An omen from Hafez
Ghazal 190
Your musky pen, upon the day it deigns to remember us,
carries off the whole reward of two hundred freed and ransomed slaves.
The courier from Salma's abode — may safety travel with him —
what would it cost him, with one greeting, to make our heart rejoice?
Put it to the trial: they will grant you treasures of desire in plenty,
if but your grace makes flourishing a ruin such as I.
O Lord, cast into the heart of that sweet Khosrow this one thought:
that she in mercy make her passage by the head of Farhad.
Better for the king than a hundred years of worship and restraint
is the worth of a single hour of life in which he metes out justice.
Just now the coquetry of your airs has torn me from my roots;
let us but see what, in its wisdom, it will raise up once again.
Your pure and flawless jewel stands above all need of our praise;
what can the tire-woman's thought avail a beauty God-bestowed?
We never came to reach our goal within the walls of Shiraz;
how happy the day when Hafez sets his face toward Baghdad!