Wed
Hafiz & I
Oh my tiny fool, look smart, show a lil wit
How can you be the guide if you never traveled the road
To learn about the truth you must adopt love as your guide
So now listen son and someday you too may be a father
All this feasting and sleeping, only made you fat and lazy
Alas today deprived and depraved you may learn something yet
Take-heart, it’s never too late to earn her shine
Greet love with your heart, and you may outshine the sun
Wash your hands off all the dust and copper
Take and tender love with a gilded touch today
Don’t sit and wait
Get out there, feel life
Touch the sun, and immerse in the sea
You’ll never know a thing if you only imagine how it feels
To know the fire; step into the flame
To know the water; bathe in the lake
Those who know her; see her only in clarity
No haze or fog to cloud their eyes
No doubts to rain on the parade
Braced by her love, you’ll never need nor ever want
In times of frolic or tragedy, no gain or loss
May ever wane the beauty
Oh dear Hafiz if you seek to reunite with the beloved
Be as dirt at the doorway to the wise, and speak from the heart.
I long for a kind sentiment from the Friend
I’ve sinned and hope for Her pardon in the end.
I know She will overlook my crimes, though she is
Beautiful-faced, on her angelic nature I can depend.
I cried such that whomever passed me by
Was in awe of the stream of my tears descend.
Naught is that mouth there, of it I see no sign
And there is that fair hair, yet knowing transcends.
I see her image in my mind and can’t wash out
In spite of all the tears that my eyes spend.
With no talk of your hair, my heart is just dead.
With your enchanting hair, which talk can I defend?
A life time has passed since I smelled your hair
That aroma, in the nose of my heart has since remained.
Hafiz your perturbed state is bad, yet
Perturbation over Beloved’s hair is a good trend.
© Shahriar Shahriari
Los Angeles, Ca
March 18, 2004
The bright moon reflects your radiant face
Your snowcapped cheekbones supply water of grace
My heavy heart desires an audience with your face
Come forward or must return, your command I will embrace.
Nobody for good measures girded your fields
Such trades no one in their right mind would chase.
Our dormant fate will never awake, unless
You wash its face and shout brace, brace!
Send a bouquet of your face with morning breeze
Perhaps inhaling your scent, your fields we envision & trace.
May you live fulfilled and long, O wine-bearer of this feast
Though our cup was never filled from your jug or your vase.
My heart is reckless, please, let Beloved know
Beware my friend, my soul your soul replace.
O God, when will my fate and desires hand in hand
Bring me to my Beloved hair, in one place?
Step above the ground, when you decide to pass us by
On this path lie bloody, the martyrs of human race.
Hafiz says a prayer, listen, and say amen
May your sweet wine daily pour upon my lips and my face.
O breeze tell us about the inhabitants of city of Yazd
May the heads of unworthy roll as a ball in your polo race.
Though we are far from friends, kinship is near
We praise your goodness and majestic mace.
O Majesty, may we be touched by your grace
I kiss and touch the ground that is your base.
© Shahriar Shahriari
Los Angeles, Ca
January 17, 2000
Where is sensible action, & my insanity whence?
See the difference, it is from where to whence.
From the church & hypocritical vestments, I take offence
Where is the abode of the Magi, & sweet wine whence?
For dervishes, piety and sensibility make no sense
Where is sermon and hymn, & the violin's music whence.
Upon seeing our friend, our foes put up their defense
Where is a dead lantern, & the candle of the sun whence?
My eye-liner is the dust of your door and fence
Where shall I go, tell me, you command me whence?
Take your focus from your chin to the trap on the path hence,
Where to O heart, in such hurry you go whence?
May his memory of union be happy and intense
Where are your amorous gestures, & your reproach whence?
Make not restlessness & insomnia, Hafiz's sentence
What is rest, which is patience, and sleep whence?
© Shahriar Shahriari
Los Angeles, Ca
Februaru 1, 2000
O beautiful wine-bearer, bring forth the cup and put it to my lips
Path of love seemed easy at first, what came was many hardships.
With its perfume, the morning breeze unlocks those beautiful locks
The curl of those dark ringlets, many hearts to shreds strips.
In the house of my Beloved, how can I enjoy the feast
Since the church bells call the call that for pilgrimage equips.
With wine color your robe, one of the old Magi’s best tips
Trust in this traveler’s tips, who knows of many paths and trips.
The dark midnight, fearful waves, and the tempestuous whirlpool
How can he know of our state, while ports house his unladen ships.
I followed my own path of love, and now I am in bad repute
How can a secret remain veiled, if from every tongue it drips?
If His presence you seek, Hafiz, then why yourself eclipse?
Stick to the One you know, let go of imaginary trips.
Returning
The morning breeze comes back
and from the southern desert
the lapwing returns
The dove's soft song about roses
I hear that again.
The tulip, who understands what the lily says,
went away, but now she's back.
With the sound of a bell,
strength and gentleness.
Hafiz broke his vow and damaged his heart,
but now, for no reason, his Friend forgives that,
and turns, and walks back up to his door.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
