A thirsty man saw a stream of water deep down in a ravine. There was no way he could descend to the water, so he climbed into a walnut-tree and began dropping walnuts into the water far below.
Plop, plop, plop, plop. The walnuts dropped into the stream.
A passerby scoffed at him. "You will never raise the water that way!" he said.
The man in the tree smiled. "I know the water carries the walnuts away, but it's not about the walnuts or about the water. It is about listening to the sound as they fall. Plop, plop, plop."
Inspired by: The English prose version of Rumi in More Tales from the Masnavi by A. J. Arberry.
Notes: This is story 110 in the book. In the original story, the man also watches the bubbles on the surface of the stream, but I focused on the sound.
No comments:
Post a Comment