I am ignorant of absolute truth. But I am humble before my ignorance and therein lies my honor and my reward.

 

Poetry is a deal of joy and pain and wonder, with a dash of the dictionary.

 

Tenderness and kindness are not signs of weakness and despair, but manifestations of strength and resolutions.

 

Sadness is but a wall between two gardens.

 

Progress lies not in enhancing what is, but in advancing toward what will be.

 

The chemist who can extract from his heart's elements compassion, respect, longing, patience, regret, surprise, and forgiveness and compound them into one can create that atom which is called love.

 

Remembrance is a form of meeting.

 

A friend who is far away is sometimes much nearer than one who is at hand. Is not the mountain far more awe-inspiring and more clearly visible to one passing through the valley than to those who inhabit the mountain?

 

And forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair.

 

The lights of stars that were extinguished ages ago still reach us. So it is with great men who died centuries ago, but still reach us with the radiations of their personalities.

 

Zeal is a volcano, the peak of which the grass of indecisiveness does not grow.

 

Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding.

 

Safeguarding the rights of others is the most noble and beautiful end of a human being.

 

A poet is a bird of unearthly excellence, who escapes from his celestial realm arrives in this world warbling. If we do not cherish him, he spreads his wings and flies back into his homeland.

 

The appearance of things change according to the emotions, and thus we see magic and beauty in them, while the magic and beauty are really in ourselves.

 

The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain. Seek ye counsel of the aged for their eyes have looked on the faces of the years and their ears have hardened to the voices of Life. Even if their counsel is displeasing to you, pay heed to them.

 

The bird has an honor that man does not have. Man lives in the traps of his abdicated laws and traditions; but the birds live according to the natural law of God who causes the earth to turn around the sun.

 

Advance, and never halt, for advancing is perfection. Advance and do not fear the thorns in the path, for they draw only corrupt blood.

 

The optimist sees the rose and not its thorns; the pessimist stares at the thorns, oblivious of the rose.

 

The obvious is that which is never seen until someone expresses it simply.

 

Rebellion without truth is like spring in a bleak, arid desert.

 

The teacher who is indeed wise does not bid you to enter the house of his wisdom but rather leads you to the threshold of your mind.

 

It is not a garment I cast off this day, but a skin that I tear with my own hands.

 

The tears that you spill, the sorrowful, are sweeter than the laughter of snobs and the guffaws of scoffers.

 

There are those who give with joy, and that joy is their reward.

 

You often say, "I would give, but only to the deserving." The trees in your orchard say not so, nor the flocks in your pastures. They give that they may live, for to withhold is to perish.

 

They consider me to have sharp and penetrating vision because I see them through the mesh of a sieve.

 

It is well to give when asked, but it is better to give unasked, through understanding.

 

Keep me away from the wisdom which does not cry, the philosophy which does not laugh and the greatness which does not bow before children.

 

They have exiled me now from their society and I am pleased, because humanity does not exile except the one whose noble spirit rebels against despotism and oppression.

 

Trees are poems the earth writes upon the sky; we fell them down and turn them into paper, that we may record our emptiness.

 

Music is the language of the spirit. It opens the secret of life bringing peace, abolishing strife.

 

Trust in dreams, for in them is hidden the gate to eternity.

 

Verily the kindness that gazes upon itself in a mirror turns to stone, and a good deed that calls itself by tender names becomes the parent to a curse.

 

The just is close to the people's heart, but the merciful is close to the heart of God.

 

We choose our joys and sorrows long before we experience them.

 

The philosopher's soul dwells in his head, the poet's soul is in his heart; the singer's soul lingers about his throat, but the soul of the dancer abides in all her body.

 

What difference is there between us, save a restless dream that follows my soul but fears to come near you?

 

The earth is like a beautiful bride who needs no manmade jewels to heighten her loveliness...

 

No human relation gives one possession in another—every two souls are absolutely different.