Ghazal 9

The splendor of youth’s era returns to the garden —

news of the rose arrives for the sweet-singing nightingale.

O breeze, if you pass by the young ones of the meadow,

convey our respects to the cypress, the rose, and the basil.

If the young wine-seller displays such beauty,

I will sweep the tavern door with my eyelashes.

O you who draw a polo stick of dark ambergris across the moon,

do not leave in turmoil this bewildered, wandering one.

I fear that these people who laugh at the dregs-drinkers

will in the end pledge their faith at the tavern’s door.

Be companion to the men of God, for in Noah’s ark

there was a bit of clay that would not buy the flood for an ocean.

Leave the house of the turning sky and seek no bread there,

for that black-bowled host will at last slay the guest.

Every soul whose final resting place is a handful of dust —

tell them: why raise your palace to the heights of heaven?

O my Canaan’s moon! The throne of Egypt is now yours —

it is time to bid farewell to this prison.

Hafez, drink wine and live freely and be glad, but

do not make the Quran a snare of deceit as others do.