Attar Quotes

We've searched our database for all the quotes and captions related to Attar. Here they are! All 100 of them:

β€œ
Blue is for cruel bargains; green is for daring what you oughtn’t; violet is for brute force. I will say to you: Coral coaxes; pink insists; red compels. I will say to you: You are dear to me as attar of roses. Please do not get eaten.
”
”
Catherynne M. Valente (Deathless)
β€œ
People will love you. People will hate you. And it always has more to do with them, than it does with you.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of The Serengeti)
β€œ
I have no news of my coming or passing away-- the whole thing happened quicker than a breath; ask no questions of the moth.
”
”
ΨΉΨ·Ψ§Ψ± Ω†ΫŒΨ΄Ψ§Ψ¨ΩˆΨ±ΫŒ
β€œ
You can either choose love or you can choose hate, because where one lives, the other will die.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
The home we seek is in eternity; The Truth we seek is like a shoreless sea, Of which your paradise is but a drop. This ocean can be yours; why should you stop Beguiled by dreams of evanescent dew? The secrets of the sun are yours, but you Content yourself with motes trapped in its beams. Turn to what truly lives, reject what seems -- Which matters more, the body or the soul? Be whole: desire and journey to the Whole.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur
β€œ
I want to remember this,” he said, pulling me into his arms. β€œIf I die tonight, I want to die remembering what it was like to hold the whole world in my hands.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
You don’t always get the treasure by holding on. Sometimes the magic happens when you let go.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
I doubt my doubt, doubt itself is unsure I love, but who is it for whom I sigh? Not Muslim, yet not heathen; who am I?
”
”
ΨΉΨ·Ψ§Ψ± Ω†ΫŒΨ΄Ψ§Ψ¨ΩˆΨ±ΫŒ (The Conference of the Birds)
β€œ
If the eye of the heart is open, in each atom there will be one hundred secrets.
”
”
ΨΉΨ·Ψ§Ψ± Ω†ΫŒΨ΄Ψ§Ψ¨ΩˆΨ±ΫŒ
β€œ
Mystics are not themselves. They do not exist in selves. They move as they are moved, talk as words come, see with sight that enters their eyes. I met a woman once and asked her where love had led her. Fool, there's no destination to arrive at. Loved one and lover and love are infinite.
”
”
ΨΉΨ·Ψ§Ψ± Ω†ΫŒΨ΄Ψ§Ψ¨ΩˆΨ±ΫŒ
β€œ
Because when we love, we carry it on the inside, and we can turn on its light even in our darkest moments. The deeper we love, the brighter it shines.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
It’s not over, you know. It never has been,” he said. β€œWhether you say yes or no, you will always be my forever.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
So what's it like? To have it all? Like flying. Soaring. Until you come across the one thing you'd give it all up for, and can never have.
”
”
Leylah Attar (53 Letters for My Lover (53 Letters for My Lover, #1))
β€œ
A man whose eyes love opens risks his soul - His dancing breaks beyond the mind's control.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur
β€œ
The people of this world are like the three butterflies in front of a candle's flame. The first one went closer and said: I know about love. The second one touched the flame lightly with his wings and said: I know how love's fire can burn. The third one threw himself into the heart of the flame and was consumed. He alone knows what true love is.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur
β€œ
Sometimes you come across a rainbow storyβ€”one that spans your heart. You might not be able to grasp it, but you can never be sorry for the color and magic it brought.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of the Serengeti)
β€œ
there is no space too dark or too vast or too irredeemable that can’t be filled with love.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
But you don’t always get what you want. Sometimes you get exactly what you need.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of the Serengeti)
β€œ
There is nothing to hide anymore. When love looks at you, when it truly pins you down and stares into your soul, it renders you defenseless. And in that moment, in that state of humbling nakedness, it makes you completely invincible.
