If you abstain from pleasure

and youthful passion

you might as well be

a large, hard, desiccated rock

Life is naught

but what you love and desire

no matter how much the envious

scold and conspire

He loves long life

for fear of perdition

But he perishes

because of long life

Perhaps what you fear does not exist Perhaps what you wish

will come to be

Perhaps what you deem easy

is not so easy

And perhaps what you think hard

will be easy

Our lives are naught

but lines that scan

Then comes the rhyme

so ends the man

Our life is but

a phrase, a breath

Then comes full-stop

and that’s our death

Verily, the boon of a people

is fleeting pleasure

and a man’s life

is but a borrowed garment