Hafiz: one who is known to recite the Qu’ran from memory

A Persian Sufi-poet 1315-1390

Taking a Riddle into the Tavern

For many years my heart wanted

something for me,

not knowing that it was itself

what it wanted:

the desire for Jamshid's cup,

wherein all existence can be seen,

except for that chalice itself, that is.

 

There was a man beloved of God

who cried out to God, "Why

have you forsaken me?"

 

I took the riddle of this into a tavern

and asked the one who served.

He said, "Some secrets must be kept,

not told to the world at large.

The rosebud and the soul write mysteries

on their margins fold within fold.

Stay closed and wait."

 

"Your wine glass is the all-revealing cup!"

"Given before the creation."

"And what of that woman there

that I cannot forget?"

 

"Hafiz," said the tavernmaster, "this love

within you that speaks needs

some restraint!"

 

Translation by Coleman Barks 

My friend has fled?

My friend has fled? alas, my friend has fled,

And left me nought but tears and pain behind?

Like smoke above a flame caught by the wind,

So rose she from my breast and forth she sped.

Drunk with desire, I seized Love's cup divine,

But she that held it poured the bitter wine

Of Separation into it and fled.

The hunter she, and I the helpless prey;

Wounded and sick, round me her toils she drew,

My heart into a sea of sorrow threw,

Bound up her camel loads and fled away.

Fain had I laid an ambush for her soul,

She saw and vanished, and the timid foal,

Good Fortune, slipped the rein and would not stay.

My heart was all too narrow for my woe,

And tears of blood my weeping eyes have shed,

A crimson stream across the desert sped,

Rising from out of my sad heart's overflow.

She knew not what Love's meanest slave can tell:

"'Tis sweet to serve!" but threw me a Farewell,

Kissing my threshold, turned, and cried "I go!"

In the clear dawn, before the east was red,

Before the rose had torn her veil in two,

A nightingale through Hafiz's garden flew,

Stayed but to fill its song with tears, and fled.

 

Translation by Gertrude Bell (The Hafez Poems of Gertrude Bell)

Cupbearer, it is morning, fill my cup with wine

Cupbearer, it is morning, fill my cup with wine.

Make haste, the heavenly sphere knows no delay.

Before this transient world is ruined and destroyed,

ruin me with a beaker of rose-tinted wine.

The sun of the wine dawns in the east of the goblet.

Pursue life's pleasure, abandon dreams,

and the day when the wheel makes pitchers of my clay,

take care to fill my skull with wine!

We are not men for piety, penance and preaching

but rather give us a sermon in praise of a cup of clear wine.

Wine-worship is a noble task, O Hafiz;

rise and advance firmly to your noble task.

 

Translation by Bernard Lewis