' Neither body nor mind '...

To what shore would you cross, O my
heart? There is no traveler before
you, there is no road:

Where is the movement, where is the
rest, on that shore?
There is no water; no boat, no boatman,
is there;

There is not so much as a rope to tow
the boat, nor a man to draw it.
No earth, no sky, no time, no thing, is
there: no shore, no ford!

There, there is neither body nor mind:
and where is the place that shall
still the thirst of the soul? You shall
find naught in that emptiness.

Be strong, and enter into your own body:
for there your foothold is firm. Consider
it well, O my heart! Go not elsewhere.
Kabir says: "Put all imaginations away, and
stand fast in that which you are."

- Kabir




"Songs of Kabir"
Translated by Rabindranath Tagore
Samuel Weiser, Inc., 1977