Jeff Olmsted: Music
Such A Teacher
(Rumi translation by Coleman Barks, music by Surya Vitalis)
Last night my teacher taught me the lesson of poverty-
having nothing and wanting nothing.
I am a naked man
standing inside a mine of rubies,
clothed in red silk.
Then I absorb the shining,
and now I am the ocean,
millions of simultaneous motions
moving everywhere, moving in me.
A circle of lovely quiet people
Becomes the ring on my finger.
Then the thunder-sound of rain on the way.
I have such a teacher.