{"id":24972,"date":"2026-03-01T20:27:22","date_gmt":"2026-03-02T03:27:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/?post_type=transcript&p=24972"},"modified":"2026-03-01T20:27:22","modified_gmt":"2026-03-02T03:27:22","slug":"encore-episode-coleman-barks-rumi-grace-and-human-friendship","status":"publish","type":"transcript","link":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/encore-episode-coleman-barks-rumi-grace-and-human-friendship\/","title":{"rendered":"[ENCORE EPISODE] Coleman Barks: Rumi, Grace, and Human Friendship"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"image_print\"Print Transcript<\/span><\/a><\/div>

Tami Simon:<\/b> This encore edition is a tribute to Coleman Barks, who at 88 years of age, died on February 23rd, 2026. In addition to being a world renowned poet, Coleman was a mystic, a lover of music, literature in life. And a friend, his Rumi translations “From the Heart” find a home in our hearts, and his voice, warm and resounding, stays with us.<\/span><\/p>\n

Today my guest is Coleman Barks. Coleman Barks is a leading scholar and translator of the 13th century Persian mystic Aladin Rumi. He taught poetry and creative writing at the University of Georgia for 30 years, and is the author of numerous Rumi Translations and has been a student of Sufism since 1977.<\/span><\/p>\n

His work with Rumi was the subject of an hour long segment in Bill Moyer’s Language of Life series on PBS. With Sounds true, Coleman Barks has released the audio programs I Want Burning the ecstatic world of Rumi Hafi and Lala, a CD called Rumi, voice of Longing, and also a brand new beautiful three CD collection, which is a collaboration between Coleman Barks and cellist, David Darling.<\/span><\/p>\n

It’s called Just Being Here, Rumi and Human Friendship. In this episode of Insights at the Edge, Coleman Barks and I spoke about the relationship between Rumi and his teacher. Whom he called the friend, shams of Tabriz, and how Coleman received insight into this friendship based on his own relationship with a Sufi teacher named Guru Bawa.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bawa Mohaideen. We also spoke about how Coleman first began translating Rumi and how the translation process involves Coleman falling into a type of trance as part of the process. Finally, Coleman and I spoke about Grace, and as part of our conversation, we listened to some new pieces from the recording just being here, Rumi and Human Friendship.<\/span><\/p>\n

Here’s my very heart opening conversation with Coleman Barks.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman, I wanna begin just by saying that I’m so happy to be speaking with you because even though we’ve known each other for a long time, I’ve never had the chance to have this kind of conversation with you about your work. That’s right. So thank you. You’re welcome. Thank you. To begin with, I wanted to talk a little bit about the process of translation and your process, what you go through when you take a poem, a poem that was originally written in Persian and then translated into English by somebody else, and then you turn it into a Coleman Barks translation.<\/span><\/p>\n

Can you tell us how that process goes for you?<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Well, it’s a little mysterious, um. I go into a kind of a trance reading the poem, the in its scholarly translation and try to, well, like, it’s, no, nothing marvelous about it. It just, uh, it’s a kind of a trance that any reading involves, uh, where I try to feel what, uh, spiritual information is trying to come through Rumi’s images, and then I try to put that in, uh, tend to an American free verse poem in the tradition of, uh, Walt Whitman and many others.<\/span><\/p>\n

So that is the. General Ments of the process,<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> do you ever have a concern, you know, how much of this is Coleman and how much of this is Rumi and am I taking too much poetic license here? I mean, how do you sort that out?<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> I try to, um, I don’t make it up images, so I take his images and then, uh, try to. Expand on them.<\/span><\/p>\n

Uh, this is not, um, poetry that is word for word of course. And it’s, you wouldn’t call it even faithful because I don’t know the original language. You know, I don’t know. Farsi, I, I did not hear Rumi’s name until I was 39 years old. Way too old to, to learn the language. And besides, I’m lazy, you know? So, uh, I just love the, the, uh, medium that I go into to do this work.<\/span><\/p>\n

It feels like a different kind of something outside the mind. Uh, call it the heart or the soul, but it’s, uh, it’s somewhere different than my. Ordinary mentality. And I, it just gives me great pleasure to be able to enter that region of consciousness. It feels like a, like, um, almost being able to, to breathe underwater.<\/span><\/p>\n

You know, it’s just some kind of, it is a breathing, uh, way of, uh, a new way of sort, sort of being in the rapture of being in a body. You know, Rumi says it’s, um, just being sentient and in a form, in a body is caused for great, great joy. And, uh, I agree with that. You know, I somehow, um, that’s part is in my DNA, I just love being alive and, uh.<\/span><\/p>\n

