Excerpt
1
STRAY birds of summer come to my window to sing and fly away.
And yellow leaves of autumn, which have no songs, flutter and fall there with a sigh.
2O TROUPE of little vagrants of the world, leave your footprints in my words.
3THE world puts off its mask of vastness to its lover.
It becomes small as one song, as one kiss of the eternal.
4IT is the tears of the earth that keep her smiles in bloom.
5THE mighty desert is burning for the love of a blade of grass who shakes her head and laughs and flies away.
6IF you shed tears when you miss the sun, you also miss the stars.
7THE sands in your way beg for your song and your movement, dancing water. Will you carry the burden of their lameness?
8HER wistful face haunts my dreams like the rain at night.
9ONCE we dreamt that we were strangers.
We wake up to find that we were dear to each other.
10SORROW is hushed into peace in my heart like the evening among the silent trees.
11SOME unseen fingers, like idle breeze, are playing upon my heart the music of the ripples.
12"WHAT language is thine, O sea?"
"The language of eternal question."
"What language is thy answer, O sky?
"The language of eternal silence."
13LISTEN, my heart, to the whispers of the world with which it makes love to you.
14THE mystery of creation is like the darkness of night--it is great. Delusions of knowledge are like the fog of the morning.
15DO not seat your love upon a precipice because it is high.
16I SIT at my window this morning where the world like a passer-by stops for a moment, nods to me and goes.
17THESE little thoughts are the rustle of leaves; they have their whisper of joy in my mind.
18WHAT you are you do not see, what you see is your shadow.
19MY wishes are fools, they shout across thy songs, my Master.
Let me but listen.
20I CANNOT choose the best.
The best chooses me.
21THEY throw their shadows before them who carry their lantern on their back.
22THAT I exist is a perpetual surprise which is life.
23"WE, the rustling leaves, have a voice that answers the storms, but who are you so silent?"
"I am a mere flower."
24REST belongs to the work as the eyelids to the eyes.
25MAN is a born child, his power is the power of growth.
26GOD expects answers for the flowers he sends us, not for the sun and the earth.
27THE light that plays, like a naked child, among the green leaves happily knows not that man can lie.
28O BEAUTY, find thyself in love, not in the flattery of thy mirror.
29MY heart beats her waves at the shore of the world and writes upon it her signature in tears with the words, "I love thee."
30"MOON, for what do you wait?"
"To salute the sun for whom I must make way."
31THE trees come up to my window like the yearning voice of the dumb earth.
32HIS own mornings are new surprises to God.
33LIFE finds its wealth by the claims of the world, and its worth by the claims of love.
34THE dry river-bed finds no thanks for its past.
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