Vahshi Bafqi
وحشی بافقی
Poet of Yazd whose plain, passionate ghazals of love and complaint are still widely known.
- Known for
- Ghazals of the 'school of incident' and Farhad and Shirin
- Forms
- Ghazal, Masnavi
- Collection
- The Greats
Kamal al-Din Vahshi was born in Bafq, near Yazd, around 1532. He spent some years in Kashan, where he is said to have worked as a schoolteacher, and later settled in Yazd, writing for its local rulers. He died there in 1583.
Vahshi was a leading poet of the maktab-e voqu', the 'school of incident', which turned the ghazal towards the plain, realistic speech of lovers' quarrels and partings. His stanzaic poem beginning 'Friends, hear the tale of my distress' is still widely known. His romance Farhad and Shirin, a reworking of a story told by Nezami, was left unfinished and completed in the nineteenth century by Vesal Shirazi.
Booksکتابها
The principal works of Vahshi Bafqi.
The Divan of Vahshi
دیوان وحشی بافقیVahshi's lyric poems, best known for ghazals in the plain, direct manner of the 'school of incident', and for his stanzaic poems of love and complaint.
Read 2 poemsFarhad and Shirin
فرهاد و شیرینVahshi's retelling of the love of the stonecutter Farhad for the princess Shirin, a story Nezami had told in Khosrow and Shirin, here centred on Farhad. Vahshi died before finishing it, and Vesal Shirazi completed it in the nineteenth century.
Read the poemNazer and Manzur
ناظر و منظورA romance of the devotion between two young men, Nazer, 'the beholder', and Manzur, 'the beheld'. It is one of the narrative poems Vahshi completed.
Poems by Vahshi Bafqiشعرها
In the original Persian, beside an English translation.
دوستان شرح پریشانی من گوش کنید
داستان غم پنهانی من گوش کنید
Friends, listen to the tale of my distress;
listen to the story of my hidden grief;
Friends, Hear the Tale of My Distress
الاهی سینه ای ده آتش افروز
در آن سینه دلی وان دل همه سوز
O God, give me a breast that kindles fire,
and in that breast a heart, and that heart all burning.
O God, Give Me a Breast That Kindles Fire
ما چون ز دری پای کشیدیم کشیدیم
امید ز هر کس که بریدیم، بریدیم
When we have drawn our foot back from a door, we have drawn it back;
when we have cut off hope of anyone, we have cut it off.
When We Turned from a Door
Vahshi Bafqi in Iranian history
Iranian historyThe Safavidsصفویان
The Safavids made Twelver Shia Islam Iran's state religion and rebuilt Isfahan as one of the most admired cities in the world.