The Gift, page 14
I will so gently
Spread open your mouth
And let you taste something of my
Sacred mind and life.
Surely
There is something wrong
With your ideas of
God.
O, surely there is something wrong
With your ideas of
God
If you think
Our Beloved would not be so
Tender.
BRING THE MAN TO ME
A Perfect One was traveling through the desert.
He was stretched out around the fire one night
And said to one of his close ones,
“There is a slave loose not far from us.
He escaped today from a cruel master.
His hands are still bound behind his back,
His feet are also shackled.
I can see him right now praying for God’s help.
Go to him.
Ride to that distant hill;
About a hundred feet up and to the right
You will find a small cave.
He is there.
Do not say a single word to him.
Bring the man to me.
God requests that I personally untie his body
And press my lips to his wounds.”
The disciple mounts his horse and within two hours
Arrives at the small mountain cave.
The slave sees him coming, the slave looks frightened.
The disciple, on orders not to speak,
Gestures toward the sky, pantomiming:
God saw you in prayer,
Please come with me,
A great Murshid2 has used his heart’s divine eye
To know your whereabouts.
The slave cannot believe this story,
And begins to shout at the man and tries to run
But trips from his bindings.
The disciple becomes forced to subdue him.
Think of this picture as they now travel:
The million candles in the sky are lit and singing.
Every particle of existence is a dancing alter
That some mysterious force worships.
The earth is a church floor whereupon
In the middle of a glorious night
Walks a slave, weeping, tied to a rope behind a horse,
With a speechless rider
Taking him toward the unknown.
Several times with all of his might the slave
Tries to break free,
Feeling he is being returned to captivity.
The rider stops, dismounts—brings his eyes
Near the prisoner’s eyes.
A deep kindness there communicates an unbelievable hope.
The rider motions—soon, soon you will be free.
Tears roll down from the rider’s cheeks
In happiness for this man.
Anger, all this fighting and tormenting want,
Mashuq,3
God has seen you and sent a close one.
Mashuq,
God has seen your heart in prayer
And sent Hafiz.
TOO BEAUTIFUL
The fire
Has roared near you.
The most intimate parts of your body
Got scorched,
So
Of course you have run
From your marriages into a
Different
House
That will shelter you
From embracing every aspect of Him.
God has
Roared near us.
The lashes on our heart’s eye got burnt.
Of course we have
Run away
From His
Sweet flaming breath
That proposed an annihilation
Too real,
Too
Beautiful.
MY EYES SO SOFT
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.
Something missing in my heart tonight
Has made my eyes so soft,
My voice so
Tender,
My need of God
Absolutely
Clear.
THE DIAMOND TAKES SHAPE
Some parrots
Have become so skilled with
The human voice
They could give a brilliant discourse
About freedom and God
And an unsighted man nearby might
Even begin applauding with
The thought:
I just heard jewels fall from a
Great saint’s mouth,
Though my Master used to say,
“The diamond takes shape slowly
With integrity’s great force,
And from
The profound courage to never relinquish love.”
Some parrots have become so skilled
With words,
The blind turn over their gold
And lives to caged
Feathers.
THAT DOES PERISH
The
Earth would die
If the sun stopped kissing her.
Hafiz is now such an exquisite world
That perishes
When God is not
Near.
CHAIN YOU TO MY BODY
All
These words
Are just a front.
What I would really like to do is
Chain you to my body,
Then sing for days
And days and
Days
About
God.
COVERS HER FACE WITH BOTH HANDS
What
We speak
Becomes the house we live in.
Who will want to sleep in your bed
If the roof leaks
Right above
It?
Look what happens when the tongue
Cannot say to kindness,
“I will be your slave.”
The moon
Covers her face with both hands
And can’t bear
To look.
DOG’S LOVE
All the crazy boys
Gather around their female
Counterpart,
When her canine beauty announces to the air
“My body is ready to play its part
In this miracle of
Birth.”
Look what dedicated young men will do
For their chance moment
Of dancing ecstatic on their
Hind legs.
They will stay up all night
And howl.
They will forget about food for days and
Feverishly pray in their own language.
They will growl, make serious threats,
Even bite each other, saying,
“She’s mine, all mine—watch out
You skinny fleabag.”
Listen, human lovers:
When did you last keep a vigil
Beseeching
Light?
When did you last fast, lose twenty pounds,
In hopes of embracing
God?
Hafiz will give you the unedited news today:
You will need to outdo all the noble acts
Of
Dog’s love.
