Saturday, February 20, 2010

The Real Me

If only you knew the real me,
Then you would see how sad I am, How much I cry, And how I want to die.
If only you knew what it was like to be me,
Then you would know what it feels like to be hated,
How it feels to have no one care about you,And you would know how much pain I am in.
But you're not me.
So you'll never know what it's like to be me, And I can never let you see the real me,
So for now I'll just smile and act like everything is okay.

Three passions have governed my life:
The longings for love, the search for knowledge, And unbearable pity for the suffering of [humankind].
Love brings ecstasy and relieves loneliness. In the union of love I have seen In a mystic miniature the prefiguring vision Of the heavens that saints and poets have imagined. With equal passion I have sought knowledge. I have wished to understand the hearts of people. I have wished to know why the stars shine.
Love and knowledge led upwards to the heavens, But always pity brought me back to earth; Cries of pain reverberated in my heart Of children in famine, of victims tortured And of old people left helpless. I long to alleviate the evil, but I cannot, And I too suffer. This has been my life; I found it worth living.

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