1. The realms of speech are in my possession, the banker of speech is the jeweller of my pearl strings.
2. Creation's preface is a sheet of my book, the secrets of both worlds are in the nib of my pen.
A stream from the ocean of thought passes by his house; correctness and equity are visible on his forehead. Serenity and truth are in him united; he is free from the bad qualities of poets.
1. Whenever you speak, watch yourself; repentance follows every word which gladdens no heart.
2. You do not require the swift wing of a bird; but since fortune is so, borrow the foot of the ant and flee.
A love sick man is so entangled in his grief, that even the wish of getting rid of it does him harm.
Whatever you see is, in some way or other, a highway robber. I know no man that has not been way-laid.
1. This is the thoroughfare of love, it is no open market; keep your lips closed, no talk is required.
2. I, too, have been among the heathens, but have seen no waist worthy of the sacred thread.
3. Covetous people are, from covetousness, each other's enemies; in friendship alone there are no rivals.
1. Let every thorn which people sow in thy road, bloom in the lustre of thy smiles.
2. Say nothing, and heal the wound of the heart with poisoned arrows.
1. My love makes me delay over everything, even if it were a scent in the house, or a colour in the bazar.
2. Thou knowest what people call me—‘mad from shame, and dejected from baseness.’
Since everything which I mended has broken again, my heart has gone altogether from trying to patch it.
1. I suffer thy cruelties and die; perhaps I thus complete my faithfulness.
2. Thou canst not deprive me of the means of union with thee, unless thou shuttest the zephyr in a box.*
This turf and this field have a tinge of madness; insanity and drunkenness have to-day a good omen.
1. Love-grief is followed by an increase of sorrow, the desire to meet him is followed by bloody tears.
2. Neither the one nor the other, however, is the means of attaining love's perfection; be sound in mind, or else, completely mad.
1. I am neither as high as the Pleiades, nor as low as the abyss; I neither cherish the old grief, nor do I possess a new thought.
2. If I am not the wailing nightingale, there is yet this excellence left, I am the moth and am pledged to the flame.*
1. I am the heart-grief of my dark nights, I am the misfortune of the day of my fate.
2. Perhaps I may go a step back to myself; it is a long time that I have been waiting for myself.
He possesses taste and writes well. He is acquainted with chronology and the ordinary sciences; and the purity of his nature led him to philosophical independence.*
I have lived through nights of lonely sorrow, and am still alive; I had no idea of the tenaciousness of my life.
Grief, not mirth, is my ware. Why dost thou wish to know its price? I know that thou wilt not buy it, and that I shall not sell it.
On account of the jealousy of the watcher I had resolved to stay away from thy feast. I was deceived by my bad luck and called it jealousy, and stayed away.
O God, bestow upon my wares a market from the unseen world! I would sell my heart for a single interview; vouchsafe a buyer!
Thou art warm with my love; and in order to keep off bad omens, I sit over the fire, and burn myself as wild rue.*
I uprooted my heart from my being, but the burden of my heart did not leave my being. I severed my head from my body, but my shoulders did not leave my collar.
1. To-day, when the cup of union with thee is full to the brim, I see Neglect sharpen the sword, in order to kill me.
2. Thou dost not dwell in my heart and hast girded thy loins with hatred towards me,—ruin upon the house which raises enemies!
1. The plaintive song of my bird [heart] turns the cage to a rosebed; the sigh of the heart in which thou art, turns to a rosebed.
2. When thy beauty shines forth, covetousness also is love; straw, when going up in flames, turns to a rosebed.
1. Happy are we if we come to thee, through thee; like blind men we search for thee, through thee.
2. Increase thy cruelties till the tenaciousness of my life takes revenge on me, and thy cold heart on thee.
1. The world is a game, the winning of which is a loss; playing cleverly consists in being satisfied with a low throw.
2. This earthly life is like a couple of dice—you take them up, in order to throw them down again.
His real name is Yol Qulí. He is a man of a happy heart and of pure manners; he is brave and sincere.
In seeking after thee, a condition is put upon us miserable lovers, viz. that our feet remain unacquainted with the hems of our garments.*
It is possible to travel along this road, even when one lightning only flashes. We blind lovers are looking for the ray of thy lamp.
If I remain restless even after my death, it is no wonder; for toil undergone during the day makes the sleep of the night restless.
1. How can the thought of thy love end with my death? for love is not like wine, which flows from the vessel when it is broken.
2. The lover would not snatch his life from the hand of death, though he could. Why should the owner of the harvest take the grain from the ant?
1. The rosebed of time does not contain a songster like me, and yet it is from the corner of my cage that I have continually to sing.
2. In order satisfactorily to settle my fortune, I spent a life in hard work; but with all my mastership I have not been able to draw silk from reeds.
The nature of love resembles that of the magnet; for love first attracts the shaft, in order to wound the heart when it wishes to get rid of the point.
May God preserve all men from falling into my circumstances! for my sufferings keep the rose from smiling and the nightingale from singing.
Love has disposed of me, but I do not yet know who the buyer is, and what the price is.
Anísí drinks the blood of his heart, and yet the vessel is never empty; it seems as if, at the banquet of love's grief, the red wine rises from the bottom of the goblet.
1. I am intoxicated with love, do not bring me wine; throw me into the fire, do not bring me water.
2. Whether I complain or utter reproaches, I address him alone, do not answer me.
1. I went away, in order to walk a few steps on the path of destruction, and to tear a few ties that bind me to existence.
2. I will spend a few days without companions, and will pass a few nights without a lamp till morning make its appearance.
1. O heart, beware! O heart, beware! Thus should it be: the hand of asking ought to be within the sleeve.*
2. O that I could but once catch a certain object! the hunter is for ever in the ambush.
He possesses poetical talent, and the garden of thought has a door open for him. Outwardly he is a good man; but he also devises plans for the architecture of the heart.
Every place, whether nice or not, appears pleasant to me: I either rejoice in my sweetheart, and grieve for him.
If thou destroyest the ware of my heart, thy loss is for once; whilst to me it would be the loss of world and faith.
If thou wilt not put my cage below the rose tree, put it in a place where the meadow hears my plaint.
It is from kindness that he [the beautiful boy] favours me, not from love; I can distinguish between friendship and politeness.
It is a generation that I have been girding my waist in thy service, and what am I worth? I must have become a Brahman, so often have I put on the badge (the thread).
Thy blood is worth nothing, Nazírí, be silent! Suffice it that he who slew thee, has no claim against thee.
I am costly and there are no buyers; I am a loss to myself, and am yet the ornament of the bazar.
The impression which my sorrow makes upon him, consists in depriving his heart of all sympathy; and the peculiar consequence of my reminding him of my love is that he forgets it.
Like a watch-dog I lie at his threshold; but I gnaw the whole night at my collar, and think of chasing him, not of watching him.
1. From carelessness of thought I transformed a heart, by the purity of which the Ka'bah swore, into a Firingí church.