In my soul there is a temple --- Sufi mystic Rabia al Basri

“In my soul there is a temple, a shrine, a mosque, a church where I kneel.

Prayer should bring us to an altar where no walls or names exist.

Is there not a region of love

where the sovereignty is illumined nothing,

where ecstasy gets poured into itself and becomes lost,

where the wing is fully alive but has no mind or body?

In my soul there is a temple, a shrine, a mosque, a church

that dissolve, that dissolve in God.

By Rabia of Basra (c. 717-801)

who is considered the most popular and influential female Muslim saint in the Sufi tradition.

Born nearly 500 years before Maulana Jalaludin Rumi,

she - perhaps more than any other poet - is said to have influenced his writing.

This poem has come via Jessica Morrison on Facebook

And from Lyndon Marcotte’s blog, InHabitude