The Conference of the Birds by Farid ud-Din Attar

Author:Farid ud-Din Attar
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Group USA, Inc.

The man who refused to drink

There was a man advanced along the Way

Who always, to his puzzled friends’

dismay, Refused to drink sweet sherbet. “Why is this?”

lines 2403–16

One asked: “What could explain this prejudice?”

He said: “I see a man who stands on guard

And notes who drinks – his eyes are cold and hard,

And if I drank, the sweetest sherbet would,

I know, act like a poison in my blood.

While he stands here the contents of the bowl

Are liquid fire to sear the drinker’s soul.”

Whatever lasts a moment’s only worth

One barley grain – though it were all the earth;

How can I trust what has no rooted power

And holds existence for a transient hour?

If you achieve your every wish, why boast

Of glory insubstantial as a ghost?

If disappointments darken all your days,

You need not grieve, for nothing worldly stays –

It is your passion for magnificence

That prompts your tears, not fancied indigence.

What is your grief compared with all the pain

God’s martyrs suffered on Kerbelah’s plain?*

In His clear sight the hardships you endure

Show like a treasure, glittering and pure –

Each breath you breathe His kindness reaches you,

And untold love envelops all you do –

But you forget His grace, and negligence

Makes friendship look like meaningless pretence.

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