Rumi Does Not Answer

Konya, an unusual spring. Almond blossoms bloom ahead of schedule, and pilgrims arrive early, perhaps because they are weary of waiting for peace that has yet to arrive in places they do not even understand.

Among the pilgrims, there was a man named Taha, forty-two years old, a freelance journalist from Amman, Jordan. He did not come to pilgrimage. He came because he was weary. For the past two years, he had moved from Gaza to Aleppo, then to Beirut, writing about things that could no longer be written. He was tired of seeing children cry amidst the rubble of buildings. More than that, he feared that his heart could no longer feel anything.

He rented a small room near the tomb of Jalaluddin Rumi. The room is located on the second floor of an old wooden house, its walls adorned with images of birds and Persian poetry, displayed like a carpet that has been washed too often. The owner of the house, an elderly woman named Fatma, does not speak much. She only serves black tea and a piece of flatbread every morning.

Everyone comes here with burdens.

“Everyone comes here with a burden,” Fatma said on the first day, “but not everyone goes home lighter.”

Taha nodded, although he wasn't sure he wanted to go home.

Every morning, he sits in front of Rumi's grave. He does not pray, nor does he cry. He simply remains silent. Around him, the pilgrims weep, pray, and touch the marble with tears. But Taha just sits. Sometimes he reads. Sometimes he sleeps. Occasionally, he writes short notes in a pocketbook that has become dirty from cigarette ash.

"Palestine is not a map. It is the voice of mothers who cannot scream," he wrote one morning.

Or: “Iran and Israel stare at each other like two old men who have forgotten why they are fighting.”

He doesn't write for others to read. He writes because otherwise his hands would die.

One afternoon, as the sky in Konya began to turn a pale gray, Taha met a woman. Her name was Ameenah, a young woman from Qatif, Saudi Arabia. She wore a dark blue hijab and carried an Arabic edition of Rumi, the pages marked with small folds. They sat in the park, with no intention to speak, but eventually did—like two people who were nearly drowning and happened to hold onto the same branch.

"Why read Rumi?" Ameenah asked.

“Nothing,” Taha replied. “Because Rumi just wanted to dance in silence.”

Ameenah laughed. “But we can’t dance anymore.”

They began to speak more. About Shia and Sunni, about the suicide bombings in Damascus, about the refugee camp in Rafah, about a mother who cannot read poetry but believes that dhikr can heal emotional wounds.

Taha did not explain that his father was killed at the border for being accused of smuggling books. He only said, "I do not know what can be salvaged from poetry."

And Ameenah answered, "Sometimes we don't save poetry. Poetry saves us."

In the following days, they walked together. Not like a couple in love, but like two strangers who had no one else. They read poetry in the park, shared cigarettes, sat by the night market, and discussed verses whose meanings had been forgotten.

His father did not want his son to sit with people who believed in Ali too much.

Ameenah recounted that she was on the verge of getting married, but it was called off due to differences in sect. "Her father did not want his daughter to sit with someone who holds Ali in too high regard."

Taha responded, "My mother cannot distinguish between Sunni and Shia. She said that when everyone is hungry, all people pray in the same language."

Sometimes they laugh, sometimes they remain silent. But there are no demands for more than that. There are no plans. There is no future. Only the present—and Rumi's tomb that remains silent.

He left without breakfast. He sat in front of Rumi's grave longer than usual. He was waiting for something. Perhaps a voice. Perhaps comfort. But all that came was the wind.

Ameenah came later.

“They died,” Taha said. “And here I am, reading poetry.”

Ameenah did not answer. He just sat. They were silent for a long time.

“Why did we come here?” Taha muttered.

“Maybe because we want to believe that love can still explain the world,” Ameenah replied.

Taha smiled bitterly. “But Rumi didn’t answer.”

That night, it rained. The roof of the room leaked. Taha could not sleep. He wrote a letter, though to whom he did not know. Perhaps to Ameenah. Perhaps to the children who did not have the chance to grow up. Perhaps to Rumi.

"If love is God, why does he allow all this?

If poetry is a bridge, why does it never arrive?

Is dance enough to replace the grave?”

He placed the letter under the pillow and then went out. The city was already quiet. He walked to the cemetery. Without footwear. The rain soaked his hair and face. He stood in front of the cold marble and then whispered:

“If you’re here, Rumi, please tell me just one thing. What should we do when the world is cracking apart?”

There was no answer. Only the rustle of rain and the wind from the south.

She cried. But her cry was not a scream. Just water falling without a sound. Like a poem lost in the waves.

Don't look for me in the tombstones. I'm not there. I live in the breath you breathe.

The next morning, Ameenah found the letter. She read it slowly. Her expression did not change. She folded the paper, placed it in her Rumi book, and then left.

He searched for Taha in the park, at the tea stall, in front of the grave. But he was nowhere to be found. Even Fatma did not know where he had gone.

"Maybe he's already gone home," said Fatma.

Ameenah looked up at the sky. There was a bird passing by—alone, slowly.

He didn't cry. He just sat. Opened Rumi's book. Reading one outdated sentence:

“Don’t look for me in the tombstones. I’m not there. I live in the breath you breathe.”

He closed the book. Then stood up and walked home.

On the road, he wrote one sentence on a used ticket paper:

"Maybe Rumi didn't answer. But his silence was a voice that refused to join in the hatred."

And for the first time, Ameenah felt like she wasn't alone.

Muhammad Aswar, Arabic literature enthusiast and Middle Eastern studies observer. Speaker at LIFEs Salihara 2021. Translated Nizar Qabbani's poem, Love Doesn't Stop at a Red Light (Circa, 2021); Albert Einstein's Letter to God (Circa, 2023); Civil Disobedience by Henry David Thoreau (Basabasi, 2024); Max Havelaar by Multatuli (Basabasi, 2025).