Hafez

Again the garden has got the glitter of Spring: The nightingale hears good news, for the rose is come. Soft wind returning to the young plants of the meadow, Greet for us the rose, the cypress and the sweet basil. They are spread for the wedding-feast of the wine-seller's son, And I'd sweep his floor with my eyelashes to win such grace.

Has made a shuttlecock of my heart, and set it spinning.

Never dieth that one, whose heart is alive with love: On the worlds record, is written the everlasting existence of ours.

Beyond the sphere passeth the arrow of our sigh. Hafez! silence. Show compassion to thy soul; avoid the arrow of ours.

Saki! with the light of wine, up-kindle the cup of ours. Minstrel! speak, saying: The worlds work hath gone to the desire of ours.

O thou void of knowledge of the joy of the perpetual wine-drinking of ours.

If the young Magian, wine-seller, display such splendor, I will make my eye-lash the dust-sweeper of the door of the wine-house.

O King of Kings, lofty of star! for Gods sake, a blessing, That, like the sky, I may kiss the dust of the court of yours.

Hafez uttereth a prayer. Listen: say an amin! Be my daily food the lips sugar-scattering of Thine.

Even after all this time, the sun never says to the earth, 'You owe me.' Look what happens with a love like that. It lights the whole sky.

I wish I could show you when you are lonely or in darkness the astonishing light of your own being.

The heart is a thousand-stringed instrument that can only be tuned with Love.

Don't surrender your loneliness so quickly. Let it cut more deep. Let it ferment and season you as few human or even divine ingredients can.

I have learned so much from God that I can no longer call myself a Christian, a Hindu, a Muslim, a Buddhist, a Jew.

The words you speak become the house you live in.

How did the rose ever open its heart and give to this world all its beauty? It felt the encouragement of light against its being; otherwise, we all remain too frightened.

Stay close to anything that makes you glad you are alive.

I am a hole in a flute that the Christ's breath moves through. Listen to this music.

I am a slave of the wine-drinking sage of Shiraz.

If that Shirazi Turk would take my heart in hand, I would remit for the Hindu's idol-temple Samarkand.