Rumi did too. And I think that’s why we, uh, gravitate toward him because he, he restores the ecstatic dimension of consciousness. And we may have forgotten about that some.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Uh, yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Now when you say that you don’t make up images, but you work with the images that are in the original, I would think it would be tempting that, you know, one image leads to another image leads, I mean, they, they, they can cascade.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Yeah, that’s, that’s the form of his, um, um, oes, his als, uh, they are just one image after another usually, and they each are, uh, expounding ’em. Um. Some kind of a psychic process like, uh, emptiness or other what, whatever the moth flying into the flame means, you know, that disappearing into one’s love. Uh, and, uh, he, he is amazing at, uh, exfoliating the, the imagery of that, uh, that idea of surrender.<\/span><\/p>\n

And, uh, yeah, but I don’t help him. I don’t make up the images with him, you know? Uh, I, I may be guilty of that sometime, but, uh. I can’t think of one right now.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Mm-hmm. Now, now you, you mentioned that you didn’t even hear Rumi’s name till you were in your late thirties. And I’m curious when you, you know, when you heard his name or you read your first Rumi poem, did you immediately go up into flames or something like that?<\/span><\/p>\n

I mean, the karma of your life was about to be forever changed.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Changed. Hmm. That’s certainly true, but, um, not exactly the first one. Um, that was at a Robert Bly conference where he thought it would be a great, uh, afternoon writing exercise to take a Rumi poem in a scholarly translation and, um, rephrase it.<\/span><\/p>\n

Free verse. And so we did that for an afternoon and he gave me the book. He said, uh, these poems need to be released from the cages, meaning the cages of the scholarly language, uh, and, uh, made more alive and more free. And, um, and I’ve been trying to do that now for 34 years. Uh, but it was after I got back to Athens, Georgia and got to, to working alone with the, the poems, uh, that I really felt the freedom and the, the, something very new was happening.<\/span><\/p>\n

And, and also something very old and deeply familiar to me. Uh. I don’t know how to explain that, but that’s the way it felt. And it was, it’s like a huge, uh, form of relaxation, you know? That’s what it felt like.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Hmm. I’m curious if there was a moment when it dawned on you, I’m gonna be spending a lot of time working on these poems.<\/span><\/p>\n

This is really gonna become the focus of my life.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Hmm, hmm. I worked on them just as a practice for seven years before I even thought of publishing them. You know, it didn’t, uh, occur to me that there would be an audience for this, but, um, well, maybe that’s not entirely true, but it was in the back of my mind, I guess.<\/span><\/p>\n

But, um. Uh, I didn’t publish a book till, uh, from 1976 when I started to 1984 when Open Secret came out. Then it became, um, apparent that these were useful to people. And, uh, so I, well, I was, I was going to keep doing it anyway, but, but it’s a different thing when you have an audience for you, what you do and your solitude, you know?<\/span><\/p>\n

And then finally, uh, Harper Collins got hold of it in 1995 and, uh, and now, um, about a, a million and a half copies have been sold. So it’s, it’s a publishing phenomenon that, um. Nobody quite understands.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> No, I’m interested. You said something that it’s different when you’re aware of an audience or there’s an audience for what you’re doing.<\/span><\/p>\n

What changed? Yeah, what changed once it was clear that there was an audience for these translations? Uh,<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Uhhuh. Well, I got some very educated feedback and some beautiful, uh, critique by people who know this material and these states of awareness much better than I do. You know, so, and I found a, found a Sufi teacher too through, uh, doing this work.<\/span><\/p>\n

But, uh. What I was thinking about it was a, a pure Lia con gave these poems a, a good reading, and they said, you know, uh, the, your poems used to be more sensual and more sexual. It says, but now they don’t seem to be that way. Uh, and I said, yeah, that was because I was more sensual and sexual when I was doing them.<\/span><\/p>\n

And, uh, so there, you know, of course the voice of the translator does come through. Uh, I have to use my own experience and my own, um, voice to do these, um, these translations. And, uh, what I try to do, of course, is to make a valid and a lively poem in American English. And, uh. I’m not interested in a scholarly translation.<\/span><\/p>\n

And I am, I’m very grateful to the scholars because they have allowed, allowed me to, to do this work. But, um, I can’t continue that kind of, uh, language, you know, I can’t, I have to make it more alive.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> More vibrant.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Now, you said Coleman, that when you started doing these translations of the Rumi poems, there was a sense of familiarity and a, a relaxation into the process.<\/span><\/p>\n

