The Secret Word

IX. I. 104. (p. 52)


How can I ever speak of the secret word?
How can I say, it is not like this, and not like that?

If I say, the Lord dwells within me,
the universe is ashamed.
If I say, He is outside of me,
I am lying.
The Beloved makes the inner and the outer worlds
to be one world for playing.
The conscious and the unconscious are his chair and footrest.

The Singer, who has sung creation,
is neither hidden nor revealed
neither known nor unknown.
There are no words to say that which He is.


version of Kabir by Lorin Roche. Working from Tagore’s 1915 Songs of Kabir.