The Unstruck Drum of Eternity: Poetry of Kabir

O DEAR ONE! Here, behold my land! / Sorrowless past understanding! / I cry aloud to king and beggar, / To emperor and miracle worker...

CLOUDS THICKEN and rise in the sky! / O, listen to the deep voice cry, / The clouds roaring, Lay waste! Lay waste! / The gray rain comes in from the east; / Its monotonous hiss strikes the dust...

I AM NEITHER of the pious, / Nor the force of ungodliness; / I live neither by the strict laws, / Nor by the vagaries of sense...

OPEN YOU, EYES of love, / Unbid, and see Him who pervades this world. / Consider Him as your legacy, / And know this is your own country...

IF GOD IS in the mosque there, hid, / Then who owns this wide world, outside?

WHEN YOU will have come there at last, / To the ocean of happiness, / Do not go back while you still thirst. / Wake, foolish man! for Death stalks you...

WHEN I PART from my Beloved, / My heart is full of blight and dread: / I have no comfort in the day, / Nor have I sleep to comfort me. / To whom shall I my sorrow cry?

THE HIDDEN BANNER is planted / In the temple of the cloud; / Around is spread the blue canopy / Decked with the moon and its array...

THE LOCK of error shuts the gate, / Hurry! Before it is too late, / Open it with the key of love: / You know the key I’m speaking of...

A SORE PAIN troubles my daylight, / And I cannot sleep in the night; / I long to meet with my Beloved, / And my father's house is decayed, / The place I felt so safe and sure, / Gives me no pleasure any more...