Alberto Caeiro Quotes

What comes, when it comes, will be what it is.

I’d like to have enough time and quiet To think about absolutely nothing, To not ever feel myself living, To only know myself in others’ eyes, reflected.

I don’t regret anything I was before because I still am. I only regret not having loved you. Put your hands in mine And let’s be quiet, surrounded by life.

Se depois de eu morrer, quiserem escrever a minha biografia, não há nada mais simples. Têm só duas datas: a da minha nascença e a da minha morte. Entre uma e outra coisa, todos os dias são meus

Accept the universe As the gods gave it to you. If the gods wanted to give you something else They’d have done it. If there are other matters and other worlds There are.

I don’t have a philosophy: I have senses... If I talk about Nature, it’s not because I know what it is, But because I love it, and that’s why I love it, Because when you love you never know what you love, Or why you love, or what love is. Loving is eternal innocence, And the only innocence is not thinking.

I'm one of my sensations.

It’s stranger than every strangeness And the dreams of all the poets And the thoughts of all the philosophers, That things are really what they seem to be And there’s nothing to understand.

She’s a manner of speaking. Even the flowers don’t come back, or the green leaves. There are new flowers, new green leaves. There are other beautiful days. Nothing comes back, nothing repeats itself, because everything is real.

And I find a happiness in the fact of accepting — In the sublimely scientific and difficult fact of accepting the inevitable natural.

The man stopped talking and was looking at the sunset. But what does someone who hates and loves want with a sunset?

I’m in no hurry: the sun and the moon aren’t, either. Nobody goes faster than the legs they have. If where I want to go is far away, I’m not there in an instant. (6/20/1919)

Even so, I’m somebody. I’m the Discoverer of Nature. I’m the Argonaut of true sensations. I bring a new Universe to the Universe Because I bring the Universe to itself.

I’m glad I see with my eyes and not the pages I’ve read.

Pouco me importa. Pouco me importa o quê? Não sei: pouco me importa.

They spoke to me of people, and of humanity. But I've never seen people, or humanity. I've seen various people, astonishingly dissimilar, Each separated from the next by an unpeopled space.

To love is to think. And I almost forget to feel only from thinking about her. I don’t know what I want at all, even from her, and I don’t think about anything but her. I have a great animated distraction. When I want to meet her, I almost feel like not meeting her, So I don’t have to leave her afterwards. And I prefer thinking about her, because it’s like I’m afraid of her. I don’t know what I want at all, and I don’t want to know what I want. All I want to do is think about her. I’m asking nothing of nobody, not even her, except to think.

Podem rezar latim sobre o meu caixão, se quiserem. Se quiserem, podem dançar e cantar à roda dele. Não tenho preferências para quando já não puder ter preferências. O que for, quando for, é que será o que é.

I’m in no hurry: the sun and the moon aren’t, either. Nobody goes faster than the legs they have. If where I want to go is far away, I’m not there in an instant.

Things don’t have significance: they only have existence. Things are the only hidden meaning of things.

Nature never remembers, that’s why she’s beautiful.

Other times when I hear the wind blow I feel that just hearing the wind blow makes it worth being born.

If I knew I was going to die tomorrow, And Spring came the day after tomorrow, I would die peacefully, because it came the day after tomorrow. If that’s its time, when else should it come? I like it that everything is real and everything is right; And I like that it would be like this even if I didn’t like it. And so, if I die now, I die peacefully Because everything is real and everything is right.

I pass and I stay, like the Universe.

Night doesn’t fall for my eyes But my idea of the night is that it falls for my eyes. Beyond my thinking and having any thoughts The night falls concretely And the shining of stars exists like it had weight.

Sinto uma alegria enorme Ao pensar que a minha morte não tem importância nenhuma.

Pensar incomoda como andar à chuva Quando o vento cresce e parece que chove mais.

There’s enough metaphysics in not thinking about anything.

I don’t always feel what I know I should feel. My thought crosses the river I swim very slowly Because the suit men made it wear weighs it down.

I don’t know what understanding myself is. I don’t look inside. I don’t believe I exist behind myself.

I love flowers for being flowers, directly. And I love trees for being trees without my thought.

Everything’s different from us. That’s why everything exists.

Water’s water and that’s why it’s beautiful.

the world wasn't made for us to think about it (to think is to have eyes that aren't well) but to look at it and be in agreement.

Todo o mal do mundo vem de nos importarmos uns com os outros,    Quer para fazer bem, quer para fazer mal.

quem ama nunca sabe o que ama Nem sabe por que ama, nem o que é amar ... Amar é a eterna inocência, E a única inocência não pensar...