”
”
Leylah Attar (53 Letters for My Lover (53 Letters for My Lover, #1))
β€œ
We are sand and rock and water and sky, anchors on ships and sails in the wind. We are a journey to a destination that shifts every time we dream or fall or keep or weep. We are stars with flaws that still sparkle and shine. We always strive, always want, always have more questions than answers, but there are moments like these, full of magic and contentment, when souls get a glimpse of the divine and quite simply, lose their breath.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
My greatest loss had led to my greatest love. Hearts were broken, and hearts were healed. Lives were lost, and lives were saved.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of the Serengeti)
β€œ
Some circles never close, some wounds never heal. Love is like that. It leaves you forever open, forever vulnerable.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of the Serengeti)
β€œ
We all die, Shayda.” He turns and looks at me. β€œIt’s about how we choose to get there.
”
”
Leylah Attar (53 Letters for My Lover (53 Letters for My Lover, #1))
β€œ
To seek death is death's only cure.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur
β€œ
Had I known how listening is superior to speaking, I would not have wasted my life preaching.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur
β€œ
Sometimes everything gets dismantled so something better can be pieced together.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
This is what it looks like when you wander somewhere between the sand and stardust, and meet a piece of yourself in someone else.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of the Serengeti)
β€œ
I am alone; make me your single goal -- My presence is sufficient for your soul; I am your God, your one necessity -- With every breath you breathe, remember Me.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur (The Conference of the Birds)
β€œ
If you will but aspire You will attain to all that you desire. Before an atom of such need the Sun Seems dim and mirky by comparison. It is life's strength, the wings by which we fly Beyond the further reaches of the sky.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur
β€œ
Heart’s blood and bitter pain belong to love, And tales of problems no one can remove; Cupbearer, fill the bowl with blood, not wine - And if you lack the heart’s rich blood take mine. Love thrives on inextinguishable pain, Which tears the soul, then knits the threads again. A mote of love exceeds all bounds; it gives The vital essence to whatever lives. But where love thrives, there pain is always found; Angels alone escape this weary round - They love without that savage agony Which is reserved for vexed humanity.
”
”
ΨΉΨ·Ψ§Ψ± Ω†ΫŒΨ΄Ψ§Ψ¨ΩˆΨ±ΫŒ (The Conference of the Birds)
β€œ
How deluded we become when we start believing that everything in the world is about us. How hard we work to make things fit into our made-up theories. How blindly we follow our worked-up emotions, the good, the bad and the ugly.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
In the grand scheme of things, we do the best we can, all of us, and we make up our stories as we go along; we write them and direct them and project them into the world. And sometimes we get other people’s stories, and sometimes we don’t, but always there is a story behind a story behind a story, linked in a chain that we can only see a small part of, because it’s there when we’re born and it continues after we’re gone. And who can comprehend all of it in one lifetime?
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
The Beginning is lost; the End stretches into eternity. Don't bother with them, they're all irrelevant. And since all is really nothing, then nothing is truly everything.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur (The Conference of the Birds)
β€œ
How strange it was that man could neither brook The presence nor the absence of his look!
”
”
Attar of Nishapur (The Conference of the Birds)
β€œ
This is what he does to me. Open up the windows of my soul and pushes me out.
”
”
Leylah Attar (53 Letters for My Lover (53 Letters for My Lover, #1))
β€œ
Come you lost Atoms to your Centre draw, And be the Eternal Mirror that you saw
”
”
ΨΉΨ·Ψ§Ψ± Ω†ΫŒΨ΄Ψ§Ψ¨ΩˆΨ±ΫŒ
β€œ
Let love lead your soul. Make it a place to retire to, a kind of cave, a retreat for the deep core of being.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur
β€œ
I wanted to stay with him so I could put together all the dented, shattered parts of him, because I could never be whole where he was broken.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
Because Damian in love was a thing of beautyβ€”intoxicating, addictive, demanding, attentive, and always, always hungry.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
but there are moments like these, full of magic and contentment, when souls get a glimpse of the divine and quite simply, lose their breath.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
Come you lost Atoms to your Centre draw, And be the Eternal Mirror that you saw: Rays that have wander'd into Darkness wide Return and back into your Sun subsid
”
”
Attar of Nishapur
β€œ
We are sand that hasn’t been washed away yet,
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
Sometimes we need to be jarred out of our own reality. We base so much of ourselves on other people’s perceptions of us. We live for the compliments, the approval, the applause. But what we really need is a grand, spine-chilling encounter with ourselves to believe we’re freaking magical. And that’s the best kind of believing, because no one can unsay it or take it away from you.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of The Serengeti)
β€œ
Just sitting here thinking how far you’ve come, and I’m overwhelmed with how much I love you.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
We were like two stars converging around the same axis, but with paths that missed each other by a fraction of infinity.
