The Cloister Of Retreat Poem by Mystic Qalandar

I choose silence
over the restless stirrings of my mind,
over the blossoms that open
and fall within my thoughts,
over the rivers of my poems
that once sought to run
into every open ear.

The world's clamor
calls to me still—
its questions,
its applause,
its demands for one more verse.

But I have learned the beauty
of a closed gate,
the strength of an unspoken word,
the fragrance of a garden
no stranger may enter.

Tell them gently—
I am not lost,
I have not vanished into annihilation.
I have gone
where music is unbroken
by the weight of speech,
where light pools quietly in my heart,
and time no longer presses its thumb
against the pulse of my dervish ways.

I have entered the cloister of retreat,
where only the nightingale of rūh recites its prayers,
and listens to its own song—
a song affirming I am
not the reflection but the light source,
a spark carrying the whole fire.