What Perfection!

Lesson 289: What Perfection!

The second you stepped into this world of existence
A ladder was placed before you to help you escape it.
First, you were mineral; then you transformed into a plant;
Then you became an animal. (How could you not know this?)
Then you changed yet again, and became a human being
Endowed with divine consciousness, reason, faith.
Look at your body, made from dust: what perfection it has!

- Jalal-ud-Din Rumi

(Translated by Andrew Harvey from A Year of Rumi)