Everyone is born a king,
and most people die in exile.
-Oscar Wilde
In the middle of the road of my life
I awoke in a dark wood
where the true way was wholly lost.
-Dante Aligheri
But paradise is locked and bolted....
We must make a journey around the world
to see if a back door has perhaps been left open.
-Heinrich von Kleist
Only the desert has a fascination - to ride alone -
in the sun in the forever unpossessed country - away from man.
That is a great temptation.
-D. H. Lawrence
Should you fail to pilot your own ship,
don’t be surprised at what inappropriate port you find yourself docked.
-Tom Robbins
"I'm going to make the statue of Laziness," said the sculptor
and he fell asleep.
-Robert Sabatier
A sad flower that, which grows alone and has no other love
Than its own shadow, listlessly reflected in the water.
-Stephane Mallarme
O, friend! Nobody veils you, but yourself.
In your path there is no thorn or weed, but yourself.
You asked: shall I reach the Beloved or not?
Between you and the Beloved there is nobody, but yourself.
-Awhadoddin Kermani
He who sleeps on the Road
will lose either his hat or his head.
-Nizami Ganjavi
If the scissors are not used daily on the beard,
it will not be long before the beard is,
by its luxuriant growth,
pretending to be the head.
-Hakim Jami
Winter loneliness
In a mountain village grows
Only deeper, when
Guests are gone, and leaves and grass
Are withered: troubling thoughts.
-Minamoto no Muneyuki
Thought is an errand boy,
fear a mine of worries.
-Yunus Emre
fear a mine of worries.
-Yunus Emre
All these, however, were mere terrors of the night,
phantoms of mind that walk in darkness.
-Washington Irving
...where ignorant armies clash by night.
-Matthew Arnold
When the camel of our efforts sinks in the mud,
what matter whether the destination is near or far?
-Ustad Khalilullah Khalili
The other side of the "sacred"
is the sight of your beloved in the underworld,
dripping with maggots.
-Gary Snyder
The self
must be a bridge,
not a pit.
-Thoedore Roethke
A precious jewel deep in mud
Will not shine, though it has luster.
-Saraha
But the jewel you lost was blue.
-Ted Hughes
at the end of the smoke
from the smudge,
humming mosquitoes
-Yamei
"breaking down a lacquer-painted pail"
-Zen Saying
Ideas are the children of barren women.
-Sanskrit Saying
Wherever the bird with no feet flew,
she found trees with no limbs.
-Audre Lorde
You can't dig a new well
by digging the same hole deeper.
-Edward de Bono
A rut is a grave
with the ends knocked out.
-Laurence J. Peter
When you hold on to yourself,
you're a fire-worshipping temple.
Dissolve, and let everything get done.
When you don't, you're an untrained colt,
full of erratic loving and biting.
Loyal sometimes, then treacherous.
-Hakim Sanai
The road you must take has no particular name.
It's the one composed of your own sighing
and giving up.
-Hakim Sanai
An ox's footprints filled with water
Will soon dry up; so with a mind that's firm
But full of qualities that are not perfect;
These imperfections will in time dry up.
-Saraha
Show a man too many camels' bones,
or show them to him too often,
and he will not be able to recognize a camel
when he comes across a live one.
-Idies Shah
Expect poison from the standing water.
-William Blake
Man becomes accustomed to poison
by degrees.
-Victor Hugo
He who would set the world on fire
often succeeds only in burning himself up.
-J. Sig Paulson
For they have sown the wind,
and they shall reap the whirlwind.
-The Bible
How long will you keep pounding on an open door
begging for someone to open it?
-Raba'i al-Adawiyya
Don't spend time beating on a wall,
hoping to transform it into a door.
-Laura Schlessinger
No need to chase back and forth like the waves.
The same water which ebbs is the same water that flows.
No point turning back to get water
When it's flowing around you in all directions
-Hsu Yen
It takes guts to get out of the ruts.
-Robert H. Schuller
I was also caught by absence in all its forms.
-Paul Éluard
We must embrace the pain
and burn it as fuel for our journey.
-Kenji Miyazawa
Patterned hairpins of the Goddess drop;
The mermaid, sitting by her loom, mourns.
Cares will not come untangled,
Streaming down all day
In silken threads.
-Tu Fu
Like a silkworm you have built a cocoon around yourself.
Who will save you?
Burst your own cocoon and come out as the beautiful butterfly,
as the free soul.
-Vivekananda
If a tablet is not wiped clean of its figures,
nothing can be written upon it.
A single heart cannot serve as the place for two things,
let alone for several things.
-Ibn Ata'Illah
You may wash charcoal with zeal,
but you will not make it white.
-Saskya Pandita
It is like someone trying to apply colorful dye to a garment covered with mud.
You cannot dye it with colors until you first clean off the mud,
for otherwise the colorful dyes will not stay on,
but will drop off in a matter of moments.
-Rabbeinu Ta'm
Throw off that multicolored cloak of deceit.
-Sanai
Laws are like cobwebs,
which may catch small flies,
but let the wasps and hornets break through.
-Jonathan Swift
which may catch small flies,
but let the wasps and hornets break through.
-Jonathan Swift
