Like The Ganges -- Hafiz

[Guest guest]

Like The Ganges

 

 

 

The Sun needs a sacred tablet where it can write

 

Its resplendent verse

 

 

 

And Hafiz has become a blessed stone.

 

 

 

When the Friend begins to sway from being so full

 

Of wine,

 

 

 

Music flows like the Ganges from His mouth.

 

 

 

He then needs fertile banks and walls in this world

 

To govern all that raging Light.

 

 

 

I build canals into the cities and the plains.

 

I run beside small villages and sing.

 

 

 

I nourish and cool the roots of stars and trees

 

And man.

 

 

 

Women wash their clothes in Me.

 

Thirsty cattle and skinny dogs come

 

 

 

Accompanied by spell-bound children,

 

But soon we all begin to splash and kiss.

 

 

 

Birds fly to my shores, then get excited and spread

 

The news:

 

 

 

The verse of Hafiz is a Turkish bath;

 

The glance of Hafiz is a beatific ocean

 

Bath

 

 

 

Where all can clean their bodies

 

In the sounds from my flute and mirth -

 

 

 

In the tenderness of my drum's alluring beat.

 

 

 

His Music has filled my pores.

 

I am inebriated with the unbearable Truth.

 

 

 

Tonight I am a staggering, awesome planet,

 

For all day long I construct alliances

 

 

 

Using my divine gravity upon all sinew,

 

Minds and souls.

 

 

 

I ecstatically speak with words and also with

 

The purest language - Silence -

 

 

 

Saying in a thousand different ways:

 

 

 

"Dear countrymen, and all my nearby cousins -

 

Comets and galaxies,

 

 

 

Every amoeba, creature and plant -

 

Bring your cup and I will pour you God."

 

 

 

O, when the Friend begins to sway

>From being so full of love,

 

 

 

Music flows like the Ganges from

 

My mouth.

 

 

 

("The Subject Tonight Is Love" - versions of Hafiz by Daniel Ladinsky)