Quotes from Fernando Pessoa

I crave time in all its duration, and I want to be myself unconditionally.

Nunca amamos a nadie: amamos, sólo, la idea que tenemos de alguien. Lo que amamos es un concepto nuestro, es decir, a nosotros mismos.

My soul is a hidden orchestra; I know not what instruments, what fiddlestrings and harps, drums and tambours I sound and clash inside myself. All I hear is the symphony.

Decadence is the total loss of unconsciousness, which is the very basis of life. Could it think, the heart would stop beating.

We live by action—by acting on desire. Those of us who don't know how to want—whether geniuses or beggars—are related by impotence.

Yes, everything's just fine. It's all perfectly fine. Except for one thing: it's all screwed up.

Isn't joyful or painful this pain in which I rejoice

When one of my Japanese teacups is broken, I imagine that the real cause was not the careless hand of a maid but the anxieties of the figures inhabiting the curves of that porcelain. Their grim decision to commit suicide doesn't shock me: they used the maid as one of us might use a gun.

Talking to people makes me feel like sleeping. Only my ghostly and imaginary friends, only the conversations I have in my dreams, are genuinely real and substantial.

A liberdade é a possibilidade do isolamento. Se te é impossível viver só, nasceste escravo.

Solitude devastates me; company oppresses me. The presence of another person derails my thoughts; I dream of the other's presence with a strange absent-mindedness that no amount of my analytical scrutiny can define.

Kalp düÅŸünebilseydi, atmaktan vazgeçerdi.

I have no philosophy, I have senses . . . If I speak of Nature it's not because I know what it is But because I love it, and for that very reason, Because those who love never know what they love Or why they love, or what love is. To love is eternal innocence, And the only innocence is not to think . .

FIRST WATCHER Why do people die? SECOND WATCHER Perhaps because they don't dream enough...

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.

They spoke to me of people, and of humanity. But I've never seen people, or humanity. I've seen various people, astonishingly dissimilar, Each separated from the next by an unpeopled space.

Vivo sempre no presente. O futuro, não o conheço. O passado, já o não tenho.

We never know self-realization. We are two abysses - a well staring at the sky.

Pouco me importa. Pouco me importa o quê? Não sei: pouco me importa.

Let's absurdify life, from east to west. Let us play hide-and-seek with our consciousness of living.

Life is whatever we make it. The traveller is the journey. What we see is not what we see but who we are. (76)

Eu que me aguente comigo e com os comigos de mim.

To love is to tire of being alone; it is therefore a cowardice, a betrayal of ourselves.

As vezes ouço passar o vento; e só de ouvir o vento passar, vale a pena ter nascido