№ 06 Iran
This Too Shall Pass
این نیز بگذرد
īn nīz bogzarad
A Persian ring inscription that comforts the grieving and unsettles the joyful — and how Mandarin, Hausa, and Latin cousins each pick sides.
Parallel & Proverbs
A weekly literary miscellany
Read by the tongue
Persian
6 Persian proverbs read closely — filed under Patience, Hardship, Humility and 4 others; set beside cousins in Latin, English, Mandarin, Mandarin Chinese and 8 others.
№ 05 Iran
A Drowning Man Clutches at a Reed
غریق به هر گیاهی چنگ می‌زند
gharīq be har giyāhī chang mīzanad
A Persian proverb about desperation's blind grasp — and how English straw and Chinese doctors circle the same truth from very different distances.
№ 04 Iran
The Garden Behind the Wall
عطر گل پنهان نمی‌شود
atr-e gol penhān nemishavad
A Persian proverb says the fragrance of a rose cannot be hidden. Quality reveals itself despite walls and distance — and Chinese wine, a Russian awl, and English cream all prove the same thing through three very different mechanisms.
№ 03 Iran
The Garden Without the Gardener
باغ بی‌باغبان نمی‌ماند
bāgh-e bī-bāghbān nemīmānad
A Persian proverb about the garden that cannot keep itself — and how three other languages, from Mencius to Ovid to a modern English shrug, circle the same observation about cultivation and decay.
№ 02 Iran
The Tongue and the Sword
زخم زبان از زخم شمشیر بدتر است.
zakhm-e zabān az zakhm-e shamshīr badtar ast
Why Persians say the wound of the tongue is worse than the wound of the sword — and how Arabic spears, Turkish blades, and Italian edges name the same injury from different rooms.
№ 01 Iran
Drop by Drop
قطره قطره جمع گردد، وانگهی دریا شود
qatreh qatreh jamʿ gardad, vāngahi daryā shavad
Saadi's drops gather into a sea. Ovid's drops hollow a stone. Swahili grain fills a small wooden cup. Japanese dust becomes a mountain. Five languages chose five different small things — and the smallness, in each case, is exactly the point.
Persian proverbs, at a glance
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Drop by drop they gather, and then become a sea
قطره قطره جمع گردد، وانگهی دریا شود
Qatreh qatreh jamʿ gardad, vāngahi daryā shavad
Literally: Drop drop, gathered becomes, and-then sea becomes
Persian · Iran
Set beside
- Latin (Ovid) — same drops, opposite direction: where Saadi builds a sea, Ovid hollows a stone
- Mandarin — the same erosion image as Ovid compressed into four characters; folk register, not poetic
- Swahili — the metaphor moves from water to grain, and from natural process to household economy
- Japanese — the most extreme leap: from the smallest noticeable particle to the largest landform
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A drowning man will clutch at any reed.
غریق به هر گیاهی چنگ می‌زند
Gharīq be har giyāhī chang mīzanad
Literally: The drowning one clutches at any vegetation
Persian · Iran
Set beside
- English — the image narrows to a single straw, emphasising the futility more than the desperation
- Chinese — when illness is urgent, wildly seek any doctor; desperation in the consulting room rather than the river
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No garden survives without a gardener
باغ بی‌باغبان نمی‌ماند
Bāgh-e bī-bāghbān nemīmānad
Literally: A garden without a gardener does not remain
Persian · Iran
Set beside
- Mandarin (Mencius) — intermittent effort cannot sustain growth; the closest claim in a kindred agricultural register
- Latin (Ovid) — the same structural claim from the opposite direction: sustained small effort succeeds
- English — the folk-modern compression, no garden, no stone, no soil
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Nothing — neither joy nor suffering — lasts.
این نیز بگذرد
Īn nīz bogzarad
Literally: This also shall pass
Persian · Iran
Set beside
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What is genuinely good reveals itself despite any barrier placed before it.
عطر گل پنهان نمی‌شود
Atr-e gol penhān nemishavad
Literally: The fragrance of a rose cannot be hidden
Persian · Iran
Set beside
- Mandarin — wine fragrance travels from a deep alley; same claim, different scent
- Russian — an awl pierces through a sack; quality reveals itself through physical force, not scent
- English — density and physics, not fragrance; quality surfaces by natural law
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The wound of the tongue is worse than the wound of the sword.
زخم زبان از زخم شمشیر بدتر است.
Zakhm-e zabān az zakhm-e shamshīr badtar ast
Literally: Wound-of tongue from wound-of sword worse is.
Persian · Iran
Set beside
- Arabic — the same claim, with the spear in place of the sword
- Turkish — a sword wound passes, a tongue wound does not
- Italian — the same claim in Romance, with the sword's edge intact