Death is alive and well in Rumi’s poetry. Whether the thirteenth century Persian mystic addresses the death of the physical body or the death of the imperious ego, his conceptions are liberating, ushering us into a more relaxed state of existence.

“Death grinds me to dust,” he writes. It grinds the whole material world to dust, he knows, inviting us to ease our grip: “We’re fodder for death, so learn to laugh from the angel of death. He laughs at the jeweled belts and crowns of kings—all that splendor’s just on loan.”

Dust aside, death is not an ending, he insists, but an ecstatic reunion with the divine. “When we die, we marry eternity. The secret revealed: God, us, All—One.” From this blissful, anxiety-free vision of the afterlife, he writes, “My mouth closes in this world and opens in the other. A shout of joy echoes through the placeless sky.”

Fana—the other death pervading Rumi’s poetry, often defined as ego death—is a coveted state in Sufi mysticism. In fana, the aspect of self that is prone to greed, pettiness, and narcissism is shed. To exit “the prison of circumspection and calculation,” to “play deaf when greed groans,” to muster generosity in the face of crisis, and to sense, uncover, and cultivate agape—that “shoreless, boundless sea of Love—is to die and be reborn. Fana is a death we experience again and again as we evolve into more expansive and compassionate states of being: “Die and die again in this Love,” he says, “You’ll live—your soul intact.”

Astounded by Rumi’s intelligence, warmth, and humor for years, I started translating his poems in 2016, and have since released two collections: Gold (2022) and Water (2025). The vast majority of the poems are from his book, the Divan I Shams. In its pages, we hear from Rumi’s many personas—the sage, the seeker, the ravaged lover, the concerned preacher. As he commands readers to do in one of his poems, I have eaten his poetry. I’ve let it flow through my blood, nourish me, and it has liberated me in ways I hadn’t expected. The first poem I ever translated was on the subject of death, which he likely composed during his final days, likely on his deathbed. Here is an excerpt, followed by more from both Gold and Water.

If wheat sprouts from my grave,
And if you bake bread from it,
expect to get drunk.

The baker and the dough will lose their minds.
The oven will rattle off ecstatic verse.

If you make a pilgrimage to my grave
and stand on my burial mound,
expect to dance.

Don’t come to my grave without a drum, my friend.
A feast with God is no place for sadness.

Asleep in my grave, mouth sewn shut,
I chew the Beloved’s sweet opium.

If you tear the death shroud from me,
wrap it around you.
Open the tavern in your soul.

On every side,
drunkards brawl, drunkards sing.
One action breeds another.

God gave me life, gave me the wine of Love.
Death grinds me to dust,
and I am still that love.

I am the drunkenness born in the wine of Love.
Tell me, what is the wine of love,
but the ecstasy of loving?

To the heights of the soul of Shams al Din,
my soul flies without delay.

Your laughter turns the world to paradise.
It tears through me like fire.
It teaches me. 

Reborn in emptiness,
I emerge laughing,
here to learn from Love
new depths of laughter. 

I’ve been short on courage,
but I have a heart of sunlight,
straight from the king’s hand.
I stir up laughter even in those who fear joy. 

Crack open my shell. Steal the pearl.
I’ll still be laughing.
It’s the rookies who laugh only when they win. 

Last night, the spirit of dawn came to my room
and gave me a lesson in laughter.
Our blazing roars lit the morning sky. 

When I brood like a rain cloud,
laughter flashes through me.
It’s the habit of lightning to laugh through a storm. 

Look at the furnace. Look at the stones.
See the glowing red veins?
Gold—laughing in fire, daring you, 
“Prove you’re no fake! Laugh even when you lose.” 

We’re fodder for death so learn to laugh
from the angel of death.
He laughs at the jeweled belts and crowns of kings—
all that splendor’s just on loan. 

Treetop blossoms erupt in laughter.
Petals rain down. 

Laugh like the bud of a flower,
hugging the ground.
Its hidden smile opens to a laugh that lasts a lifetime. 

This time, I’m wrapped and entwined in Love.
This time, I’m free of worry,
no obsessions with self-preservation.

Thought, sense, reason—
I scorched them to the ground.
I tore my heart out. I’m still alive.

Nothing ordinary here, my friends.
Even the Love-drunk ecstatic would be shocked to feel what I feel.
Even the madman spilling stars would flee this pitch of ecstasy.

I linked arms with death
and leapt into emptiness.

My mind second-guessed me,
chased me down,
tried to scare me out of surrender.

Why should I be afraid?
I give form to formless fear.
I write its every rant.

Once, I lived in a prison of circumspection and calculation.
I thought I was being prudent and wise.
A prison. Why? What had I stolen?

I drowned in a sea of blood.
I wept like an untamed horse at bit and bridle.
I washed my blood-soaked clothes and mind in the soil.

Blood nourishes a baby in the womb.
Blood thunders in a baby’s ears.
Reborn so many times,
I know that music.

Come into my invisible dwelling.
See through my eyes.

Love’s wine flows here.
Drink with no mind
till you laugh with no mouth.

When we die, we marry eternity.
The secret revealed:
God, us, all—One.

Sunlight shining through a carved stone screen
splits. You can count the beams
through the source is one sun.

You can count the grapes in a cluster
but not the grapes in wine.

The light inside the body flickers and dies.
The Source shines on, eternal.

God—Creator—Unfathomable One—
you grant us vision.

A bird with hungry eyes
is flying towards you.

On the day I die,
when they carry me to my grave,
don’t be so sure I’m dying to come back!

Don’t weep for me, dear love.
Don't cry out, What a pity! How terrible!
You’re gone. You’re gone!

This leaving is an arrival,
a reunion.

Lower me into my grave
with no goodbye.

If the grave is a cage,
the soul flies free of it.

If the grave is a curtain,
gardens blossom beyond it.

When the sun and moon set,
they climb another sky.
When you see me going down,
see me rising.

A bucket disappears in the well
and comes up full.
A seed is buried in the ground.
A flower sprouts.

Why imagine another fate
for the seed of the human soul?

My mouth closes in this world
and opens in the other.

A shout of joy echoes
through the placeless sky. ♦

Adapted from Gold (2022) and Water (2025). Poems by Rumi, translations by Haleh Liza Gafori. Reprinted by permission of NYRB Classics. Copyright © 2025 by Haleh Liza Gafori.