"When Hector heard that challenge he rejoiced and right in the no man's land along his lines he strode, gripping his spear mid-haft, staving men to a standstill while Agamemnon seated his Argives geared for combat. And Apollo lord of the silver bow and Queen Athena, for all the world like carrion birds, like vultures, slowly settled atop the broad towering oak sacred to Zeus whose battle-shield is thunder, relishing those men."

"The hunter catches a dreadful prey, the seaman steers his ship into an unspeakable harbor, the plowman sows and reaps a fearful harvest, the investigator finds the criminal and the judge convicts him—they are all the same man—the revealer turns into the thing revealed, the finder into the thing found, the calculator finds he is himself the solution of the equation and the physician discovers that he is the disease. The catastrophe of the tragic hero thus becomes the catastrophe of fifth-century man; all his furious energy and intellectual daring drive him on to this terrible discovery of his fundamental ignorance—he is not the measure of all things but the thing measured and found wanting."

"You are the king no doubt, but in one respect, at least, I am your equal: the right to reply. I claim that privilege too. I am not your slave. I serve Apollo. I don't need Creon to speak for me in public. So, you mock my blindness? Let me tell you this. You with your precious eyes, you're blind to the corruption in your life, to the house you live in, those you live with— who are your parents? Do you know? All unknowing you are the scourge of your own flesh and blood, the dead below the earth and the living here above, and the double lash of your mother and your father's curse will whip you from this land one day, their footfall treading you down in terror, darkness shrouding your eyes that now can see the light! Soon, soon, you'll scream aloud—what haven won't reverberate? What rock of Cithaeron won't scream back in echo? That day you learn the truth about your marriage, the wedding-march that sang you into your halls, the lusty voyage home to the fatal harbor! And a crowd of other horrors you'd never dream will level you with yourself and all your children. There. Now smear us with insults—Creon, myself and every word I've said. No man will ever be rooted from the earth as brutally as you."

"The memory of one who is taken into the heart of a little child is kept forever green."

"Like a hyacinth in the mountains, trampled by shepherds until only a purple stain remains on the ground."

"Dapple-throned Aphrodite, eternal daughter of God, snare-knitter!"

"I wanted to hear Sappho’s laughter and the speech of her stringed shell.What I heard was whiskered mumble- ment of grammarians:Greek pterodactyls and Victorian dodos."

"Hesperus, you herd homeward whatever Dawn’s light dispersedYou herd sheep—herd goats—herd children home to their mothers."

"Some say a cavalry corps, some infantry, some, again, will maintain that the swift oars of our fleet are the finest sight on dark earth; but I say that whatever one loves, is."

"A hundred souls cried out, but we are yours, we are yours, we are yours. You are the light that spoke to Moses and said I am God, I am God, I am God. I said Shams-e Tabrizi, who are you? He said, I am you, I am you, I am you."

"Love said to me, there is nothing that is not me. Be silent."

"I always thought that I was me — but no, I was you and never knew it."

"Silence is an ocean. Speech is a river.When the ocean is searching for you, don't walk into the language-river. Listen to the ocean, and bring your talky business to an endTraditional words are just babbling in that presence, and babbling is a substitute for sight."

"Do not believe in an absurdity no matter who says it."

"I don't know where I am. At times I plunge to the bottom of the sea, at times, rise up like the Sun.At times, the universe is pregnant by me, at times I give birth to it."

"Even if you lose yourself in wrath for a hundred thousand years, at the end you will discover, it is me, who is the culmination of your dreams."

"To Love is to reach God. Never will a Lover's chest feel any sorrow. Never will a Lover's robe be touched by mortals. Never will a Lover's body be found buried in the earth. To Love is to reach God."

"From Hallaj, I learned to hunt lions, but I became something hungrier than a lion."

"I can't stop pointing to the beauty.Every moment and place says, "Put this design in your carpet!""

"This that we are now created the body, cell by cell, like bees building a honeycomb.The human body and the universe grew from this, not this from the universe and the human body."

