I look for myself but find no one. I belong to the chrysanthemum hour of bright flowers placed in tall vases. I should make an ornament of my soul. Fernando Pessoa More Quotes by Fernando Pessoa More Quotes From Fernando Pessoa I'm sick of everything, and of the everythingness of everything. Fernando Pessoa book-of-disquiet sick Silence emerges from the sound of rain and spreads in a crescendo of gray monotony over the narrow street I contemplate. I’m sleeping while awake, standing by the window, leaning against it as against everything. I search in myself for the sensations I feel before these falling threads of darkly luminous water that stand out from the grimy building facades and especially from the open windows. And I don’t know what I feel or what I want to feel. I don’t know what to think or where I am. Fernando Pessoa rain sleep fall THIRD WATCHER Let her speak. Don't interrupt. She knows words that mermaids taught her...I'm falling asleep in order to hear her...Go on, sister, go on...My heart aches because I wasn't you when you dreamed at the seashore. Fernando Pessoa heart order fall Every spoken word double-crosses us. The written word is the only tolerable form of communication, as it isn't a stone in a bridge between souls but a ray of light between stars. Fernando Pessoa philosophical communication stars Who am I to myself? Just a feeling of mine. Fernando Pessoa mines ego feelings Sadly I write in my quiet room, alone as I have always been, alone as I will always be. And I wonder if my apparently negligible voice might not embody the essence of thousands of voices, the longing for self expression of thousands of lives, the patience of millions of souls resigned like my own to their daily lot, their useless dreams, and their hopeless hopes. Fernando Pessoa voice dream writing I realize that, while often happy and often cheerful, I am always sad. Fernando Pessoa cheerful realizing Better to dream than to be. Fernando Pessoa dream I seek and don’t find myself. I belong to chrysanthemum hours, neatly lined up in flowerpots. Fernando Pessoa chrysanthemums hours Life is whatever we conceive it to be. Fernando Pessoa life-is If I write what I feel, it's to reduce the fever of feeling. What I confess is unimportant, because everything is unimportant. Fernando Pessoa fever feelings writing Every day things happen in the world that cannot be explained by any law of things we know. Every day they're mentioned and forgotten, and the same mystery that brought them takes them away, transforming their secret into oblivion. Such is the law by which things that can't be explained must be forgotten. The visible world goes on as usual in the broad daylight. Otherness watches us from the shadows. Fernando Pessoa shadow secret law Life is an experimental journey undertaken involuntarily. It is a journey of the spirit through the material world and, since it is the spirit that travels, it is the spirit that is experienced. That is why there exist contemplative souls who have lived more intensely, more widely, more tumultuously than others who have lived their lives purely externally. The end result is what matters. What one felt was what one experienced. One retires to bed as wearily from having dreamed as from having done hard physical labor. One never lives so intensely as when one has been thinking hard. Fernando Pessoa what-matters journey thinking I've always been an ironic dreamer, unfaithful to my inner promises. Like a complete outsider, a casual observer of whom I thought I was, I've always enjoyed watching my daydreams go down in defeat. I was never convinced of what I believed in. I filled my hands with sand, called it gold, and opened them up to let it slide through. Words were my only truth. When the right words were said, all was done; the rest was the sand that had always been. Fernando Pessoa ironic dreamer hands After the rains departed the skies and settled on earth - clear skies; moist brilliant earth - greater clarity returned to life alone with the blue above and made the world below rejoice with the freshness of the recent rain. It left heaven in our souls and a freshness in our hearts. Fernando Pessoa rain blue heart What is a disease is wishing with an equal intensity what is needed and what is desirable, and suffer for not being perfect as you would suffer for not having bread. The romantic error is this wanting the moon as if there was a way to get it. Fernando Pessoa errors moon perfect One never lives so intensely as when one has been thinking hard. Fernando Pessoa thinking-hard has-beens thinking ...the painful intensity of my sensations, even when they're happy ones; the blissful intensity of my sensations, even when they're sad. Fernando Pessoa book-of-disquiet intensity painful I asked for very little from life, and even this little was denied me. Fernando Pessoa denied littles I know not what tomorrow will bring. Fernando Pessoa funny-famous-last-words last-words tomorrow
