What Should We Do about that Moon ?

A wine bottle fell from a wagon
And broke open in a field.

That night hundred beetles and all their cousins
Gathered

And did some serious binge drinking.

They even found some seed husks nearby
And began to play them like drums and whirl.
This made God very happy.

Then the ‘night candle’ rose into the sky
And one drunk creature, laying down his instrument
Said to his friend – for no apparent
Reason,

“What should we do about that moon?”

Seems to Hafiz
Most everyone has laid aside the music

Tackling such profoundly useless
Questions.

From: The Gift – Poems by Hafiz the Great Sufi Master
translations by Daniel Ladinsky

Joy and Sorrow

THEN a woman said, Speak to us of Joy and Sorrow.

And he answered:

Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.

And the selfsame well from which your laughter
rises was often times filled with your tears.

And how else can it be?

The deeper that sorrow carves into your
being, the more joy you can contain.

Is not the cup that holds your wine the very
cup that was burned in the potter’s oven?

And is not the lute that soothes your spirit,
the very wood that was hollowed with knives?

When you are joyous, look deep into your heart
and you shall find it is only that which has given
you sorrow that is giving you joy.

When you are sorrowful look again in your heart,
and you shall see that in truth you are weeping

for that which has been your delight.

Some of you say, “Joy is greater than sorrow,”
and others say, “Nay, sorrow is the greater.”
But I say unto you, they are inseparable.

Together they come, and when one sits alone with
you at your board, remember that the other is
asleep upon your bed.

Verily you are suspended like scales
between your sorrow and your joy.

Only when you are empty are you at
standstill and balanced.

When the treasure-keeper lifts you to weigh
his gold and his silver, needs must your joy
or your sorrow rise or fall.