Food for the Soul: Celebrating Spring (Nowrooz) with Persian Poets

'Drop of Green' (name of painting above)--plz see info on the artist and painting at the end of this post *

OPEN the WINDOWS, for the kind breeze is celebrating the birthday of the beautiful flowers,
And spring on each and every branch -- close to each young leaf -- has turned on lovely candles...
Look at the generosity in the eyes of the green meadow...
the Soul is alive again...!**

--Fereydun Mosheri

(see end of post for credit/url where I found this excerpt.)

THIS MOMENT
This moment, this love, comes to rest in me
many beings in one being
In one wheat grain a thousand sheep stacks

Inside the needle's eye
a turning night of stars

There is a light seed grain inside
you fill it with yourself or it dies...

TENDER WORDS
Tender words we spoke
to one another
are sealed
in the secret vaults of heaven.
One day like rain,
they will fall to earth
and grow green
all over the world.

The way of love is not a subtle argument.
The door there is devastation.
Birds make great sky-circles of their freedom.
How do they learn it?
They fall, and falling, they're given wings.

--Rumi

A POET
A poet is someone Who can pour Light into a cup and raise it to nourish your beautiful parched holy mouthA POET A poet is someone Who can pour Light into a cup and raise it to nourish your beautiful parched holy mouth

THE LUTE WILL BEG
You need to become a pen
In the Sun´s hand.

We need for the earth to sing
Through our pores and eyes.

The body will again become restless
Until your soul paints all its beauty
Upon the sky.

Don´t tell me, dear ones,
That what Hafiz says is not true,

For when the heart tastes its glorious destiny
And you awake to our constant need
for your love

God´s lute will beg
For your hands.

Good poetry makes the universe reveal a secret

EVERY CHILD HAS KNOWN GOD
Every child has known God,
Not the God of names,
Not the God of don’ts,
Not the God who ever does Anything weird,
But the God who knows only 4 words.
And keeps repeating them, saying:
“Come Dance with Me , come dance.”

WITH THAT MOON LANGUAGE
Admit something:
Everyone you see, you say to them, "Love me."
Of course you do not do this out loud, otherwise someone would call the cops.
Still, though, think about this, this great pull in us to connect.
Why not become the one who lives with a full moon in each eye
that is always saying,
with that sweet moon language,
what every other eye in this world is dying to hear?

What happens when your soul
Begins to awaken
Your eyes
And your heart
And the cells of your body
To the great Journey of Love?

First there is wonderful laughter
And probably precious tears

And a hundred sweet promises
And those heroic vows
No one can ever keep.

But still God is delighted and amused
You once tried to be a saint.

What happens when your soul
Begins to awake in this world

To our deep need to love
And serve the Friend?

O the Beloved
Will send you
One of His wonderful, wild companions ~
Like Hafiz.

MY EYES SO SOFT
Don't surrender your loneliness so quickly
let it cut more deep.
Let it ferment and season you
as few human or even divine ingredients can

Something missing in my heart tonight
has made my eyes so soft
my voice so tender
my need of God
absolutely clear.

--Hafiz

MY OWN POETRY
I didn't trust it for a moment,
but I drank it anyway,
the wine of my own poetry.
It gave me the daring to take hold
of the darkness and tear it down
and cut it into little pieces.

--Lalla, Contemporary of Hafiz

DESSE BARAMA (Peace)
The world shines about me,
luminous as the moon, smiling like a rose,
and a sweet benediction
flows through everything existing.
How beautiful life is.
I marvel at people who are not in love with life.
You, my girl***, are beautiful,
and your beauty,
like the beautiful thought of peace,
belongs to the eternity.
Detest war and destruction.
When you go to the riverbank,
and the sun sets in the evening,
the waters of the river will be rippling softly,
and from a distance, in the twilight, you will see white sails.
A song of the boatman will come from there.
'Today no suffering, no suffering.'
The world shines about me,
luminous as the moon,
smiling like a rose.

--Hamza El Din

Blogger's Note:
These "translations" and/or paraphrases (sometimes heavily-informed by the poet who "translates" are renditions for modern readers by Coleman Barks, David Ladinsky, and others. David Ladinsky, who did most of the Hafiz after he studied the poet with an "expert" in South Asia. Ladinsky also relied on translations by Wilberforce Clark published in 1891.

I have "borrowed" these poems/versions from several sources yet quoting each with url could defeat the purpose of these works at this time. Surely all the poets and poet lovers involved -- including the readers -- long for simplicity, beauty and truth and might feel distracted by too many "scholarly references". However, place any concerns, questions, comments or additions you may have below and I will do my best to read and reply.

Here are a few more exquisite and divinely energizing sites for even more of the same quality of work as above:

Persian Music & Poetry & Spring Equinox - The Persian New Year is celebrated on the day of the Spring Equinox and is called ' Nowrooz '. More exquisite beauteous treats for the starved soul on YouTube GO here

***See DESSE BARAMA above. Persian art work often springs from and works toward the reuniion of humankind with God. The Persian artist, like many others, trusts art's ability to help accomplish this. So on this Eve of Spring, 20 March, 2012, I celebrate my exquisite daughter -- who beautifully continues the Asian and African art of Batik and truth in beauty -- and offer her this poem of PEACE.

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Addendum:

A helpful little article I keep revisiting here

Finally, I also keep re-finding "Rumi on War and Conflict" on Rishi Faisal's unassuming yet lovely little known blog here I hope we will see more by him soon..

Celebrating Passion and Peace,

Connie

*For original notation of painting copy posted above:
http://www.book530.com/painting/188246/Drop-of-green.html Email: handarts@gmail.com

** بهار را باور کن - زنده یاد فریدون مشیری - Believe in Spring, the Persian New Year and especially the Divine Inspiration behind such joys. I found the introductory poem excerpt and more here