Inside this clay jar there are meadows and groves and the One who made them.

Inside this jar there are seven oceans and innumerable stars, acid to test gold, and a patient appraiser of jewels.

Inside this jar the music of eternity, and a spring flows from the source of all waters.

Kabir says: Listen friend! My beloved Master lives inside.

-- Kabir

(trans. by C. Milosz and R. Hass)

in The Enlightened Heart (ed. by Stephen Mitchell)

There is an old Jewish legend about the origin of praise.

After God created mankind, says the legend,

He asked the angels what they thought

of the world He had made.

"Only one thing is lacking," they said.

"It is the sound of praise to the Creator."

So, the story continues,

"God created music,

the voice of birds,

the whispering wind,

the murmuring ocean,

and planted melody in people's hearts."

quoted from Music Lovers Quotations

(edited by Helen Exley)

"A Tune"

I know a certain tune that my life plays;

Over and over I have heard it start

With all the wavering loveliness of viols

And gain in swiftness like a runner's heart.

It climbs and climbs; I watch it sway in climbing

High over time, high even over doubt,

It has all heaven to itself -- it pauses

And faltering blindly down the air, goes out.

-- Sara Teasdale

(from The Collected Poems of Sara Teasdale)

Praise to you

Spirit of fire!

To you who sound

The timbrel and the lyre.

Your music sets our minds ablaze!

-- Hildegard of Bingen

in Prayers of the Women Mystics

(edited by Ronda De Sola Chervin)