from The Songs of Kabir
II. 22. man tu pr utar knh jaiho
To what shore would you cross, O my heart? there is no traveller before you, there is no road:
Where is the movement, where is the rest, on that shore?
There is no water; no boat, no boatman, is there;
There is not so much as a rope to tow the boat, nor a man to draw it.
No earth, no sky, no time, no thing, is there: no shore, no ford!
There, there is neither body nor mind: and where is the place that shall still the thirst of the soul? You shall find naught in that emptiness.
Be strong, and enter into your own body: for there your foothold is firm. Consider it well, O my heart! go not elsewhere,
Kabr says: "Put all imaginations away, and stand fast in that which you are."
Kabir (Indian, 1440-1518) was a mystic poet influenced by various religious traditions -- Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam.
Rabindranath Tagore (Bengali, 1861-1941), winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913, translated The Songs of Kabir.
II. 22. man tu pr utar knh jaiho
To what shore would you cross, O my heart? there is no traveller before you, there is no road:
Where is the movement, where is the rest, on that shore?
There is no water; no boat, no boatman, is there;
There is not so much as a rope to tow the boat, nor a man to draw it.
No earth, no sky, no time, no thing, is there: no shore, no ford!
There, there is neither body nor mind: and where is the place that shall still the thirst of the soul? You shall find naught in that emptiness.
Be strong, and enter into your own body: for there your foothold is firm. Consider it well, O my heart! go not elsewhere,
Kabr says: "Put all imaginations away, and stand fast in that which you are."
Kabir (Indian, 1440-1518) was a mystic poet influenced by various religious traditions -- Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam.
Rabindranath Tagore (Bengali, 1861-1941), winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913, translated The Songs of Kabir.