Stray Birds

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.

O troupe of little vagrants of the world, leave your footprints in my words.

The world puts off its mask of vastness to its lover. It becomes small as one song, as one kiss of the eternal.

It is the tears of the earth that keep her smiles in bloom.

If you shed tears when you miss the sun, you also miss the stars.

Once we dreamt that we were strangers. We wake up to find that we were dear to each other.

Sorrow is hushed into peace in my heart like the evening among the silent trees.

Listen, my heart, to the whispers of the world with which it makes love to you.

The mystery of creation is like the darkness of night--it is great. Delusions of knowledge are like the fog of the morning.

Do not seat your love upon a precipice because it is high.

I sit at my window this morning where the world like a passer-by stops for a moment, nods to me and goes.

These little thoughts are the rustle of leaves; they have their whisper of joy in my mind.

What you are you do not see, what you see is your shadow.

I cannot choose the best. The best chooses me.

They throw their shadows before them who carry their lantern on their back.

That I exist is a perpetual surprise which is life.

Rest belongs to the work as the eyelids to the eyes.

Man is a born child, his power is the power of growth.

O Beauty, find thyself in love, not in the flattery of thy mirror.

"Moon, for what do you wait?" "To salute the sun for whom I must make way."