Your face is neither infinite nor ephemeral.
You can never see your own face,
only a reflection, not the face itself.
So you sigh in front of mirrors
and cloud the surface.
It's better to keep your breath cold.
Hold it, like a diver does in the ocean.
One slight movement, the mirror-image goes.
Don't be dead or asleep or awake.
Don't be anything.
What you most want,
what you travel around wishing to find,
lose yourself as lovers lose themselves,
and you'll be that.
Farīd ud-Dīn ʿAṭṭār (full name: Abū Ḥamīd bin Abū Bakr Ibrāhīm) (c.1145 - c.1221) Persia (ancient Iran)
Translated by Coleman Barks
Source: Poetry Chaikhana
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