Hmm. And I, I’m curious in your inner world, what your relationship with Rumi and Shams feels like.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n

Um, I’m only sure not to. Uh, telling you lies here.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> That’s good. I appreciate that. Yeah, thank you. Take your, take your time. I’m, I’m happy to wait for, I’m happy to wait for the truth.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Ian Shas and my own life.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Yeah. What they’re like, what, what your relationship’s like inside of you with, with them, do they feel like legends?<\/span><\/p>\n

Do they feel like friends that you have, like actual, I mean, what, what’s it feel like inside<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Uhhuh more like that? Um, my teacher Bawa ine once told me, he said, you, you know, Ru and Chams are to me talking about it himself, uh, are not literary figures. They’re not people in a book. Uh, I know them. He said like, I know you.<\/span><\/p>\n

And, uh, so that gave me a sense of. He allowed me, I think, entrance into the, um, vast identity of that, those two and that friendship. Uh, somehow if I hadn’t met him, it wouldn’t be the same. Uh, my access to the poems would not be as intimate maybe as it feels now. Yeah. I’m glad you asked that.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Mm-hmm. And tell me a little bit, when did you meet Bawa Mu?<\/span><\/p>\n

Well,<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> I met him in a dream, you know, and um, and then a year and a half later I met him in this more solid world. But, uh, I have had several precognitive dreams and, um. Uh, it’s a just a, to me, um, mysterious fact of existence that the, the mind in dream consciousness can go forward in time and, um, see something, a scene maybe that, um, will become apparent on the retina two years afterward.<\/span><\/p>\n

I don’t know how that happens, but it is, has been my experience. It not a lot of times, but it has happened. And, uh, so, uh, that’s what happened with him. That, that he, he was able to come to me and dream consciousness and, uh, the dreams became lucid that. I woke up inside the dream and, uh, became aware that I was dreaming, but I was still asleep.<\/span><\/p>\n

And in the dream that I met him, uh, I was sleeping out on a bluff above the Tennessee River where I grew up and where the school was that I grew up at. My father was a headmaster and, um, just five miles north of Chattanooga on the Tennessee River. And, uh, it was night. And, uh, I, I woke up in say inside the dream and a ball of light rose off of Williams Island and came over me and, uh, clarified from the inside out and a man was sitting in there and he, with his head bowed on the white shawl over his head and he raised his head.<\/span><\/p>\n

And he said, I love you. And I said, I love you too. And, uh, the whole landscape filled with, uh, dew or the moisture and uh, and the moisture somehow was love. It was just spread out through the landscape. I, I felt the process of the dew forming, this is all very mysterious, and, uh, but it did, it did as far as I know, happened to me.<\/span><\/p>\n

And then, uh, a year and a half to later I met him in Philadelphia. And, um, he said this room of work, that it had to be done. And, uh, I assume that that meant that he was going to help me with it because, and I think, uh. He has in some mysterious way been part of the process. So<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> did you know when you had the dream that it was an important dream?<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Oh gosh, yeah. Yeah. I, I, um, started writing my dreams down in 19, early 1970s. And, uh, I kept, I now have about 90 dream notebooks and I still write them down. And, uh, yeah, it felt like, uh, I’ve never had a man appear in a ball of light before and, no, no sense either. And, uh, uh, he could visit me in the, in the dreams and he, and he did.<\/span><\/p>\n

And I would go up to Philadelphia and start telling him the dream, and we, he would say, you don’t need to tell me that. I’m, I was there. You know, so he had the ability to do that. There are people who are, are on other planes of existence and, uh, I was got really lucky and met one of them.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> After you had the dream, did you seek him out?<\/span><\/p>\n

Did you<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> No. No, no.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> So, so it just by chance happened that a year and a half later you met this person, were like, oh my God,<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> that’s, well, it was, it was somewhat con connected to this work. Very much. I sent some, oh, these. Versions, translations to a friend of mine who was teaching, uh, law at, uh, Rutgers University at, uh, Camden, the Camden Division.<\/span><\/p>\n

And he read them to his torts class. And, uh, a man came up out of the audience and, and, uh, it was Jonathan Ol. And Jonathan said, who did those poems? And, uh, Milner Ball gave Jonathan my name and Jonathan started writing to me and he said, there’s this teacher in Philadelphia I think you should meet. And so on.<\/span><\/p>\n

