A reed is torn from its bed and made into a flute, and its song is the longing of every soul separated from its source. Rumi began composing this vast spiritual poem around 1258 in Konya, dictating its six books over the final years of his life, producing one of the most expansive works in the Persian language. Parables nest inside parables: a shopkeeper argues with a parrot, a lion hunts with a wolf, a lover knocks on a door and learns that he and the beloved are one. The verse moves between earthy comedy and mystical transport without warning, because for Rumi there is no boundary between the sacred and the ordinary. Everything is a door. The Masnavi opens it again and again, inviting the reader to step through.