Throw Yourself Like Seed

Photo credit: jusben from morguefile.com

Shake off this sadness, and recover your spirit

sluggish you will never see the wheel of fate

that brushes your heel as it turns going by,

the man who wants to live is the man in whom life is abundant.

Now you are only giving food to that final pain

which is slowly winding you in the nets of death,

but to live is to work, and the only thing which lasts

is the work; start then, turn to the work.

Throw yourself like seed as you walk, and into your own field,

don't turn your face for that would be to turn it to death,

and do not let the past weigh down your motion.

Leave what's alive in the furrow, what's dead in yourself,

for life does not move in the same way as a group of clouds;

from your work you will be able one day to gather yourself.

~ Miguel De Unamuno

Throw Yourself Like Seed

Photo credit: jusben from morguefile.com

Shake off this sadness, and recover your spirit

sluggish you will never see the wheel of fate

that brushes your heel as it turns going by,

the man who wants to live is the man in whom life is abundant.

Now you are only giving food to that final pain

which is slowly winding you in the nets of death,

but to live is to work, and the only thing which lasts

is the work; start then, turn to the work.

Throw yourself like seed as you walk, and into your own field,

don't turn your face for that would be to turn it to death,

and do not let the past weigh down your motion.

Leave what's alive in the furrow, what's dead in yourself,

for life does not move in the same way as a group of clouds;

from your work you will be able one day to gather yourself.

~ Miguel De Unamuno

The Anguish of Love

O ancient temple, there hath risen for you a light that gleams in our hearts.

I complain to thee of the deserts which I crossed, where I let my tears flow unchecked,

Taking no joy in rest at dawn or dusk, continuing from morn to morn and passing from eve to eve.

Truly, the camels, even if they suffer from footsoreness, journey by night and make haste in their journey.

These beasts of burden carried us to you with eager desire, though they did not hope to attain thereby.

They traversed wildernesses and well nigh rainless lands, impelled by passion, but they did not therefore complain of fatigue.

They did not complain of the anguish of love, and 'tis I who complain of fatigue.

Indeed, I have claimed something absurd.

~ Ibn al-'Arabi

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Those who believe that they believe in God, but without passion in their hearts, without anguish in mind, without uncertainty, without doubt, without an element of despair even in their consolation, believe only in the God idea, not God Himself. ~ Miguel de Unamuno

The Anguish of Love

O ancient temple, there hath risen for you a light that gleams in our hearts.

I complain to thee of the deserts which I crossed, where I let my tears flow unchecked,

Taking no joy in rest at dawn or dusk, continuing from morn to morn and passing from eve to eve.

Truly, the camels, even if they suffer from footsoreness, journey by night and make haste in their journey.

These beasts of burden carried us to you with eager desire, though they did not hope to attain thereby.

They traversed wildernesses and well nigh rainless lands, impelled by passion, but they did not therefore complain of fatigue.

They did not complain of the anguish of love, and 'tis I who complain of fatigue.

Indeed, I have claimed something absurd.

~ Ibn al-'Arabi

___________________________________________________

Those who believe that they believe in God, but without passion in their hearts, without anguish in mind, without uncertainty, without doubt, without an element of despair even in their consolation, believe only in the God idea, not God Himself. ~ Miguel de Unamuno