word is raz, and it means secret. Asrar 

Asrar

Meaning secret. Asrareh man, my secrets. Asrareh man

Asrareh man

And side note, we have a whole translation of a poem called Raz by Ahmad Shamlou you can listen to after you’re done memorizing this poem- you can find that at lesson 88 of Chai and Conversation or chaiandconversation.com/lesson88. But again, let’s say this whole sentence together- az darooneh man

Az darooneh man

Najost

Najost

Asrareh man

Asarareh man

So altogether- az darooneh man najost asrareh man

Az darooneh man najost asrareh man

And there we go, there’s the final part of the poem! Now let’s listen to this full final part:

Man beh har jameeyatee nalan shodam

Jofteh badhalan va khoshhalan shodam

Har kasee az zaneh khod shod yareh man

Az darooneh man najost asrareh man

Wonderful! And now we’re going to listen to the full poem again read by aghayeh Karimzadeh. This time, I want you to feel the poem while understanding each individual word:

Behsno een nay chon shekayet meekonad

Az jodayeeha hekayat meekonad

Kaz neyestan mara beboreede-and

Dar nafeeram mard o zan naleedeand

Seene khaham sharhe sharhe az faragh

Ta begooyam sharheh dardeh eshteeyagh

Har kesee k’oo door mand az asleh kheesh

Baz jooyeed roozegareh vasleh kheesh

Man beh har jameeyatee naleen shodam

Jofteh badhalan va khoshhalan shodam

Har kasee az zaneh khod shod yareh man

Az darooneh man najost asrareh man

Perfect! And now your task is to memorize this poem. Even if you don’t know every single word at the moment, memorizing it will cause you to internalize these words and phrases, and eventually using them in conversation as you continue your studies of the Persian language will become easier. We have plenty of resources on the website to help you. Go to chaiandconversation.com/lesson91 to see the first of the lessons, and go from there. We have PDF guides that have all these individual words and phrases written in English phonetic and in Persian script- so you don’t even need to be able to read Persian to understand them. In addition, we have the poem there in audio format- you can click on each individual sentence to hear it read out loud, and you can even click on each word to hear them read out loud so you can master the pronunciation. Take advantage of all these resources by signing up for a free trial to our membership program at chaiandconversation.com with Chai spelled CHAI. We’ve worked so hard to make this poem completely accessible to you- memorizing it will bring you so many advantages when learning the Persian language!

And that’s it for now. We look forward to seeing your videos of reciting your poems- you can send that directly to me at leyla@chaiandconversation.com .

This has been quite a journey, and it’s been so fun for me to understand the nuances of this poem as well. Thank you for being on this journey with us, and log in to our website at chaiandconversation.com for plenty more Persian language resources.

And that’s it for now. I’m your host Leyla Shams- this episode was edited by Chadwick Wood, and our theme music was written and performed by Babak Rajabi. Until next time, khodahafez, from Leyla