Hafez · Ghazal 308 · Your face like paradise
ای رخت چون خلد و لعلت سلسبیلسلسبیلت کرده جان و دل سبیل
سبزپوشان خطت بر گرد لبهمچو مورانند گرد سلسبیل
ناوک چشم تو در هر گوشه‌ایهمچو من افتاده دارد صد قتیل
یا رب این آتش که در جان من استسرد کن زان سان که کردی بر خلیل
من نمی‌یابم مجال ای دوستانگرچه دارد او جمالی بس جمیل
پای ما لنگ است و منزل بس درازدست ما کوتاه و خرما بر نخیل
حافظ از سرپنجه عشق نگارهمچو مور افتاده شد در پای پیل
شاه عالم را بقا و عز و نازباد و هر چیزی که باشد زین قبیل
Hafez is honest about the distance: the foot is lame, the road long, the dates high on the palm and the hand short. If what you want feels out of reach, this ghazal does not pretend otherwise. But it also prays that the burning in the heart be soothed, as Abraham's fire was turned cool, and that prayer is worth making. Be patient with your own limits. The road can be walked one step at a time, and grace has cooled fiercer fires than yours.
O you whose face is like paradise and whose ruby lip is Salsabil,
your Salsabil has made soul and heart a free offering.
The green-clad down of your face around your lips
is like ants around the spring of Salsabil.
The arrow of your eye has, in every corner,
a hundred slain lying fallen like me.
O Lord, this fire that is in my soul,
make it cool, as you did for Abraham, your Friend.
I can find no way to approach her, O friends,
though she has a beauty that is beautiful indeed.
Our foot is lame and the destination very far;
our hand is short, and the dates are high on the palm.
Hafez, in the grip of love for the beloved,
has fallen like an ant beneath the foot of an elephant.
To the King of the world be long life, glory and delight,
and everything else of that kind.