One poetry reading, jaunt, uh, up there. I stopped into Philadelphia and met Jonathan and then met, um, this teacher and I realized that he was the one in my dream and nobody can, um, nobody would know that except. Myself and him, you know, but, uh, but he’s such a distinctive looking person with these magnificent, um, deep eyes that, uh, he’s very recognizable.<\/span><\/p>\n

So, uh, that’s the way that actually the meeting actually happened.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Did you feel there was something in your relationship with Bwa Muha Addin that was similar to the relationship between Rumi and Shams, and that that’s part of what gave you an appreciation of that a teacher student dynamic?<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> It feels very, it felt very deep and still feels deep and like a, um, so at least since he died in 1986.<\/span><\/p>\n

It feels like it’s become more like a friendship that, uh, than a teacher student thing. Uh, so yeah, I do feel that it’s a, it’s a lot to claim, but, uh, I feel that. Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Well, it’s wonderful that you bring up the friendship word you’ve just published through Sounds True. A three CD collection along with David Darling, the cellist called Just Being Here, Rumi and Human Friendship.<\/span><\/p>\n

And in just a moment, I want to hear a piece from that three CD collection, but maybe you could say a few words as a way of introduction about this central idea of friendship, Rumi and human friend.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Well, he said that if friendship, it can change from being a relationship, it is that it’s very specific and a shams of tab debris is an actual person and from an actual town.<\/span><\/p>\n

And, and, um, it is a specific relationship, but it can widen and broaden out to include and then become a kind of atmosphere that one walks within. Or, uh, in one of his startling metaphors, he said what was just a person is now a holiday without limits, you know, suddenly the, the person and the relationship becomes just something like a.<\/span><\/p>\n

A day off, you know, just a great sense of freedom and, uh, expansion like a holiday. So, and then in another place he said that charms had become what anybody says, just any conversation going on is like a, he’s overhearing his beloved. He’s, he is. It’s, it’s become part of the fabric of his, his life. So maybe we, we should hear.<\/span><\/p>\n

Part of that, uh, set three C days set.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Yeah. And uh, I do think you might have some pre-cognitive abilities as well, because the track that I’ve queued up, which you wouldn’t know is called holiday without limits. And this is from the in charge here? Exactly, yeah. From just being here. Rumi and Human Friendship.<\/span><\/p>\n

Let’s listen.<\/span><\/p>\n

Music:<\/b> Holiday without limits<\/span><\/p>\n

going into battle. We carry no shield<\/span><\/p>\n

playing in concert, unaware of the beat or the melody. We have become. Grains in the ground, underfoot, fold, unfold, layers of love. Nothing else<\/span><\/p>\n

obliterated<\/span><\/p>\n

as when the eye medicine is no longer even a powder, then it can cure sight.<\/span><\/p>\n

An accident gradually gets accepted as the thing that needed to happen. Sickness melts into health.<\/span><\/p>\n

There is nothing worse. Than staying congealed.<\/span><\/p>\n

Let your liver dissolve to blood, let your heart break into such tiny pieces. It cannot be found. The moon orb wanes<\/span><\/p>\n

then for three days. You could say that there is no moon.<\/span><\/p>\n

That is the moon that has drawn so close to the sun. It is nowhere and everywhere.<\/span><\/p>\n

Send us someone who can sing music for the soul.<\/span><\/p>\n

Though we know such longing cannot rise eyes from a loot or a tambourine, not from the Sun or Venus or any star<\/span><\/p>\n

as day comes.<\/span><\/p>\n

Give back the night fantasy things you stole.<\/span><\/p>\n

Admit your arrogance as the stars do. At dawn<\/span><\/p>\n

when the sun goes down, Venus begins bragging, claiming light,<\/span><\/p>\n

arguing her loveliness over the moons.<\/span><\/p>\n

Jupiter lifts a gold coin from his bag. Mars shows the sharpness of his blade to Saturn. Mercury sits on a high seat and gives himself successive titles. That is how it goes in the middle of the night. Then Dawn Jupiter is suddenly poor Mars and Saturn have no plans. Venus and the Moon run away, broken and terrified.<\/span><\/p>\n

Then the sun within the sun. Enters and this night and day talk seems a meaningless convention. The lighting business.<\/span><\/p>\n

