EARLY PERSIAN SUFI POETS: LIVES & POEMS Translations & Introductions Paul Smith CONTENTS: Introduction... Sufis & Dervishes: Their Art and Use of Poetry... The Main Forms in Persian Sufi & Dervish Poetry. Included with each selection of a poet is a brief biography plus a list of further reading. The correct rhyme-structure has been kept as well as the beauty and meaning of these beautiful, mystical poems. THE POETS... Rudaki, Baba Tahir, Abu Said, Ibn Sina, Baba Kuhi, Ansari, Al-Ghazzali, Hamadani, Sana'i, Mahsati, Khaqani, Mu'in, Ruzbihan, Baghdadi. Pages 91. Introduction to Sufi Poets...

AFGHAN SUFI POETS: LIVES & POEMS Translations & Introductions Paul Smith Introduction includes... The Main Forms in Dari/Persian, and Pashtu Poetry; Sufis & Dervishes: Their Art and Use of Poetry. Included with each selection of a particular poet is a brief biography plus a list of further reading. The correct rhyme-structure has been kept as well as the beauty and meaning of these beautiful and powerful mystical poems. THE POETS... Mirza, Khushal Khan Khattak, Ashraf Khan, Bedil, Abdul-Kadir, Rahman Baba, Khwaja Mohammad, Hamid, Ahmad Shah, Shaida, Khalili. 92 pages. Introduction to Sufi...

'AISHAH AL-BA'UNIYAH: Life & Poems Translation & Introduction Paul Smith 'Aishah al-Ba'uniyah (1457 - 1517) came from the village of Ba'un in the south of Syria. Her family were well-known and respected religious scholars and poets. She surpassed her father and brothers in her poetry, scholarship and renown. As a young woman she went to Mecca where she had a vision of Prophet Mohammed. All her family were Sufis connected to the Qadir'iyah order. She had two spiritual masters Jamal al-Din Isma'il al-Hawwari and Muhyi al-Din Yayha al-Urnwari. The first she praised in her famous qasida. Her...

A QUILT OF WOMEN SPIRITUAL POETS OF THE MIDDLE-EAST & INDIA Translation & Introduction Paul Smith This is the largest anthology of women mystical poets of the Middle East & India in the correct form of the poetry and the meaning ever published. It covers the years from the 8th to the 20th century. Here are poems full of longing, loving, faith and despair, pain and bliss, realization and depression... always honest, always real and at times... inspiring and helpful on the spiritual path. Here are Sufis, dervishes, princesses, a naked fakir, prisoners, scholars, lovers, devotees... but, always,...

Anthology of Sufi & Folk Strophe Poems of Persia & the Indian Sub-Continent Translation & Introduction Paul Smith A Persian tarji-band consists of a series of stanzas or strophes each containing a variable but equal, or nearly equal, number of couplets all in one rhyme... as in the ghazal and qasida, these stanzas being separated from each other by a series of isolated rhyming couplets that mark the end of each strophe. If the same couplet (or refrain) is repeated at the end of each band, or strophe, the poem is a tarji-band, or 'return-tie'. If on the other hand the couplets concluding each...

A BOOK OF QUATRAINS FOR THE ONE Paul Smith The quatrain (ruba'i in the east) is an ancient form of poetry of four lines in which usually the first, second and fourth lines rhyme and sometimes with the radif (refrain) after the rhyme words... sometimes all four rhyme. Each quatrain is a separate poem in itself. It should be eloquent, spontaneous and ingenious. Every major and most minor poet of Persia and Turkey and India composed at some times in the ruba'i form, Omar Khayyam being the most famous. Paul Smith, an Australian poet, has translated all the major Sufi and other poets of this form...

THE BOOK OF JAHAN KHATUN The Persian Princess Sufi Poet & Friend of Hafiz Translation & Introduction Paul Smith Daughter of the king of one of Shiraz's most turbulent times (14th century) Masud Shah; pupil and lifelong friend of the world's greatest mystical, lyric poet, Hafiz of Shiraz; the object of crazed desire by (among others) Iran's greatest satirist, the obscene, outrageous, visionary poet Obeyd Zakani; lover, then wife of womanizer Amin al-Din a minister of one of Persia's most loved, debauched and tragic rulers Abu Ishak; imprisoned for twenty years while her daughter mysteriously...

BHAGAVAD GITA Revised into Modern English by Paul Smith from the original Sanskrit by Shri Purohit Swami. Introductions to Chapters by Charles Johnston The Bhagavad Gita is the single most famous poem in the ancient literature of India. It is equally celebrated as the highest spiritual philosophy and poetry. It constitutes the beginning and in a sense the end of any true knowledge of Indian mysticism. The translator refers to it as 'The Bible of India'. The Guardian said of this translation in 1935 when it was first published: "A beautiful rendering, and gives the reader a clearer and more...

THE BOOK OF PARVIN ETESAMI Translation & Introduction Paul Smith Parvin Etesami (1907-1941) was one of Iran's greatest female poets. She left Tabriz for Tehran with her family in 1912 and then lived in Tehran. She learned Arabic and Persian literature from her father, a well-known literary figure. She composed her first poems in the classical style at eight and knew most Iranian poets by the time she was eleven, having a remarkable memory. She passed high school and taught for two years and was then a librarian in Tehran University. She refused to work in the royal court. Her first collection...

THE BOOK OF BABA FARID Translation & Introduction Paul Smith The father of Punjabi poetry Baba Farid (1173-1266) was born in the Punjab. Khwaja Bakhtiar Kaki was Baba Farid's Spiritual Master. Kaki met Mu'in ud-din Chishti at Baghdad and became his disciple. The king at Delhi, Balban, welcomed Farid in Delhi. His daughter married Farid. Baba Farid, the Sufi Master poet laureate from Punjab is famous for his wise and spiritual couplets (slokas)... 112 of them are in the bible of the Sikhs (whom he influenced) the Guru Granth, and 128 are translated here with the correct rhyme-structure and...