On a whitely cloudy day I get sad, almost afraid, And I begin to meditate about problems I make up.

If I could take a bite of the whole world And feel it on my palate I’d be more happy for a minute or so... But I don’t always want to be happy. Sometimes you have to be Unhappy to be natural... Not every day is sunny. When there’s been no rain for a while, you pray for it to come. So I take unhappiness with happiness Naturally, like someone who doesn’t find it strange That there are mountains and plains And that there are cliffs and grass... What you need is to be natural and calm In happiness and in unhappiness, To feel like someone seeing, To think like someone walking, And when it’s time to die, remember the day dies, And the sunset is beautiful, and the endless night is beautiful... That’s how it is and that’s how it should be...

Amar é a eterna inocência, E a única inocência não pensar...

A beleza é o nome de qualquer cousa que não existe Que eu dou às cousas em troca do agrado que me dão. Não significa nada.

O meu misticismo é não querer saber. É viver e não pensar nisso.

The river of my village doesn’t make you think about anything. When you’re at its bank you’re only at its bank.

A stagecoach passed by on the road and went on; And the road didn’t become more beautiful or even more ugly. That’s human action on the outside world. We take nothing away and we put nothing back, we pass by and we forget; And the sun is always punctual every day. (5/7/14)

I think about this, not like someone thinking, but like someone breathing, And I look at flowers and I smile... I don’t know if they understand me Or if I understand them, But I know the truth is in them and in me And in our common divinity Of letting ourselves go and live on the Earth And carrying us in our arms through the contented Seasons And letting the wind sing us to sleep And not have dreams in our sleep.

O único sentido íntimo das cousas É elas não terem sentido íntimo nenhum.  

Pensar uma flor é vê-la e cheirá-la E comer um fruto é saber-lhe o sentido.

Sim, eis o que os meus sentidos aprenderam sozinhos: — As cousas não têm significação: têm existência. As cousas são o único sentido oculto das cousas.

Also at times, on the surface of streams, Water?bubbles form And grow and burst And have no meaning at all Except that they’re water?bubbles Growing and bursting.

A row of trees far away, there on the hillside. But what is it, a row of trees? It’s just trees. Row and the plural trees aren’t things, they’re names.

I consider a dream like I consider a shadow,” answered Caeiro, with his usual divine, unexpected promptitude. “A shadow is real, but it’s less real than a rock. A dream is real — if it weren’t, it wouldn’t be a dream — but less real than a thing. That’s what being real is like.

Ser poeta não é uma ambição minha. É a minha maneira de estar sozinho.

It’s an already inside outside, The philosophers say it’s the soul But it’s not the soul: it’s the animal or the man itself In its way of existing.

É talvez o último dia da minha vida. Saudei o sol, levantando a mão direita, Mas não o saudei, dizendo-lhe adeus, Fiz sinal de gostar de o ver antes: mais nada.

When I’m depressed, I read Caeiro — he’s my fresh air. I become very calm, content, faithful — yes, I find faith in God, and in the soul’s transcendent living smallness, after reading the poems by that ungodly anti-humanist who goes unsurpassed on earth.

What does a river know about this and what does a tree know? And I, who am no more than those, what do I know? Every time I look at things and think about what men think about them, I laugh like how a brook sounds cool on a stone.

He should be happy because he can think about the unhappiness of others! He’s stupid if he doesn’t know other people’s unhappiness is theirs, And isn’t cured from the outside, Because suffering isn’t like running out of ink, Or a trunk not having iron bands! There being injustice is like there being death.

If I die very young, hear this: I was never anything but a kid playing. I was a heathen like the sun and the water, I had the universal religion only people don’t have. I was happy because I didn’t ask for anything at all, Or tried to find anything, And I didn’t find any more explanation Than the word explanation having no meaning at all.

I’m in no hurry. What for? The sun and moon aren’t in a hurry: they’re right. Hurrying is believing people can get past their legs, Or that, jumping, they can land past their shadow. No; I don’t know how to hurry.

Live, you say, in the present; Live only in the present. But I don’t want the present, I want reality; I want things that exist, not time that measures them. What is the present? It’s something relative to the past and the future. It’s a thing that exists in virtue of other things existing. I only want reality, things without the present. I don’t want to include time in my scheme. I don’t want to think about things as present; I want to think of them as things. I don’t want to separate them from themselves, treating them as present. I shouldn’t even treat them as real. I should treat them as nothing. I should see them, only see them; See them till I can’t think about them. See them without time, without space, To see, dispensing with everything but what you see. And this is the science of seeing, which isn’t a science.