A true holy day for a man or a woman. Is the one when they bring themselves as the sacrifice. When shams shone his light from nowhere, I felt a holiday without limits begin,<\/span><\/p>\n

where once was just a person.<\/span><\/p>\n

A true holy day for a man or a woman<\/span><\/p>\n

is the one when they bring themselves as the sacrifice. When shams shone his light from nowhere, I felt a holiday without limits, but yet where once was just a person.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Coleman, it seems to me that it has so many layers of meaning that you created a collection of translations with music on Rumi and human friendship with someone who is in fact, a dear friend of yours, David Darling, a musician. Yeah, that’s right. I’m wondering if you could talk a little bit about that process of working together and, and how it informed, uh, a record on friendship.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Yeah. David Darling and I have, uh, for a long time had wanted to make something, um, with the cello and, uh, his music and rumi’s poetry and maybe some of my own poetry. That has a kind of orchestral feel, so something more vast than the single instrument. And so he has created this music and, uh, he would, uh, put something on like a track and, um, then I would just feel what poem might go with that music?<\/span><\/p>\n

And, uh, it seemed to work out pretty well. Sometimes it would, uh, happen that way. And sometimes I would start reading the poem and he would, uh, put the music with it. But it worked both ways. First, first the boards, then the music, then the music, and then vice versa. But, um, his delight in, uh, the process and in the poetry.<\/span><\/p>\n

And then of course in the music. Is a apparent throughout. He’s got great freshness and joyfulness about him. And, uh, I just, uh, really enjoy his presence and, uh, and I think he likes to be hang out with me too. So we, we enjoyed being in his sound studio in the woods of Connecticut and, uh, putting this together.<\/span><\/p>\n

It was, it was, it was not work. It was very much play and, uh, we loved doing it.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> I think part of what’s underneath my question is, I’d love to understand more what friendship means to you. Coleman barks. Mm-hmm. I mean, part of, part of the project you’re exploring Rumi and human friendship, but I’m also interested in knowing what it means for you.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Well, I mean, what can you say it, it’s the, the opening of the heart, isn’t it? Some kind of feeling of a new way of being, uh, that is, and I, as I say in the notes, a a new way of breathing. Maybe that’s, uh, not so fearful and not so, uh, sad. When you meet a new friend, you, the, the world has more light in it, doesn’t it?<\/span><\/p>\n

And, but things become, become more spontaneous and more full of, uh, laughing and freedom and novelty somehow. And I hope all that is apparent in this, uh, three CD set. I hope it is. Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> One of the comments you made in the liner notes that I thought was interesting was you were talking about how in Rumi’s poetry, the Sun is often a central image in understanding human friendship.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Shams means the sun. So whenever Sunlight is mentioned or the dawn coming up, uh, it’s, um, it’s always, uh, a reference to shams and his friendship and his love for him and their love for each other. It’s, uh, one of the great images, uh, it’s like a little secret. He sells always in his, his, uh, poems that the world is always asking you to open up and be more loving.<\/span><\/p>\n

You know, the, the candle is taking the bite’s. Burning is telling you the moth by going into the candle is telling you to do that. And music is, wine is always telling you to, uh, give up the bouquet and the names and all again, just run wild and anonymous through the human brain. Yeah. And uh, he, at the end of a poem I didn’t put in on this, uh, collection, he says, everything begs with the silent rocks for you to be flung out, like light over this plane, the presence of shas tab debris.<\/span><\/p>\n

Yeah. Uh, so light itself and, uh, probably seeing itself and hearing and seeing. Just being alive is, uh, for him, the presence of, uh, of the friend, the friendship, the beloved. What, you can’t say much about that mystery, but it’s certainly central to whatever religion is in these poems. It’s a, it’s a religion of deep friendship and light and, uh, music too.<\/span><\/p>\n

I think often the, the image of a flute comes in and, uh, the, um, emptiness that has to happen for the flute to make music, you know, and then the emptiness of the flute player and, uh, those two, I. Emptiness is a, are somehow related to love, and the merging of the emptiness are, are related to this new kind of love that, that, uh, Rumi and shas are bringing to us.<\/span><\/p>\n

I think it’s new, even though it’s, uh, eight centuries old. I don’t know that we’ve lived it out yet. It’s a new kind of way of being and a new, uh, depth of inwardness and joy and sharing. But when you try to start talking about it, it just, uh, disappears almost. So the best way to talk about it is through poetry and with music.<\/span><\/p>\n

So let’s listen to another one.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Okay, we’ll listen to a piece. This is called Raggedness. Oh yeah. And this is also from just being here, Rumi and Human Friendship. Maybe you can introduce it for us, Cole.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Well, it’s, this is lots of, of changes of that happen in, um, AST a student teacher relationship. You’ll see I was dead and then alive.<\/span><\/p>\n

