Once again my distraught heart
has contracted in pain,
but speaking brings relief
and heals the heartache.
Once we were free of pain,
the sorrow of the heart a stranger to us.
Then a frenzied madness set in
and the stranger became an intimate.
Unity had set us free from concern
about having more or less.
Then from the bottle of multiplicity
sorrow was poured into the heart’s mouth.
In the banquet of lovers
our way is silence;
the lover who breathes a word
is imperfect in love.
O ruinous love,
you devastated me and said,
“Whoever is slain by me
is of the rank of Adam.”
O love, in your presence there is safety,
while in your district there is blame.
Whoever keeps company with you
becomes steeped in suffering and grief.
If now and then Nurbakhsh
remembers You with a sigh,
it is because every moment
he receives grace from You.