Understand

"Understand perceive O beloved mind
How can you slumber and be a Lover?
Having received then share it all
Or would you rather lose it possessing?
If crumbs be all that you have to fare
Does it matter if it is saltless or tasty?
When eyes are loaded with deep sleep
What is then the pillow and bedding?
Says Kabir, such is the path of Love
Why lose heart having committed yourself?"


Kabir

This is What You Shall Do

"This is what you shall do; Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and with the young and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes and in every motion and joint of your body.” 
― Walt Whitman

Romeo and Juliet

Shakespeare...Romeo speaks ...


But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks?
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,
Who is already sick and pale with grief,
That thou her maid art far more fair than she:
Be not her maid, since she is envious;
Her vestal livery is but sick and green
And none but fools do wear it; cast it off.
It is my lady, O, it is my love!
O, that she knew she were!
She speaks yet she says nothing: what of that?
Her eye discourses; I will answer it.
I am too bold, 'tis not to me she speaks:
Two of the fairest stars in all the heaven,
Having some business, do entreat her eyes
To twinkle in their spheres till they return.
What if her eyes were there, they in her head?
The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars,
As daylight doth a lamp; her eyes in heaven
Would through the airy region stream so bright
That birds would sing and think it were not night.
See, how she leans her cheek upon her hand!
O, that I were a glove upon that hand,
That I might touch that cheek!

The Hope of Loving

What keeps us alive, what allows us to endure?
I think it is the hope of loving,
or being loved.

I heard a fable once about the sun going on a journey
to find its source, and how the moon wept
without her lover’s
warm gaze.

We weep when light does not reach our hearts.
We wither like fields if someone close
does not rain their
kindness
upon
us.

~ Meister Eckhart

Petrarch Sonnet to Laura

When Love within her lovely face appears now and again among the other ladies, as much as each is less lovely than she the more my wish I love within me grows. I bless the place, the time and hour of the day that my eyes aimed their sights at such a height, and say: 'My soul, you must be very grateful that you were found worthy of such great honour. From her to you comes loving thought that leads, as long as you pursue, to highest good, esteeming little what all men desire; there comes from her all joyous honesty that leads you by the straight path up to Heaven- already I fly high upon my hope.'

God's Lovers

"The reward of an individual who serves God out of love consists in experiencing celestial joy of a wondrous character... One who serves the King of the Universe out of love, without expectation of reward in this world or the next --but out of love alone-- will be compensated by the Holy One Himself. If he serves Him for the sake of some earthly reward, for the purpose of acquiring wealth or having children, he receives his reward entirely in this world. Just as this world is transitory, so too his reward. And if he serves God for the sake of securing a place in Paradise, his reward will be administered by the angels who tend there. But if he devotes himself to God out of pure love, his soul cleaves to the "Infinite One"... Those who attain the grade of super-soul are called God's lovers." -Elijah De Vidas

Die in Love

Rumi
"You think you are alive
because you breathe air?
Shame on you, 
that you are alive in such a limited way.
Don't be without Love, 
so you won't feel dead.
Die in Love 
and stay alive forever."