And so it’s all about the continuous, changing the relation, uh, um, nature of, uh, relationship where maybe, um, a teacher’s involved, but nobody knows who is the student who’s, who’s the teacher. And she keeps, uh, changing back and forth. Uh, okay, let’s hear it.<\/span><\/p>\n

Music:<\/b> I was dead, then alive, weeping, then laughing.<\/span><\/p>\n

The power of love came into me, and I became fierce like a lion. Then tender like the evening star, he said, you’re not mad enough. You don’t belong in this house. I went wild and it had to be tied up. He said, still not wild enough to stay with us. I broke through another layer into joyfulness. He said, it’s not enough.<\/span><\/p>\n

I died. He said, you’re a clever little man, full of fantasy and doubting. I plucked out my feathers and became a fool. He said, now you’re the candle for this assembly, but I’m no candle. Look, I’m scattered smoke. He said, you are the shake, the guide, but I’m not a teacher. I have no power.<\/span><\/p>\n

He said, you already have wings. I cannot give you wings. But I wanted his wings. I felt like some flightless chicken.<\/span><\/p>\n

Then new events said to me, don’t move. A sublime generosity is coming toward you.<\/span><\/p>\n

And Old Love said, stay with me. I said, I will.<\/span><\/p>\n

You are the Fountain of the Sun’s light.<\/span><\/p>\n

I am a willow shadow on the ground.<\/span><\/p>\n

You are the fountain of the sun’s light.<\/span><\/p>\n

I am a willow shadow on the ground. You make my raggedness silky.<\/span><\/p>\n

I was dead, then alive, weeping, then laughing.<\/span><\/p>\n

The power of love came into me and I became fierce like a lion. Then tender like the evening star.<\/span><\/p>\n

You are the fountain of the sun’s light.<\/span><\/p>\n

I am a willow shadow on the ground.<\/span><\/p>\n

You make my raggedness silky.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> I love that. It’s so beautiful, Coleman.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> That, uh, image of that, uh, flowing shadow on the ground as being silky is just gorgeously fresh, isn’t it?<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> It’s so, um, so new.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> One of the things I’d love to hear more about, if it’s okay, it’s a little personal, but I’ve never heard you talk really about your relationship with Bawa Mohaideen, guru bwa, easier to mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n

Say that, and you’ve told us now a little bit about the initial meeting in the dream and then when you first saw him, but I’m, I’m wondering how that relationship progressed for you, and then at the time of his death and now after his death, 20 plus years, what that’s all like for you.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Huh? Um, he used to come in dreams after he died, and, uh, but he hasn’t in, in several years now.<\/span><\/p>\n

Uh, I don’t know what that means, but, uh, I still feel, uh, very close to him and I love to go to visit his. Tomb there where he is buried outside of, of Philadelphia. Feels very good to be there. Let’s see. He came in a dream once and, uh, taught, he was teaching me how to take tiny little sips out of a glass of water, I think.<\/span><\/p>\n

And, uh, so tiny. It’s like a little bee or a butterfly or something, drinking. And I said, what does this mean? And uh, he says, you want to be wise to quickly. Don’t just take one sip of wisdom and assimilate that. And so that was good advice. Do don’t be in a hurry with the, with the wisdom. Just take it. Uh, don’t get greedy with it.<\/span><\/p>\n

I don’t know that I’ve learned that yet. And another in the same dream. He was teaching me to bow all the way down. He said my back was a little stiff. I needed to bow all the way down. So I think I know what that means.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> A little, do much pride and, uh, so I need to the full prostration on. Yeah. Well, I’m sure other incidents would occur to me what they just not right now anyway.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Gives me a feeling. Thank you.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Yeah, thank you.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> You, you mentioned Coleman in your own writing and, and translation of Rumi’s poetry that you began. As a practice, and I’m curious if you have any suggestions for people in terms of listening to your readings or engaging with your Rumi translations, the books, how, how they would approach it as a type of practice.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Hmm. I have a little practice that I have done, I didn’t today, but I like to listen to, um, Steven Mitchell’s translations of ko, you know, and have the text there of the duo allies, uh, out in front of me. So I listen to Steven read his translations of them and I just wait with a blank piece of paper to see, uh, what might come to me, ideas or for writing or for my life or whatever.<\/span><\/p>\n