”
”
Leylah Attar (53 Letters for My Lover (53 Letters for My Lover, #1))
β€œ
What good is love if you don't show it?
”
”
Leylah Attar (53 Letters for My Lover (53 Letters for My Lover, #1))
β€œ
I would die a thousand deaths to save her.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of the Serengeti)
β€œ
It was in China, late one moonless night, The Simorgh first appeared to mortal sight – He let a feather float down through the air, And rumours of its fame spread everywhere...
”
”
Attar of Nishapur (Ω…Ω†Ψ·Ω‚ Ψ§Ω„Ψ·ΩŠΨ±)
β€œ
Hope is a hollow backbone. It can’t always carry the weight of reality.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
All of my wild, crazy exuberance fit perfectly in the quiet crevices of her dreams. It was as if all my life, I had been running towards this moment, this diamond sharp clarity of being and belonging, this strange, intriguing girl with her rose breath and her broken wings.
”
”
Leylah Attar (From His Lips (53 Letters for My Lover, #1.5))
β€œ
What is humanity? To feel pain at the sorrows of our neighbours, to feel humiliated at the humiliation of fellow-beings.
”
”
Idries Shah (The World Of The Sufi)
β€œ
I pulled back, my eyes still closed, knowing that I had just stolen an epic moment from life.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of the Serengeti)
β€œ
We are a question that hasn’t been answered yet, a hiding place that hasn’t been found yet, a battle that hasn’t been fought yet.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
But people’s eyes should never be so different that you no longer recognized their souls; they should never turn so hard that they shut all the doors to the past.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
Lift your head out of this hurricane to find solace and tranquillity. If you stay caught in the storm, your head will whirl as fast as a millstone and you will know so little peace that even a single fly can buzz away your peace. Parable
”
”
Attar of Nishapur (The Conference of the Birds)
β€œ
When you lose someone you love, it doesn’t end with that event, or with their funeral, or with their name on the tombstone. You lose them again and again, every day, in small moments that catch you off guard. Almost
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of The Serengeti)
β€œ
The truth doesn’t always set you free. The truth can kill you, slice open your innards and turn everything inside out. Everything I believed, everything I thought was real had been turned upside down.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
We have an infinite capacity to love, but when you wrap up your love and give it to someone, they expect all of it. And that’s what you think tooβ€”that you’re giving them everything you’ve got. You really do. Until you realize that love is end-less, bottom-less, boundary-less. The more you give, the more gushes out. It spills over, refusing to be contained in neat little parcels, swelling like a river after a flash flood. And in the end, it doesn’t matter which part was whose, because in the end it’s all one, like streams merging into the ocean
”
”
Leylah Attar (53 Letters for My Lover (53 Letters for My Lover, #1))
β€œ
Kissing Jack was like kissing a slumbering lion. He barely moved, but I could sense the raw power behind his restraint.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of the Serengeti)
β€œ
And it all starts within, because within is where all things begin.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
No one knows how many tomorrows they have. That’s what makes it all so precious.
