We are foes to ourselves, and friends to him who slays us; we are drowned in the sea, and the waves of the sea are slaying us.
For this reason, laughing and gay, we are yielding up sweet life, because that king is slaying us with honey and sugar and sweetmeat.
We make ourselves out fat for the sacrifice of the feast, because that butcher of lovers slays the very fine and handsome.
That Iblis without light begs for a respite from Him; He gave him respite, because He is slaying him after tomorrow.
Like Ishmael, cheerfully lay your neck before the knife; do not steal your throat away from Him, if He is slaying, until He slays.
Azrael has no power or way to overcome lovers; love itself and passion slays the lovers of love.
The slain ones shout, “Would that my people knew”; secretly the Beloved bestows a hundred lives, and openly slays.
Put forth a head out of the earth of the body, and then see that He is either drawing you to heaven, or slaying you.
The spirit of breath He takes away, the comfort spiritual He bestows; He releases the falcon of the soul, and slays the owl of sorrow.
That idea the Christian carries abroad, the Moslem has not that idea, that He is slaying this Messiah upon the cross.
Every true lover is like Mans.¯ur, they slay themselves; show any beside the lover who deliberately slays himself!
Death daily makes a hundred requisitions on mankind; the lover of God without requisition slays himself.
I make this enough, else I will myself utter the secret of the lovers’ {death}, though the unbeliever slays himself of anger and fury.
Shams-i Tabr¯ız¯ı has climbed over the horizon like the sun; unceremoniously he is extinguishing the candles of the stars.