Les dieux sont ceux qui ne doutent jamais.

Não me importo com as rimas.  Raras vezes Há duas árvores iguais, uma ao lado da outra.

 A nossa alma e o céu e a terra bastam-nos.     Querer mais é perder isto, e ser infeliz.

All beings exist and nothing else And that’s why they’re called beings

There are no roses in my yard: what wind brought you? But I suddenly come from far away. I was sick for a moment. No wind whatsoever brought you now. Now you’re here. What you were isn’t you, or else the whole rose would be here.

O que é preciso é ser-se natural e calmo Na felicidade ou na infelicidade, Sentir como quem olha, Pensar como quem anda, E quando se vai morrer, lembrar-se de que o dia morre, E que o poente é belo e é bela a noite que fica...

If science wants to be truthful, What science is more truthful than the science of things without science? I close my eyes and the hard earth where I’m lying Has a reality so real even my back feels it. I don’t need reason — I have shoulderblades.

What does this think about that? Nothing thinks about anything. Does the earth have consciousness of its stones and plants? If it did, it would be people. . . Why am I worrying about this? If I think about these things, I’ll stop seeing trees and plants And stop seeing the Earth For only seeing my thoughts... I’ll get unhappy and stay in the dark. And so, without thinking, I have the Earth and the Sky.

All the evil in the world comes from us bothering with each other, Wanting to do good, wanting to do evil. Our soul and the sky and the earth are enough for us. To want more is to lose this, and be unhappy.

Now I sense the perfume of flowers like seeing a new thing. I know they smell just as well as I know I existed. They’re things known from the outside. But now I know with my breathing from the back of my head.

Nem sempre consigo sentir o que sei que devo sentir. O meu pensamento só muito devagar atravessa o rio a nado Porque lhe pesa o fato que os homens o fizeram usar.

Os poetas místicos são filósofos doentes,  E os filósofos são homens doidos.

Ser poeta no es un ambición mía. Es mi manera de estar solo

O mundo não se fez para pensarnos nele (pensar é estar doente dos olhos) mas para olharmos para ele e estarmos de acordo...

Let’s only care about the place where we are. There’s beauty enough in being here and not anywhere else. If there’s someone beyond the curve in the road, Let them worry about what’s past the curve in the road, That’s what the road is to them.

And since today’s all there is for now, that’s everything. Who knows if I’ll be dead the day after tomorrow? If I’m dead the day after tomorrow, the thunderstorm day after tomorrow Will be another thunderstorm than if I hadn’t died. Of course I know thunderstorms don’t fall because I see them, But if I weren’t in the world, The world would be different — There would be me the less — And the thunderstorm would fall on a different world and would be another thunderstorm. No matter what happens, what’s falling is what’ll be falling when it falls. (7/10/1930)

I saw that there is no Nature, That Nature doesn’t exist, That there are hills, valleys, plains, That there are trees, flowers, weeds, That there are rivers and stones, But there is not a whole these belong to, That a real and true wholeness Is a sickness of our ideas.

A kid thinking about fairy tales and believing in fairy tales Acts like a sick god, but like a god. Because even though he affirms that what doesn’t exist exists, He knows things exist, that he exists, He knows existing exists and doesn’t explain itself, And he knows there’s no reason at all for anything to exist. He knows being is the point. All he doesn’t know is that thought isn’t the point. (10/1/1917)

Something changed in part of reality — my knees and my hands. What science has knowledge for this? The blind man goes on his way and I don’t make any more gestures. It’s already not the same time, or the same people, or anything the same. This is being real.

It’s the poet we love in Caeiro, not the philosopher. What we really get from these poems is a childlike sense of life, with all the direct materiality of the child’s mind, and all the vital spirituality of hope and increase that exist in the body and soul of nescient childhood. Caeiro’s work is a dawn that wakes us up and quickens us; a more that material, more than anti-spiritual dawn. It’s an abstract effect, pure vacuum, nothingness.

I was never a keeper of sheep

Pensar é não compreender.

If they want me to have mysticism, okay, I’ve got it. I’m a mystic, but only in my body, My soul is simple and doesn’t think.

If I talk about her like she’s a being It’s because talking about her I need to use the language of men Which gives personality to things, And imposes a name on things.

As bolas de sabão que esta criança Se entretém a largar de uma palhinha São translucidamente uma filosofia toda.

Sou místico, mas só com o corpo. A minha alma é simples e não pensa.

