I recognise you; I know you again, from a dream or another life…
— Jeanette Winterson, from ‘Weight’
Long before I met you / I had waited for you. I had always waited for you.
— Tasos Livaditis, Selected Poems; from 'This Star is For All of Us,1952', tr. Manolis Aligizakis
'If I had never seen her before I should still have known her.'
'As for the strange fact that she appeared familiar to me from the first glance, do not lovers always experience the feeling that they have seen each other before and that a mysterious bond has long existed between them?'
— Sadeq Hedayat, The Blind Owl and Other Stories; from ‘The Blind Owl’, tr. D. P. Costello
I didn't meet him, I recognised him. Love ravages me.
— Art of Style: Jean Cocteau
I loved you before I was born. / It doesn't make sense, I know.
From the beginning of my life / I have been looking for your face
— Rumi, The Love Poems of Rumi; from 'Looking for Your Face', tr. Deepak Chopra & Fereydoun Kia Rider
And he’s been here in my heart before I even knew him. Understand? He’s always been here. Always.
— Sandra Cisneros, Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories; from 'Never Marry a Mexican'
I remember / but it hasn’t happened yet
I wandered through the world / without knowing you existed / however / (now I know) / since the uncertain mist of the beginning / I went searching for you / among the faces.
— Claribel Alegria, Fugues; 'Now I Know', tr. Darwin J. Flakoll
Twice or thrice had I lov’d thee, / Before I knew thy face or name;
— John Donne, from ‘Air and Angels’
Though you had never possessed me / I had belonged to you since the beginning of time
— Mina Loy, The Lost Lunar Baedeker: Futurism × Feminism: The Circle Squared (Poems 1914–1920); from 'Three Moments in Paris'
Say my name. Say it. / The way it’s supposed to be said. / I want to know that I knew you / even before I knew you.
— Sandra Cisneros, Loose Woman; from ‘Dulzura’
You have been mine before, / How long ago I may not know:
— Dante Gabriel Rossetti, from ‘Sudden Light’
Your heart and my heart / Are very, very old / Friends.
— Hafiz, The Gift: from 'Your Mother and My Mother', tr. Daniel Ladinsky
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