”
”
Leylah Attar (53 Letters for My Lover (53 Letters for My Lover, #1))
β€œ
It wasn’t just a kiss. It was a lessonβ€”a fierce, burning imprint, so that my lips would always know the difference between being wanted and being craved.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of the Serengeti)
β€œ
The dwellers in Paradise know that the first thing they must give up is their heart.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur (The Conference of the Birds)
β€œ
To enter the valley of love, one must plunge wholly into fire. Yes, we must become one with the fire itself, for otherwise one cannot live there. He that truly loves must resemble fire, his countenance aflame, burning and . impetuous like fire.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur
β€œ
Daddy?” said Lily. Her face was all lit up as she spoke into the phone. β€œI’m in the safe place now.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of the Serengeti)
β€œ
Don’t play with scorpions unless you intend to get stung.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
Terror is a bigger bitch than Panic. Terror swallows you whole.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
His part is mercy, ours is endless praise.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur (The Conference of the Birds)
β€œ
Hope is a hollow backbone. It can’t always carry the weight of reality. And I was tired of propping it up. I was tired of mending it each time it snapped. You can only cheat death so many times; you can only fight so long, so hard.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
A thousand for his love expired each day, And those who saw his face, in blank dismay Would rave and grieve and mourn their lives away- To die for love of that bewitching sight Was worth a hundred lives without his light. None could survive his absence patiently, None could endure this king's proximity- How strange it was that man could neither brook The presence nor the absence of his look!
”
”
Attar of Nishapur (The Conference of the Birds)
β€œ
But sitting here before Troy Heathgate now, I'm teetering on a knife's edge between honor and disgrace.
”
”
Leylah Attar (53 Letters for My Lover (53 Letters for My Lover, #1))
β€œ
I wish I could hold your hand outside this room, go for a walk, sit on a patio, watch the world go by.
”
”
Leylah Attar (53 Letters for My Lover (53 Letters for My Lover, #1))
β€œ
What we don’t understand always scares us.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of The Serengeti)
β€œ
Because I'm scared. Because each time I see him, it's a little more overwhelming than before. Because I'm afraid it'll build up to a tsunami- like crescendo and come crashing down on me.
”
”
Leylah Attar (53 Letters for My Lover (53 Letters for My Lover, #1))
β€œ
Among lovers, only those with wings flee this worldly cage before death comes. The condition of these lovers is hard to recount, for such souls speak a different tongue. The one who learns and speaks their language will hold the elixir of happiness at Simorgh's court.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur (The Conference of the Birds)
β€œ
He lay on the floor, taking stock of the rest of his body. Legs? Yup, still there. Arms? Present. And functional. Torso? All systems go. Junk? Come in, junk? Alive, captain. Not happy, but alive.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
Pull a thread here and a life unravels there.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of the Serengeti)
β€œ
You kept tearing down my defences until I couldn’t fight you anymore. I’m in love with you, Skye. Bare, stripped down, completely vulnerable, in love.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
It’s all fucked up, Rafael. There are no good guys or bad guys. Everyone has a reason.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
Murder, rape, torture, abuse. Are we ever able to truly understand the β€˜why’ or do we simply yearn for labels and boxes to organize the chaos we can’t control?
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
You’re like the broken chapter of my favorite story.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of the Serengeti)
β€œ
It's strange how someone can walk into your life, shatter the windows, break down your doors, scatter your belongings, and then walk away without having the slightest inkling of the storm they'd brought.
”
”
Leylah Attar (From His Lips (53 Letters for My Lover, #1.5))
β€œ
I want to share every sunrise and every sunset and every second in between with you. I want your laughter and your breath and your blood and your bones. You’re the one thing that centres my soul. I may circle the whole world, but you’ll always be home, Beetroot.
”
”
Leylah Attar (53 Letters for My Lover (53 Letters for My Lover, #1))
β€œ
How arrogant you are To think your wretched Self so singular! The disappointments of this world will die In less time than the blinking of an eye, And as the earth must pass, pass by the earth Don't even glance at it, know what it's worth; What empty foolishness it is to care For what must one day be dispersed to air!
”
”
ΨΉΨ·Ψ§Ψ± Ω†ΫŒΨ΄Ψ§Ψ¨ΩˆΨ±ΫŒ
β€œ
We are busy with the luxury of things. Their number and multiple faces bring To us confusion we call knowledge. Say: God created the world, pinned night to day, Made mountains to weigh it down, seas To wash its face, living creatures with pleas (The ancestors of prayers) seeking a place In this mystery that floats in endless space. God set the earth on the back of a bull, The bull on a fish dancing on a spool Of silver light so fine it is like air; That in turn rests on nothing there But nothing that nothing can share. All things are but masks at God's beck and call, They are symbols that instruct us that God is all.
