An omen from Hafez

Ghazal 426

From the heart's blood I wrote a letter to the Friend:

'Truly, in your parting, I have seen an age of Resurrection.'

From her parting I bear a hundred marks upon my eye:

'The tears of my eye — is this not our very token?'

However much I put her to the test, no gain was mine:

'Whoever tries the tried and true, regret befalls him.'

I asked a physician the state of the Friend; he said:

'In her farness is torment, in her nearness is safety.'

I said: 'Blame will surely come, if I circle round the Friend';

'By God — we have never seen a love without its blame.'

Hafez, since he turned seeker, gave a cup for his sweet life,

'that he might taste from it one cup of the grace of God.'

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