O enwrapped in thy cloak, stand up and warn! “O source of bounteousness, O rising place of beauty, O chosen by the Majestic! O you who have pulled the cloak of mortal nature over your head and covered yourself with the rug of human na- ture. If you want proximity to Me, stand up through Me and drop from yourself everything other than Me. Rise up from yourself and rise up from your own rising up! Flee to the sanctuary of My exaltedness! Lift off the cloak of mortal nature from yourself, remove the rug of human nature from the road of the heart so that the heart may be a vast plain! Let it fly like a bird in the world of desire on the air of seeking until it arrives at the nest of proximity.” A great man was asked, “What is the meaning of proximity?” “If you mean the servant's proximity to the Real, expressing that is easy and alluding to it simple: It is service in seclusion, hidden from the people; the unveiling of the Haqiqah, hidden from the angels; immersion in companionship, hidden from oneself. “If you are talking about the Real's proximity to the servant, that cannot be put into words, nor do expression and allusion have any access to it. It is nothing but what He Himself says: 'Surely I am near [2:186]: Unsought, uncalled, unperceived, I am near. Compared to My closeness, the eye's blackness is distant from the eye's whiteness, for I am nearer than that, and the breath is far from the lips, for I am nearer than that. I am not near to your intellect's preserve, for I am near to My own attributes in the description of My own firstness.'” The Pir of the Tariqah said, “If people were to see the light of proximity in the recognizer, they would all be burned away, and if the recognizer were to see the light of proximity in himself, he would burn away. The knowledge of proximity does not fit into tongue and ear. It is a narrow road, and proximity disdains companionship with the tongue's water and clay. Whenever proxim- ity shows its face, how can the universe and man wait around?” As long as you are with you, what good is this talk to you? For this is the Fountain of Life, the world disowned.
