Kabir - Inside Out Poem by Michael Maxwell Steer

If God is within the mosque, who is without?
If Ram is the object of your pilgrimage,
who journeys with you? Are the devout
rewarded only by place and image?

Hari is in the east you claim. To find
Allah go west. Yet if Karim and Ram
exist, don't seek an answer on the wind,
it's only in your hearts you'll find that calm.

All men and women living on the earth
are children of Allah & Ram. I, Kabir
am but one of many who have found rebirth:
within my heart the Guru speaks, my Pir.


Original poem by the 15thC mystical poet Kabir (Bk3.2) , translated by Rabindranath Tagore and Kshiti Mohan Sen (#69) . Versed by MMS 5/12/10