-Surah Kahf: 109

The ocean of his generosity has no shore.
The tongue is powerless to thank,
the heart too bewildered to understand.
Though my sins are many
his compassion is greater still–
I swim in the sea of disobedience

but I do not drown.

— from Sarmad: Martyr to Love Divine, by Isaac Ezekiel

Hafez :

The sea of love is a sea that has no shore.
There, you can only give up your soul.

Each time you give your heart to love is a joyous moment.
For auspicious deeds there is no need for divination.

Avail yourself of the rend’s way, for this mark,
like the road to buried treasure, is not plain to everyone.

Don’t frighten us with reason’s prohibitions, and bring wine,
for that watchman has no authority in our province.

One can see him with a pure eye, like the new moon.
Not every eye can hold that crescent’s beauty.

Ask your own eyes who is killing us, O soul,
it is not the sin of ascendants and the crime of stars.

You are unaffected by the cry of Hafiz.
I am perplexed at that heart, hard as granite.

Translation:

Elizabeth Gray, The Green Sea of Heaven

 

Original:

بحریست بحر عشق که هیچش کناره نیست
آن جا جز آن که جان بسپارند چاره نیست
هر گه که دل به عشق دهی خوش دمی بود
در کار خیر حاجت هیچ استخاره نیست
ما را به منع عقل مترسان و می بیار
کان شحنه در ولایت ما هیچ کاره نیست
از چشم خود بپرس که ما را که می‌کشد
جانا گناه طالع و جرم ستاره نیست
او را به چشم پاک توان دید چون هلال
هر دیده جای جلوه آن ماه پاره نیست
فرصت شمر طریقه رندی که این نشان
چون راه گنج بر همه کس آشکاره نیست
نگرفت در تو گریه حافظ، به هیچ رو
حیران آن دلم که کم از سنگ خاره نیست

If there is no sign of you in someone
گر خورشیدست آن ندارد
Even if they are
shining like the sun,
they still don’t have
That (secret element)!

ما بر در و بام عشق حیران
We stand
raptured in awe
at the gates
and on the roof
of loveآن بام که نردبان ندارد
An inaccessible roof
With no ladder

دل چون چنگست و عشق زخمه
The heart is a harp
And love the player
پس دل به چه دل فغان ندارد
Who cannot feel emotions
Of longing when you hear it played?
امروز فغان عاشقان را

بشنو که تو را زیان نداردهر ذره پر از فغان و نالهست
Every particle of the lovers being is shouting
اما چه کند زیان ندارد
And behold there is no hurt involved

رقص است زبان ذره زیرا

Dance is the speech of the moon’s atoms

جز رقص دگر بیان ندارد

Other than dance it has no other expression

هر سو نگران تست دلها

وان سو که تویی گمان ندارد

این عالم را کرانهای هست
This world does have a boundary
عشق من و تو کران ندارد
The love of me and you has none
مانند خیال تو ندیدم
I have never seen anything like the thought of You
بوسه دهد و دهان ندارد
Which gives kisses without having a mouth
ماننده غمزهات ندیدم
I have not seen the likeness of your coyness
تیر اندازد کمان ندارد
Which shoots arrows but has no bow
دادی کمری که بر میان بند

طفل دل من میان ندارد

گفتی که به سوی ما روان شو

بی لطف تو جان روان ندارد

I marveled at an Ocean without shore,
and at a Shore that did not have an ocean;
And at a Morning Light without darkness,
and at a Night that was without daybreak;
And then a Sphere with no locality
known to either fool or learned scholar;
And at an azure Dome raised over the earth,
circulating ’round its center – Compulsion;
And at a rich Earth without o’er-arching vault
and no specific location, the Secret concealed…

from: http://www.ibnarabisociety.org/articles/elmore.html