The Masnavi, book one

"Rumi, known in Iran and Central Asia as Mowlana Jalaloddin Balkhi, was born in 1207 in the province of Balkh, now the border region between Afghanistan and Tajikistan. Rumi expressed a new vision of reality in volumes of mystical poetry. His enormous collection of lyrical poetry is considered one of the best that has ever been produced, while his poem in rhyming couplets, the Masnavi, is so reversed as the most consummate expression of Sufi mysticism that it is commonly referred to as 'the Koran in Persian'."--BOOK JACKET.