”
”
ΨΉΨ·Ψ§Ψ± Ω†ΫŒΨ΄Ψ§Ψ¨ΩˆΨ±ΫŒ
β€œ
I needed his frost and his bite and his unrelenting fury to power us through the storm.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
The hoopoe said: 'Your heart's congealed like ice; When will you free yourself from cowardice? Since you have such a short time to live here, What difference does it make? What should you fear? The world is filth and sin, and homeless men Must enter it and homeless leave again. They die, as worms, in squalid pain; if we Must perish in this quest, that, certainly, Is better than a life of filth and grief. If this great search is vain, if my belief Is groundless, it is right that I should die. So many errors throng the world - then why Should we not risk this quest? To suffer blame For love is better than a life of shame. No one has reached this goal, so why appeal To those whose blindness claims it is unreal? I'd rather die deceived by dreams than give My heart to home and trade and never live. We've been and heard so much - what have we learned? Not for one moment has the self been spurned; Fools gather round and hinder our release. When will their stale, insistent whining cease? We have no freedom to achieve our goal Until from Self and fools we free the soul. To be admitted past the veil you must Be dead to all the crowd considers just. Once past the veil you understand the Way From which the crowd's glib courtiers blindly stray. If you have any will, leave women's stories, And even if this search for hidden glories Proves blasphemy at last, be sure our quest Is not mere talk but an exacting test. The fruit of love's great tree is poverty; Whoever knows this knows humility. When love has pitched his tent in someone's breast, That man despairs of life and knows no rest. Love's pain will murder him and blandly ask A surgeon's fee for managing the task - The water that he drinks brings pain, his bread Is turned to blood immediately shed; Though he is weak, faint, feebler than an ant, Love forces him to be her combatant; He cannot take one mouthful unaware That he is floundering in a sea of care.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur
β€œ
In this valley, Love is represented by fire, Reason by smoke. When Love bursts into flame, Reason is forthwith dissipated like smoke. Reason cannot coexist with Love’s mania, for Love has nothing whatever to do with human Reason. If ever you attain a clear vision of the unseen world, then only will you be able to realize the source of Love. By the odour of Love every atom in the world is intoxicated. It owes its existence to the existence of Love. If
”
”
Attar of Nishapur (The Conference of the Birds)
β€œ
Strive to discover the mystery before life is taken from you. If while living you fail to find yourself, to know yourself, how will you be able to understand the secret of your existence after you die?
”
”
Attar of Nishapur
β€œ
The only way to feel truly alive is to start living fearlessly.
”
”
Leylah Attar (53 Letters for My Lover (53 Letters for My Lover, #1))
β€œ
Taleenoi olngisoilechashur.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of the Serengeti)
β€œ
It said I was equal parts earth and stars, equal parts animal and soul. I was hope. I was calamity. I was love. I was prejudice. I was my sister. I was his daughter. I was Juma. I was Jack, Jack, Jack, Jack.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of the Serengeti)
β€œ
My heart thunders like the hooves of a thousand wild horses.
”
”
Leylah Attar (53 Letters for My Lover (53 Letters for My Lover, #1))
β€œ
I feel like a tree exposed to the elements, my roots clinging to the soil, my branches flirting with heaven.
”
”
Leylah Attar (53 Letters for My Lover (53 Letters for My Lover, #1))
β€œ
It was like we had found a pocket of quiet, where all the ghosts in our mind had gone to sleep, and we were the only two people awake.
”
”
Leylah Attar (Mists of the Serengeti)
β€œ
A Drunkard accuses a Drunkard... A sot became extremely drunk - his legs And head sank listless, weighed by wine's thick dregs. A sober neighbour put him in a sack And took him homewards hoisted on his back. Another drunk went stumbling by the first, Who woke and stuck his head outside and cursed. "Hey, you, you lousy dipsomaniac," He yelled as he was borne off in the sack, "If you'd had fewer drinks, just two or three, You would be walking now as well as me.
