IF YOU SHOW PATIRNCE
If you show patience,
I'll rid you of this virtue.
I'll rid you of this virtue.
If you fall asleep,
I'll rub the sleep from your eyes.
I'll rub the sleep from your eyes.
If you become a mountain,
I’ll melt you in fire.
I’ll melt you in fire.
And if you become an ocean,
I'll drink all your water.
I'll drink all your water.
Analysis and Review of the poem by OKORO AMARACHI ANASTASIA
This is a short meaningful poem written by Mewlana Jalaluddin Rumi. This poem paradoxical in nature. The poet employ a powerful imagery as a great poetic tool to picture its message in the mind of the readers. The tone of the speaker is rigid and confrontational, as it language is simple. There is no rhyming at the end of each line, it only exist in the beginning of each line due the repetition of the word “if you…”
The figurative devices apply in the poem, include Repetition (see in line 1-4 “If you”, and I’ll in line 1-4), Hyperbole (see in line 3-4 “If you become a mountain, I'll melt you in fire. And if you become an ocean, I'll drink all your water.), metaphor (such as mountain and ocean metaphors which represent the impossible obstacles that patience can conquer.) allegory and personification, etc.
Theme of the poem centered on patience, strength of the divine and endurance. The erosion of virtue of fragility of human nature and presence of insurmountable presence of divine force, having control and dominion over the former. The contradiction and tension that exist in the poem put every reader that unease as they question it balance.