Poetry Chaikhana
Sacred Poetry from Around the World

Muslim / Sufi

Contemporary

About Hafiz (Daniel Ladinsky)

Timeline (1945? - )

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Original Language
English

How Could a Lover Fall?

Themes

Death

Heart

Lover and Beloved

Pain and Wounding

Sun

Recommended Books

	The Gift: Poems by Hafiz the Great Sufi Master, by Daniel Ladinsky
	I Heard God Laughing: Renderings of Hafiz, by Daniel Ladinsky
	Love Poems from God: Twelve Sacred Voices from the East and West, Translated by Daniel Ladinsky
	The Subject Tonight Is Love: 60 Wild and Sweet Poems of Hafiz, by Daniel Ladinsky

What could have caused your grip to weaken
that allowed creation to be?

How could a lover fall to his death
from the arms of infinite
strength?

How active you are in the mind sustaining such a great wall
that the sun can cast a frightening shadow
the world believes.

No one has ever really known sadness. No real God
would ever allow pain.

How then can a heart feel it is broken and in need
if we are held in the arms of infinite
compassion and
strength?

That mirror you (God) stand before --
we need to gaze into it also.

That name you called Beloved
as I fell from your lips --
I suffer

because I did not quite
hear it;

so tell me again dear One
so clear:

I am
you.

-- from Love Poems from God: Twelve Sacred Voices from the East and West, Translated by Daniel Ladinsky

Amazon.com

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Poetry Chaikhana Sacred Poetry from Around the World

About Hafiz (Daniel Ladinsky)

Poetry Chaikhana
Sacred Poetry from Around the World