TWENTY-TWO
Stay with Us
You
Leave
Our company when you speak
Of shame
And this makes
Everyone in the Tavern sad.
Stay with us
As we do the hardest work of rarely
Laying down
That pick and
Shovel
That will keep
Revealing our deeper kinship
With
God,
That will keep revealing
Our own divine
Worth.
You leave the company of the Beloved’s friends
Whenever you speak of
Guilt,
And this makes
Everyone in the Tavern
Very sad.
Stay with us tonight
As we weave love
And reveal ourselves,
Reveal ourselves
As His precious
Garments.
I AM FULL OF LOVE TONIGHT
I am full of love tonight
Come look into my eyes, and let’s go off
Sailing, my dear, on a long ocean ride.
This world will not touch you,
I will keep you snug upon my seat.
Let’s plot
To make the moon jealous
With a radiance leaping from your cheek.
I will be full of love tonight,
Come look into these ancient eyes!
And let’s go off sailing, my dear,
With our spirits intertwined.
Your body is just an old sandbar
In a speeding hourglass of time.
Love will turn the mouth of sorrow
Right side up.
Let your heart commence its destined
Laughing chime!
Hafiz will be brimful of love tonight,
Why ever be shy?
Come look into the playful eyes of my verse,
They are eternally branded,
Branded with
The Sun!
MANY LIVES AGO
Your tastes have become refined.
It used to be
If someone stole all your coins
Or locked your sexual pleasures in a room
You could not reach
This world would have no meaning
And a thirst for a hemlock brew
Might arise.
But that was many lives ago.
Now look at yourself:
You are often still a mess
Though these days,
At times,
You weep because
You miss
Him.
IT WILL STRETCH OUT ITS LEG
All the classes you have sat in,
All the money you have paid
For “truth,”
Something must be wrong, though,
If your eye still wanders through the streets
Acting like a beggar.
Why not try this:
Let all the fake teachers starve.
Picture one of the great masters
In your mind,
Put your lips against his cheek
Each morning.
Say, keep saying,
“Dear Beloved, pinch me.
I want proof You’re near—
A love-bruise on my rump will do.”
The Friend is an unfathomable well
That knows everything;
Draw from that safe luminous sky.
Stay near this book,
It will stretch out its leg and
Trip you;
You’ll fall
Into
God.
SOME OF THE PLANETS ARE HOSTING
The ear becomes alert when music says,
“I am over here.”
The eye goes on duty,
Becomes viable,
When beauty whistles and points to her dress
On the ground.
God has sent out ten thousand messengers
Announcing a great bash tonight some of the planets
Are hosting
Where the lead singer is God,
Himself.
But most of those couriers
Have become drunk, got waylaid,
Disoriented to the hilt
With such exalted
News,
And can no longer remember
The time and the
Place.
What does that have to do
With you?
Plenty.
Hafiz will fill you in later
If need
Be.
WHAT IS THE ROOT?
What
Is the
Root of all these
Words?
One thing: love.
But a love so deep and sweet
It needed to express itself
With scents, sounds, colors
That never before
Existed.
THE SAME SUNTAN
Burn
Every address for
God.
Any
Beloved
Who has just one color of hair,
One gender, one race,
The same suntan all the time,
One rule book,
Trust me when I say,
That man is not even
Half a god
And will only
Cause you
Grief.
FOR THREE DAYS
Not many teachers in this world
Can give you as much enlightenment
In one year
As sitting all alone, for three days,
In your closet
Would
Do.
That means not leaving.
Better get a friend to help with
A few sandwiches
And
The chamber
Pot.
And no reading in there or writing poems,
That would be cheating;
Aim high—for a 360 degree
Detox.
This sitting alone, though, is
Not recommended
If you are normally
Sedated
Or have ever been under a doctor’s
Surveillance because of your
Brain.
Dear one,
Don’t let Hafiz fool you—
A ruby is buried
Here.
TWENTY-THREE
A Clever Piece of Mutton
Like a
Clever piece of mutton
Refusing to go down the “well”
Knowing it will so quickly just come out
The “other end”
So it lodges itself between one’s teeth—
That’s the kind of poem Hafiz
Wants to sing
Today.
WHO CAN HEAR THE BUDDHA SING?
Hafiz,
Tonight as you sit with your
Young students
Who
Have eyes
Burning like coals for the truth,
Raise your glass in honor
Of The Old Great One from Asia,
Speak in the beautiful style
And precision wit of a
Japanese verse.