"God's joy moved from unmarked box to unmarked box, from cell to cell."

"He says, "There’s nothing left of me. I’m like a ruby held up to the sunrise. Is it still a stone, or a world made of redness? It has no resistance to sunlight."This is how Hallaj said, I am God, and told the truth!The ruby and the sunrise are one. Be courageous and discipline yourself.Completely become hearing and ear, and wear this sun-ruby as an earring."

"Every object and being in the universe is a jar overflowing with wisdom and beauty, a drop of the Tigris that cannot be contained by any skin. Every jarful spills and makes the earth more shining, as though covered in satin."

"My head is bursting with the joy of the unknown. My heart is expanding a thousand fold. Every cell, taking wings, flies about the world. All seek separately the many faces of my Beloved."

"There is a certain cloud, impregnated with a thousand lightnings. There is my body, in it an ocean formed of his glory, all the creation, all the universes, all the galaxies, are lost in it."

"This is a gathering of Lovers. In this gathering there is no high, no low, no smart, no ignorant, no special assembly, no grand discourse, no proper schooling required. There is no master, no disciple. This gathering is more like a drunken party, full of tricksters, fools, mad men and mad women. This is a gathering of Lovers."

"This heart sanctuary does exist, but it can't be described. Why try! Solomon goes there every morning and gives guidance with words, with musical harmonies, and in actions, which are the deepest teaching. A prince is just a conceit until he does something with generosity."

"Who looks out with my eyes? What is the soul? I cannot stop asking. If I could taste one sip of an answer, I could break out of this prison for drunks. I didn't come here of my own accord, and I can't leave that way. Whoever brought me here, will have to take me home."

"All day I think about it, then at night I say it. Where did I come from, and what am I supposed to be doing? I have no idea. My soul is from elsewhere, I'm sure of that, and I intend to end up there."

"Gamble everything for love, if you are a true human being."

"When in Love, body, mind, heart and soul don't even exist."

"It may be that the satisfaction I need depends on my going away, so that when I've gone and come back, I'll find it at home."

"Disputational knowing wants customers. It has no soul."

"Move outside the tangle of fear-thinking. Live in silence. Flow down and down in always widening rings of being."

"The cure for pain is in the pain. Good and bad are mixed. If you don't have both, you don't belong with us."

"Learn from Ali how to fight without your ego participating. God's lion did nothing that didn't originate from his deep center."

"Quit acting like a wolf, and feel the shepherd's love filling you."

"There is a community of the spirit Join it, and feel the delight of walking in the noisy street, and being the noise."

"There is no reality but God, says the completely surrendered sheik, who is an ocean for all beings."

"We talk about this and that. There’s no rest except on these branching moments."

"Spring is Christ, Raising martyred plants from their shrouds. Their mouths open in gratitude, wanting to be kissed. The glow of the rose and the tulip means a lamp is inside. A leaf trembles. I tremble in the wind-beauty like silk from Turkestan. The censer fans into flame. This wind is the Holy Spirit. The trees are Mary."

"Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field. I will meet you there. When the soul lies down in that grass, the world is too full to talk about language, ideas, even the phrase each other doesn't make any sense."

"Do not grieve. Anything you lose comes round in another form."

"Every tree and plant in the meadow seemed to be dancing, those which average eyes would see as fixed and still."

"Observe the wonders as they occur around you. Don't claim them. Feel the artistry moving through, and be silent."

"Come to the orchard in Spring. There is light and wine, and sweethearts in the pomegranate flowers.If you do not come, these do not matter. If you do come, these do not matter."

"This poetry. I never know what I'm going to say. I don't plan it. When I'm outside the saying of it, I get very quiet and rarely speak at all."

"The place that Solomon made to worship in, called the Far Mosque, is not built of earth and water and stone, but of intention and wisdom and mystical conversation and compassionate action."

"They will ask you what you have produced. Say to them, except for Love, what else can a Lover produce?"

"Christ is the population of the world, and every object as well. There is no room for hypocrisy. Why use bitter soup for healing when sweet water is everywhere?"