And, uh. Uh, that seems to be a, to listen to poetry and, uh, with, um, the text there and, um, and a blank piece of paper next to that that, you know, just to see what you might want to put down as a inspiration from, uh, from the, uh, poetry, the being read out loud. There’s a great, uh, connection I think between a voice saying the poem and your eardrum and your writing ability too.<\/span><\/p>\n

So it’s a very intimate thing going on, I think between the, a spoken voice and a listening ear, you know, and the. Well, Rumi has a poem about listening. He says, uh, you should give more of your time to the deep listening. And, uh, there’s a implied of sort of practice there that you can go deeper into your own inwardness, your own soul and heart, and, uh, by listening And, uh, I don’t really have a practice except writing the poetry, my own, and, and these, uh, rephrasing of Rumi.<\/span><\/p>\n

Uh, that’s the only thing that I’m really faithfully, uh, attentive to every day. I, I don’t do meditation. Oh, 20 minutes here and there, but, uh, not so you would call it the practice, but, uh, I do the writing every day. I give time to that. And, uh, I would recommend anybody that wants to do writing that you just don’t wait to be inspired.<\/span><\/p>\n

Try to coax inspiration out of you. And you can do that by listening to any number. Sounds true. Um, productions<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> alright, Coleman?<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Yeah? Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Okay.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> You do good work, Tammy.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Now, you know, I wanna end actually by listening to a piece from one of my favorite. CDs Coleman. This is from God, almost 20 years ago that we recorded this 15 years ago.<\/span><\/p>\n

Mm-hmm. It’s called, I Want Burning the Ecstatic World of Rumi, Hafi and Lala in just a moment. We’ll hear that. But before we do, I, I wanna say how happy I am to be speaking with you, especially some of our listeners may know this, some people may not. But you had a stroke. What just did? I did<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> in February.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Yeah. I mean, less than a year ago. And you’re doing so fabulously<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Well, yeah. I can hear, you know, glitches and halts in my voice and, uh, I’m sorry about that. But, um, it’s just, uh, the way of the world, the way of the body, uh, the, but I’m, I’m very, very lucky to be able to, uh, speak with any fluency at all. And, uh.<\/span><\/p>\n

So I’m, I’m proud to be here.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> I’m wondering if the experience changed you in any way. I mean, all experience changes us, but how this experience changed you?<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> Uh, it makes me feel more, um, fragile, well, more broken open, more, less, um, glib, as I say, less, um, and less, um, proud of myself. Uh, it ought to make things funnier, but it don’t, I don’t think it does.<\/span><\/p>\n

You know, having a stroke is a strange experience because. It doesn’t hurt, you know, you don’t know you’re having it unless you happen to be, as I was talking on the phone to my sweetie Lisa Star, and I was just talking and became unintelligible, you know? So immediately I drove myself to the, um, emergency room and, um, checked myself in and got that, uh, treatment called TPA.<\/span><\/p>\n

I think that only 2% of the stroke victims get there in time to have, but, uh, it, uh, it helps you to recuperate and recover, um, much better than you would otherwise. So I’ve been very fortunate and, uh, that’s part of my sense of things too. Uh, the change since that I feel just. Were very lucky and, uh, I kind know, I guess sort of quiet, uh, a little quieter than I was before.<\/span><\/p>\n

Uh, and I, at least I hear it in my voice and, uh, I can Sure. The, uh, people listening to can hear the difference between the recorded voice before the stroke and, and my voice now.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> But it’s very, very minor, very minor comment, resonant, bus<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> resonant. Anyway,<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> it’s very minor and I feel so, so happy that me too, six months later.<\/span><\/p>\n

And, you know, it’s, it’s curious because you, you mentioned when Guru Bawa came to you in a dream that you thought I was so lucky. And here you were able to drive yourself immediately and, and mm-hmm. Receive a treatment that only 2% of the, I feel so lucky. And I mean, do you, do you, is do you think, I mean, is luck just what it is on face value?<\/span><\/p>\n

I mean,<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> no. I mean, I, I would don’t mind using the word grace. You know, it’s, it’s a gift. Uh, I don’t know what kind of a, um hmm. Presence is, uh, we are living within. But, uh, I feel the gift of that, uh, more, it is more precious to me, uh, because of this, uh, stroke. Uh, I think it’s the grace is just always happening, it feels like to me.<\/span><\/p>\n

