English
In Praise of Imam Hasan al-Mujtaba
Come, the wine cup swears by our old vow
to break your repentance once more; leave that to me.
Don't pin your heart on penitence, my heart, or you'll become an idol-worshipper;
come, the idol-breaker has arrived, the wine that shatters every vow.
Ascetic, if you look with the eye of true insight,
worshipping your own repentance and worshipping idols are one and the same.
Come to the tavern's school, to the old wine-master,
so you may learn how to journey beyond yourself.
Among the people of true devotion, your prayer is not valid
unless you have learned from the cup the art of bowing low.
The smile of the wine-cup's flower is a hidden hint:
these two days of life yield nothing from grieving.
Cup-bearer, bring that wine you know so well,
whose very scent from the bottle is an intoxication that fells brave men.
So we may wash the dust of reason from heart and soul,
and shake the haze of intellect off head and body.
How sweet is the wine of pure beholding, whose cup
is drunk through the eye, not through the mouth.
Whoever has tasted the drunkenness of the beloved's face knows
that the only true wine is the wine of love; all the rest is mere trickery.
God knows, and the Giver, and the cup-bearer of Kawthar,
that wine never left my skirt soberer than before.
There is only me, the wine, and the gaze of that bloodthirsty child of an eye
whose lips, fresh from milk, have washed themselves in the blood of my heart.
The talk of wine has spilled at last into verse and song;
for it is settled: one word always gives birth to another.