Do not listen to the friendliness of the fair-spoken ignorant man, for it is like old (virulent) poison.
جان مادر چشم روشن گویدت ** جز غم و حسرت از آن نفزویدت
He says to you, “O soul of thy mother! O light of my eye!” (but) from those (endearments) only grief and sorrow are added to you.
مر پدر را گوید آن مادر جهار ** که ز مکتب بچه‌ام شد بس نزار
That (foolish) mother says plainly to your father, “My child has grown very thin because of (going to) school.
از زن دیگر گرش آوردیی ** بر وی این جور و جفا کم کردیی
If thou hadst gotten him by another wife, thou wouldst not have treated him with such cruelty and unkindness.”
از جز تو گر بدی این بچه‌ام ** این فشار آن زن بگفتی نیز هم 1435
(Your father replies), “Had this child of mine been (born) of another (wife), not of thee, that wife too would have talked this (same) nonsense.”
هین بجه زن مادر و تیبای او ** سیلی بابا به از حلوای او
Beware, recoil from this mother and from her blandishments: your father's slaps are better than her sweetmeat.
هست مادر نفس و بابا عقل راد ** اولش تنگی و آخر صد گشاد
The mother is the carnal soul, and the father is noble reason: its beginning is constraint, but its end is a hundred expansions (of the spirit).
ای دهنده‌ی عقلها فریاد رس ** تا نخواهی تو نخواهد هیچ کس
O Giver of (all) understandings, come to my help: none wills (aught) unless Thou will (it).
هم طلب از تست و هم آن نیکوی ** ما کییم اول توی آخر توی
Both the desire (for good) and the good action (itself) proceed from Thee: who are we? Thou art the First, Thou art the Last.
هم بگو تو هم تو بشنو هم تو باش ** ما همه لاشیم با چندین تراش 1440
Do Thou speak and do Thou hear and do Thou be! We are wholly naught notwithstanding all this hewing.
زین حواله رغبت افزا در سجود ** کاهلی جبر مفرست و خمود
Because of this resignation (to Thy will) do Thou increase our desire for worship (of Thee): do not send (upon us) the sloth and stagnation of necessitarianism.
جبر باشد پر و بال کاملان ** جبر هم زندان و بند کاهلان
Necessitarianism is the wing and pinion of the perfect; necessitarianism is also the prison and chains of the slothful.
هم‌چو آب نیل دان این جبر را ** آب مومن را و خون مر گبر را
Know that this necessitarianism is like the water of the Nile— water to the true believer and blood to the infidel.
بال بازان را سوی سلطان برد ** بال زاغان را به گورستان برد
Wings carry falcons to the king; wings carry crows to the graveyard.
باز گرد اکنون تو در شرح عدم ** که چو پازهرست و پنداریش سم 1445
Now return to the description of non-existence, for it (non-existence) is like bezoar, though you think it is poison.
هم‌چو هندوبچه هین ای خواجه‌تاش ** رو ز محمود عدم ترسان مباش
Hark, O fellow-servant, go and, like the Hindú boy, be not afraid of the Mahmúd of non-existence.
از وجودی ترس که اکنون در ویی ** آن خیالت لاشی و تو لا شیی
Be afraid of the existence in which you are now: that phantasy of yours is nothing and you (yourself) are nothing.
لاشیی بر لاشیی عاشق شدست ** هیچ نی مر هیچ نی را ره زدست
One nothing has fallen in love with another nothing: has any naught ever waylaid (and attacked) any other naught?
چون برون شد این خیالات از میان ** گشت نامعقول تو بر تو عیان
When these phantasies have departed from before you, that which your understanding hath not conceived becomes clear to you.
لیس للماضین هم الموت انما لهم حسره الموت
Those who have passed away do not grieve on account of death; their only regret is to have missed the opportunities (of life).
راست گفتست آن سپهدار بشر ** که هر آنک کرد از دنیا گذر 1450
That captain of mankind has said truly that no one who has passed away from this world
نیستش درد و دریغ و غبن موت ** بلک هستش صد دریغ از بهر فوت
Feels sorrow and regret and disappointment on account of death; nay, but he feels a hundred regrets for having missed the opportunity,
که چرا قبله نکردم مرگ را ** مخزن هر دولت و هر برگ را
Saying (to himself), “Why did not I make death my object —(death, which is) the store-house of every fortune and every provision—
قبله کردم من همه عمر از حول ** آن خیالاتی که گم شد در اجل
(And why), through seeing double, did I make the lifelong object of my attention those phantoms that vanished at the fated hour?”
حسرت آن مردگان از مرگ نیست ** زانست کاندر نقشها کردیم ایست
The grief of the dead is not on account of death; it is because (so they say) “we dwelt upon the (phenomenal) forms,
ما ندیدیم این که آن نقش است و کف ** کف ز دریا جنبد و یابد علف 1455
And this we did not perceive, that those are (mere) form and foam, (and that) the foam is moved and fed by the Sea.”