And, uh, it’s a, and that’s certainly what rumi’s poetry is. It, it’s just filled with that sense of gratitude and, and gracefulness and a sense of, uh, kind of hilarity about the whole thing. Uh. Anyway, let’s hear the,<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> this is a, this is a piece, it’s called like this. Uh, oh. Yeah. I just love this piece. And, uh, this whole actual recording, it’s a live recording where you were performing down in Santa Fe, and I often refer to this production.<\/span><\/p>\n

I want Burning the ecstatic world of Rumi, Hafi and Lala as a little jewel. The whole CD is a little jewel. Let’s listen.<\/span><\/p>\n

Music:<\/b> One thing Rumi does, um, it’s amazing. He, um, talks about, uh, the terms of spirituality and he grounds them in the reality of an experience. He says that all the terms like spirit and um, guide and all those things, they have their God’s fragrance.<\/span><\/p>\n

Those things have a refer to something experiential as real as a. A friend of yours who thought you thought were was out of town surprising you by putting his head around the corner of your door. Is that real?<\/span><\/p>\n

If anyone asks you how the perfect satisfaction of all our sexual wanting will look, lift your face. And say like this, when someone mentions the gracefulness of the night sky, climb up on the roof and dance and say like this. If you want to know what spirit means or what God’s fragrance is, lean your head toward him or her.<\/span><\/p>\n

Keep your face there close like this.<\/span><\/p>\n

When someone quotes the old poetic image about clouds, gradually uncovering the moon, slowly loosen not by not the strings of your robe like this.<\/span><\/p>\n

If anyone wants to know how Jesus raised the dead. Don’t try to explain the miracle. Kiss me on the lips like this. Like this.<\/span><\/p>\n

When someone asks what it means to die for love, point here.<\/span><\/p>\n

If someone asks how tall I am, frown and measure with your fingers the space between the creases on your forehead. This tall,<\/span><\/p>\n

the soul sometimes leaves the body and then returns. When someone doesn’t believe that. Walk back into my house like this.<\/span><\/p>\n

When lovers moan, they’re telling our story like this. I’m a sky where spirits live. Stare into this deepening blue while the breeze says a secret like this,<\/span><\/p>\n

when someone asks what there is to do, light the candle in his hand like this. How did Joseph scent come to Jacob? Who.<\/span><\/p>\n

How did Jacob’s sight return?<\/span><\/p>\n

A little wind cleans the eyes like this.<\/span><\/p>\n

When Shams comes back from tab, he’ll put just his head around the edge of the door to surprise us like this.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> And Coleman, uh, just like this, this moment, sharing this time with you, I just wanna thank you so much for, uh, being here with me, for all of the work that you’ve done, really to bring Rumi to so many of us. I mean, I, there are no words to describe how it was a great<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> pleasure,<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> how valuable it is.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> And thank you for your work.<\/span><\/p>\n

You’re doing such a beautiful job on this, uh, three CD set. It’s just this perfectly done, very lovingly done. And uh, so thanks for that, babe.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Thank you.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coleman Barks:<\/b> And I love you. Okay,<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> Coleman Barks and David Darling recently releasing a three CD collection, which sounds true, called Just Being Here. Rumi and Human Friendship.<\/span><\/p>\n

A beautiful, beautiful collection as well with Coleman Barks. Sounds True. Has two previous releases we just heard from. I Want Burning the ecstatic World of Rumi, Hafi and Lala, and also a previous release called Rumi, voice of Longing that has Marcus Wise on the Tabla. And David Wetstone on Satar Coleman.<\/span><\/p>\n

God bless you. Thank you so much. Thank you. Be well. Okay. Bye-bye. See you later. Thank you for listening to Insights at the Edge. You can read a full transcript of today’s interview at soundstrue.com\/podcast, and if you’re interested, hit the subscribe button in your podcast app and also if you feel inspired, head to iTunes and leave Insights at the Edge a review. I love getting your feedback, being in connection with you, and learning how we can continue to evolve and improve our program working together. I believe we can create a kinder and wiser world. Sounds true.com. Waking up the world.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"template":"","meta":{"_expiration-date-status":"","_expiration-date":0,"_expiration-date-type":"","_expiration-date-categories":[],"_expiration-date-options":[]},"class_list":["post-24972","transcript","type-transcript","status-publish","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\n[ENCORE EPISODE] Coleman Barks: Rumi, Grace, and Human Friendship | Sounds True<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"[ENCORE EPISODE] Coleman Barks: Rumi, Grace, and Human Friendship | Sounds True\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Tami Simon: This encore edition is a tribute to Coleman Barks, who at 88 years of age, died on February 23rd, 2026. 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