[41] Moles or «beauty spots» are very highly esteemed in the East.
[42] i.e., If life were eternal, you could not take the place of others who have died before you. L. 2, lit.: «let the world pass, etc.»
[43] i.e., the Mystic Road or Way of Salvation.
[44] Burak was the winged mule of Muhammad on which he is said to have journeyed from Jerusalem to heaven.
[45] This is a very difficult quatrain to translate. The mystic soaring of the soul in search of enlightenment is compared to the flight of a falcon. In l. 3, lit.: «any partner of the secret.»
[46] C. reads these two lines:—
These two or three days of the period of my existence pass by
They pass as passes the wind in the desert.
[47] Compare FitzGerald's «First Morning of Creation» in q. 73.
[48] i.e., the Curtain that Veils the Mysteries of God, a constantly recurring image in Persian literature.
[49] C. reads «of this juggling about of the soul.» E.B.C. suggests «of this chess-opening.»