Pain follows pleasure, which follows pain.
Today we drink wine in celebration,
Tomorrow we’ll drink it because we grieve.
But nothing from either wine will remain.

translated by Richard Zenith

“I love my dreams,” I said, a winter morn,
To the practical man, and he, in scorn,
Replied: “I am no slave of the Ideal,
But, as all men of sense, I love the Real.”
Poor fool, mistaking all that is and seems!
I love the Real when I love my dreams.

translated by Richard Zenith

I love what I see because one day
I’ll stop seeing it. I also
Love it because it is.
In this calm moment when I feel myself
By loving more than by being,
I love all existence and myself.
No better thing could the primitive gods
Give me, were they to return—
They, who also know nothing.

translated by Richard Zenith

What matters is love.
Sex is just an accident:
It can be the same
Or different.
Man isn’t an animal:
He’s an intelligent flesh,
Though subject to sickness.

translated by Richard Zenith

No one loves anyone else; he loves
What he finds of himself in the other.
Don’t fret if others don’t love you. They feel
Who you are, and you’re a stranger.
Be who you are, even if never loved.
Secure in yourself, you will suffer
Few sorrows.

translated by Richard Zenith