Ode 173

ALL the long night we talked of your long hair:

The hollow listening hours rolled darkly by,

The solemn world beneath the steady stars

To morning moved, sleep-walking up the sky;

Only in Shiraz in the realm of Fars

The dark night long kept open one bright eye—

'T was where we sat up talking of your hair.

Each one of us, though wounded and far spent,

With arrowed eyelash sticking in his heart,

Still longed to see that bow your eyebrow bent,

And speeding yet another poisoned dart.

For 't is so many days since we have heard

News of you, that our hearts grew faint with fear;

But now at last the East Wind brings us word:

Ah! blame him not—we had such need to hear.

Ere you were born love was not; through you fell

The bitter curse of beauty on the world—

Yes! it was all that hair upon your head;

Amid its crafty convolutions curled

All the dark arts of beauty lie in wait;

For even I, before I came to tread

That darkling way, among the saints did dwell,

And full of grace and safety was my state.

Open your tunic: I would lay my head

Upon your heart—ah! deep within your side

Silence and shelter sweet I ever found;

Else must I seek them in the grave instead.

When HAFIZ sleeps indeed beneath the ground,

Visit his grave—it was for you he died.