I was caught suddenly by a sweep of reverence, by a sensation that made me want to sink to my knees. For somehow I knew that I had stumbled upon an epiphany, a strange gracing of my darkness... That was the moment the knowledge descended into my heart and I understood. REALLY understood. Crisis, change, all the myriad upheavals that blister the spirit and leave us groping — they aren't voices simply of pain but also of creativity. And if we would only listen, we might hear such times as beckoning us to a season of waiting, to the place of fertile emptiness.
If your spirit is not fit to see the Beloved, neither will your heart be a bright mirror, fit to reflect love. It is true that no eye is able to contemplate and marvel at Love's beauty, nor is it capable of understanding; one can no feel toward the Beloved as one feels toward the beauty of this world. But by abounding Grace, we have been given a mirror to reflect the Beloved, and this mirror is the heart. Look into your heart and there you will see Love's image.
~ from THE CONFERENCE OF THE BIRDS by Farid ud-Din Attar and Afkham Darbandi
