English
In His Praise
How splendid: even the highest heaven ranks beneath you, and every kind of praise reason can conceive falls short.
You are the one whom art itself calls its stronghold, safe from the sudden blows of fate.
The sky turns joyfully on itself because it counts itself equal in worth to you.
Why would anyone bother with sun and cloud, when they know the road to your hand and sleeve of giving?
Where the vanguard of your generosity marches on the path of gifted people, what enemy could hope to lie in ambush?
The heavens, whose deeds follow your judgment, treat your favor and anger as the very source of love and hate.
Not one speck of the sun stands apart from your shadow, for it knows its own brightness depends on this.
By your shadow the sun has become known and honored, since everyone judges a companion by the company they keep.
How could the guide called imagination reach your court, when it knows the way only as far as the seventh sphere?
In many years the bright-hearted sun cannot grasp the fine point that your far-seeing mind takes in at once.
Great one, this humble poet is a follower of your fortune; heaven counts my soul as pledged to your love.
He brings less trouble to your presence because he knows the weariness of that gentle nature.
I shorten the long night by praising you; the honest dawn is my true and faithful witness.
I bring my words to your seat, to which they are devoted: only someone who knows the worth of this precious jewel.
People of fine taste know the value of graceful words, as the jasmine petal knows the worth of the morning breeze.
There are many poets, but only the one with true taste can tell the water of life from a filthy ditch.
God knows whether I can find, among these poets, anyone who even understands the plain meaning of dark-eyed beauty.
How can I bring my words to one so careless that, with great effort, he still mistakes left for right?
What difference is there between me and others, in the eyes of one who takes Rostam's warhorse for a lump of clay?
How can anyone seek a cure for their pain from someone who counts a thorn as sweet manna?
All my humility comes from expecting nothing from anyone; reason knows this story of mine for certain.
When expectation is cut off... the one who reckons himself lower than this or that.
I kept putting a question to the old sage, reason, for he is the one who knows the cure for a grieving heart.
I asked: who is it that can share the sorrow of gifted people? He answered: Baha al-Din, the master, knows how.
Do not withhold your kind favors from this poet, for he counts them as his only treasure in the world.
I know you as my patron and pray for you; God in His glory knows this of me.