Yunus Emre

1238-1320 / Turkey

If You Break A True Believer's Heart Once

If you break a true believer's heart once,
It's no prayer to God-this obeisance,
All of the world's seventy-two nations
Cannot wash the dirt off your hands and face.

There are the sages-they have come and gone.
Leaving their world behind them, they moved on.
They flapped their wings and flew to the True One,
Not like geese, but as birds of Paradise.
The true road doesn't ever run awry,
The real hero scoffs at clambering high,
The eye that can see God is the true eye,
Not the eye that stares from a lofty place.
If you followed the never-swerving road,
If you held a hero's hand as he strode,
If doing good deeds was your moral code,
You shall get a thousand to one, no less.
These are the moving facts that Yunus tells,
Where his blend of butter and honey jells,
Not salt, but jewelry is what he sells
These goods he hands out to the populace.
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