تا به از جان نیست جان باشد عزیز ** چون به آمد نام جان شد چیز لیز4110
Whilst nothing is better than life, life is precious; when a better appears, the name of life becomes a slippery (futile) thing.
لعبت مرده بود جان طفل را ** تا نگشت او در بزرگی طفل‌زا
The lifeless doll is as (dear as) life to the child until he has grown up to manhood.
این تصور وین تخیل لعبتست ** تا تو طفلی پس بدانت حاجتست
This imagination and fancy are (like) the doll: so long as you are (spiritually) a child, you have need of them;
چون ز طفلی رست جان شد در وصال ** فارغ از حس است و تصویر و خیال
(But) when the spirit has escaped from childishness, it is in union (with God): it is done with sense-perception and imagination and fancy.
نیست محرم تا بگویم بی‌نفاق ** تن زدم والله اعلم بالوفاق
There is no confidant (familiar with this mystery), that I should speak without insincerity (reserve). I will keep silence, and God best knoweth the (true) accord.
مال و تن برف‌اند ریزان فنا ** حق خریدارش که الله اشتری4115
The goods (of this world) and the body are snow melting away to naught; (yet) God is their purchaser, for God hath purchased.
برفها زان از ثمن اولیستت ** که هیی در شک یقینی نیستت
The snows seem to you better than the price, because you are in doubt: you have no certainty (no sure faith),
وین عجب ظنست در تو ای مهین ** که نمی‌پرد به بستان یقین
And in you, O contemptible man, there is this marvellous opinion that does not fly to the garden of certainty.
هر گمان تشنه‌ی یقینست ای پسر ** می‌زند اندر تزاید بال و پر
O son, every opinion is thirsting for certainty and emulously flapping its wings (in quest thereof).
چون رسد در علم پس پر پا شود ** مر یقین را علم او بویا شود
When it attains to knowledge, then the wing becomes a foot, and its knowledge begins to scent certainty,