Form and ideal, gnat and lion, word and sense, Sound of the voice and thought, learnst thou by dissidence, The words and sounds take rise from exercise of thought. The sea of thought is where? Of this thou knowest naught. Words, as thou seest, rise as waves upon the sea. The sea of thought thou knowest great, immense to be. 255 The waves of thought arise, by breath of knowledge raised; They take the forms of words, of sounds, which ear has seized. Through words have forms arisen, and passed away again; As waves still lose themselves beneath the ocean’s main. From realm of formlessness, existence doth take form; And fades again therein: “To Him we must return.”[161] Each moment, then, for thee death and return await, As Ahmed hath declared: “Life’s transitory.”[162] Wait! Thoughts, bolts are, shot by God into the air like dust. Whose thoughts can reach to God, through densest air of lust? 260 The world’s renewed each moment, though we still remain In ignorance that permanence can change sustain. Life, like a river, ceaselessly, is still renewed; And apes persistency, in forms by change subdued, Through fleetness it puts on continuity’s shape; Like squib when ’tis revolved in dark by boy with tape. A flash of flame, through motion’s necessary speed, Appears unto our eyes a fire of size, indeed. Its length and its extension, through quickness of fact, Appear to be effects of God’s creative act. 265 A student of this mystery, a doctor of great skill, Is our Husāmu-’d-Dīn,[163] whose praises books would fill. The lion, now enraged with hunger’s gnawing pain, Perceived the hare was coming, bounding o’er the plain. All carelessly, in confidence, he frisking came, The lion all the while growled, gnashed his teeth from shame. No consciousness of fault was visible, no fear; But confidence, sure sign his conscience he felt clear. When he’d reached hearing range, the lion him addressed In tones of wrath: “Thou demon, insolent, possessed! 270 Know I’m a lion; elephants my prey I make. The tigers, spotted pards, by me are caused to quake. A petty hare am not I, slighted thus to be, Or see my just dominion spurned by likes of thee. Cast off assumed prim innocence, awake to fact; Thou hear’st the lion’s roar; forget not thus the pact.” The hare replied: “Gramercy! Hear my poor excuse. Let me explain. Your Majesty will ne’er refuse.”