A Response to Hafiz

A Response to Hafiz

Some Fill With Each Good Rain, by Hafiz

“There are different wells within your heart.

Some fill with each good rain,

Others are far too deep for that.

In one well

You have just a few precious cups of water,

That “love” is literally something of yourself,

It can grow as slow as a diamond

If it is lost.

Your love

Should never be offered to the mouth of a

Stranger,

Only to someone

Who has the valour and daring

To cut pieces of their soul off with a knife

Then weave them into a blanket

To protect you.

There are different wells within us.

Some fill with each good rain,

Others are far, far too deep

For that.”

It is late, I cannot sleep and the heart spirals in the dark silence, so I offer a response. 

The knife is sharp. 

The well deep, imperceptibly so. 

Few people have tasted of this precious love.

They are more likely to cut pieces from your own soul 

with a rusty blade 

and tangle the scraps into a tattered rag 

to protect themselves from a passing storm

Before discarding it

To chase butterflies in the sun.

We hope,

We long for,

We deserve

The warmth and the sweetness of one

Who can sat beside us and weave

Before the roaring fire of our shared devotion. 

. . . and then it started to flow

Poetry is strong and moves through me like a tender storm this evening. 

Those who know me will attest to my fire but not my delicacy. These past few days have seen that change, a softening has occurred, grasping became a caress and my soul found it's voice. It may not sing aloud but in every moment it cries silently for the beauty of being. 

I have found some special souls these past few days and my heart weeps for the memories it had forgotten it had forgotten. It took many ways and long times of working but finally the chains fell of their own accord. 

A gypsy gave my heart wings and my soul soared, it dared to dream again and the dreams are written on the wings of angels, and demons, may their sweet love making give us muse our hearts crack in trying to comprehend. 

And can I speak of the visionary? 

I fear to, for words would cripple her sight.

The Door is Open

Bittersweet longing, wanton, unrequited. 

Potent yearning brimming with hope. 

There is a shard of promise 

in that hope, 

like glass it shines 

and like glass it cuts. 

We can live a long time on hope alone, 

empty fuel, delusion made truth by power of imagination. 

Crazy in love, but . . . . still . . . . there is hope. 

And should our reaching hand find friendly fingers intertwined, 

the heart skips a beat, 

a bar, 

the heart skips with delight. 

Then there is the loving, 

the falling, 

the fooling, 

the sticky extrication. 

Every rose loses it's fragrance to rot.

In regret bitter knows no sweet. 

Better then to live in hope without risking loss,

or to suffer the torture of longing fulfilled?

But what of the other love, 

so pure, so complete,

so very much so there is no need to compete?

My heart sings in simply knowing. 

I celebrate your freedom,

offer you a golden cage

with no door. 

The space you may never visit again, 

holy by your absence, 

because that hole bears your shape. 

Memory of you a silent song. 

The sun dims in awe and stars cluster to adorn your dreams. 

Dreams dream of you, and I with them. 

What makes the difference then between these types of love? 

Heaven and hell inhabit the same coin, 

is it the chance of the toss, 

is it the hand of Fate that decides?

I wish I knew. 

How I wish I knew.