”
”
ΨΉΨ·Ψ§Ψ± Ω†ΫŒΨ΄Ψ§Ψ¨ΩˆΨ±ΫŒ
β€œ
When they had understood the hoopoe's words, A clamour of complaint rose from the birds: 'Although we recognize you as our guide, You must accept - it cannot be denied - We are a wretched, flimsy crew at best, And lack the bare essentials for this quest. Our feathers and our wings, our bodies' strength Are quite unequal to the journey's length; For one of us to reach the Simorgh's throne Would be miraculous, a thing unknown. [...] He seems like Solomon, and we like ants; How can mere ants climb from their darkened pit Up to the Simorgh's realm? And is it fit That beggars try the glory of a king? How ever could they manage such a thing?' The hoopoe answered them: 'How can love thrive in hearts impoverished and half alive? "Beggars," you say - such niggling poverty Will not encourage truth or charity. A man whose eyes love opens risks his soul - His dancing breaks beyond the mind's control. [...] Your heart is not a mirror bright and clear If there the Simorgh's form does not appear; No one can bear His beauty face to face, And for this reason, of His perfect grace, He makes a mirror in our hearts - look there To see Him, search your hearts with anxious care.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur (The Conference of the Birds)
β€œ
Love is a cruel pain that devours everything. Sometimes it tears the veil from the soul, sometimes it draws it together. An atom of love is preferable to all that exists between the horizons, an atom of its pain better than the happy love of all lovers. Love is the marrow of beings; but there can be no real love without real suffering. Whoever is grounded firm in love renounces faith, religion, and unbelief. Love will open the door of spiritual poverty and poverty will show you the way of unbelief. When there remains neither unbelief nor religion, your body and your soul will disappear; you will then be worthy of the mysteries- if you could fathom them, this is the only way.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur (The Conference of the Birds)
β€œ
But it’s not always enough, you know? And sometimes, it spills over because you can’t control it, because you need to make others feel your pain, your hurt, your rage, because it’s tough to walk around all scarred up, in a world full of slick billboards and bright, smiley toothpaste ads and shiny, happy people. Life’s not always fair. So suck it, lick it, stroke it, fuck it.
”
”
Leylah Attar (The Paper Swan)
β€œ
A KING WHO PLACED MIRRORS IN HIS PALACE There lived a king; his comeliness was such The world could not acclaim his charm too much. The world's wealth seemed a portion of his grace; It was a miracle to view his face. If he had rivals,then I know of none; The earth resounded with this paragon. When riding through his streets he did not fail To hide his features with a scarlet veil. Whoever scanned the veil would lose his head; Whoever spoke his name was left for dead, The tongue ripped from his mouth; whoever thrilled With passion for this king was quickly killed. A thousand for his love expired each day, And those who saw his face, in blank dismay Would rave and grieve and mourn their lives away- To die for love of that bewitching sight Was worth a hundred lives without his light. None could survive his absence patiently, None could endure this king's proximity- How strange it was that man could neither brook The presence nor the absence of his look! Since few could bear his sight, they were content To hear the king in sober argument, But while they listened they endure such pain As made them long to see their king again. The king commanded mirrors to be placed About the palace walls, and when he faced Their polished surfaces his image shone With mitigated splendour to the throne. If you would glimpse the beauty we revere Look in your heart-its image will appear. Make of your heart a looking-glass and see Reflected there the Friend's nobility; Your sovereign's glory will illuminate The palace where he reigns in proper state. Search for this king within your heart; His soul Reveals itself in atoms of the Whole. The multitude of forms that masquerade Throughout the world spring from the Simorgh's shade. If you catch sight of His magnificence It is His shadow that beguiles your glance; The Simorgh's shadow and Himself are one; Seek them together, twinned in unison. But you are lost in vague uncertainty... Pass beyond shadows to Reality. How can you reach the Simorgh's splendid court? First find its gateway, and the sun, long-sought, Erupts through clouds; when victory is won, Your sight knows nothing but the blinding sun.
”
”
Attar of Nishapur