Nizami

Only man can know the pain of having something he does not need, while needing something he does not have …

But needs are often confused with wants, and those things that are wanted — but not needed — are sometimes the cause of our downfall.

Her eyes were dark and deep and lustrous, like the eyes of a gazelle, and with one flutter of her eyelashes she could have reduced the whole world to ruins.

Love was a wine-bearer who had filled their cups to the brim, and they drank whatever he poured for them.

She shone in him like the sun at noon in a cloudless sky: how could such light be concealed? How could he turn away, even for a second, from the only thing that gave meaning to his life?

With her, he felt the arrows of reproach from a thousand bows; without her, the pain of separation cut into his heart like a knife.

In his separation from Layla — a separation that had made him her slave — he was moved to compose the most beautiful odes and sonnets in her name, verses the likes of which those who were fortunate enough to hear had never heard before.

His home had become a prison where people talked, but never listened; where people counselled, but never understood. He had reached a point where he no longer paid any attention to what they were saying; he was past caring. Only the word ‘Layla’ meant anything to him now; when people talked of other things, he would block his ears and say nothing.

Caress her hair softly and whisper in her ear.

‘Dearest heart, if I had not given my soul to you, it would have been better to give it up for good, to lose it for ever.