Porque o único sentido oculto das cousas  É elas não terem sentido oculto

Sometimes in the evening on Summer days, Even when there’s not a breeze at all, it seems Like there’s a light breeze blowing for a minute But the trees are unmoving In every leaf of their leaves And our feelings have had an illusion, An illusion of what would please them...

She goes on with her beautiful hair and mouth like before, I go on like before, alone in the field. It’s like my head had been lowered, And if I think this, and raise my head And the golden sun dries the need to cry I can’t stop having. How vast the field and interior love... ! I look, and I forget, like dryness where there was water and trees losing their leaves.

I don’t know how to talk because I’m feeling. I’m listening to my voice as if it were someone else’s, And my voice is speaking about her as if she were speaking. She has hair as blond as yellow wheat in the sun, And when she speaks her mouth says things that aren’t words. She laughs, and her teeth are as clean as stones in a river.

His conception of the universe is, however, instinctive, not intellectual; it can't be criticized as a concept, because there’s none there, and it can't be criticized as temperament, because temperament can't be criticized.

Se eu pudesse trincar a terra toda E sentir-lhe um paladar, Seria mais feliz um momento ... Mas eu nem sempre quero ser feliz. É preciso ser de vez em quando infeliz Para se poder ser natural... Nem tudo é dias de sol, E a chuva, quando falta muito, pede-se. Por isso tomo a infelicidade com a felicidade Naturalmente, como quem não estranha Que haja montanhas e planícies E que haja rochedos e erva ... O que é preciso é ser-se natural e calmo Na felicidade ou na infelicidade, Sentir como quem olha, Pensar como quem anda, E quando se vai morrer, lembrar-se de que o dia morre, E que o poente é belo e é bela a noite que fica... Assim é e assim seja ...

The Amorous Shepherd is a fruitless interlude, but those few poems are among the world’s greatest love poems, because they’re love poems about love, not about being poems. The poet loves because he loves, not because love exists.

Nothing at all reminds us of something else when we pay attention to it. Each thing only reminds us of what it is And it’s only what nothing else is. The fact that it’s it separates it from every other thing. (Everything’s nothing without another thing that’s not it).

I was born subject like others to errors and defects, But never to the error of wanting to understand too much, Never to the error of wanting to understand only with the intellect.. Never to the defect of demanding of the World That it be anything that’s not the World.

Olá, guardador de rebanhos, Aí à beira da estrada, Que te diz o vento que passa?' 'Que é vento, e que passa, E que já passou antes, E que passará depois. E a ti o que te diz?' 'Muita coisa mais do que isso, Fala-me de muitas outras coisas. De memórias e de saudades E de coisas que nunca foram.' 'Nunca ouviste passar o vento. O vento só fala do vento. O que lhe ouviste foi mentira, E a mentira está em ti.

Praise be to God I’m not good, And have the natural egotism of flowers And rivers following their bed Preoccupied without knowing it Only with blooming and flowing. This is the only mission in the World, This—to exist clearly, And to know how to do it without thinking about it.)

Yes: I exist inside my body. I’m not carrying the sun and the moon in my pocket. I don’t want to conquer worlds because I slept badly, And I don’t want to eat the world for breakfast because I have a stomach. Indifferent? No: a son of the earth, who, if he jumps, it’s wrong, A moment in the air that’s not for us, And only happy when his feet hit the ground again, Pow! In reality where nothing’s missing! (6/20/1919)

O Universo não é uma ideia minha. A minha ideia do Universo é que é uma ideia minha. A noite não anoitece pelos meus olhos. A minha ideia da noite é que anoitece por meus olhos. Fora de eu pensar e de haver quaisquer pensamentos A noite anoitece concretamente E o fulgor das estrelas existe como se tivesse peso.   Assim

Passa uma borboleta por diante de mim E pela primeira vez no Universo eu reparo Que as borboletas não têm cor nem movimento, Assim como as flores não têm perfume nem cor. A cor é que tem cor nas asas da borboleta, No movimento da borboleta o movimento é que se move, O perfume é que tem perfume no perfume da flor. A borboleta é apenas borboleta E a flor é apenas flor.

Between what i see in a field and what I see in another field There passes for a moment the figure of a man. His steps go with “him” in the same reality, But I look at him and them, and they’re two things: The “man” goes walking with his ideas, false and foreign, And his steps go with the ancient system that makes legs walk. I see him from a distance without any opinion at all. How perfect that he is in him what he is — his body, His true reality which doesn’t have desires or hopes, But muscles and the sure and impersonal way of using them.