I am reading Hafiz’s Little Book of Life, poetry by Hafiz-e Shirazi. He is challenging me to become more comfortable with ambiguity. I will share his poem and some of my thoughts on his poem (sometimes with the help of experts when the concepts are too hard for me), followed by a poem and some art inspired by his poem.

Hafiz’s Poem 35:

Harvests of spirituality could burn
Right on down to the ground
In the flames of self-denial
& the bonfires of hypocrisy

Some thoughts:

A lot of work comes before the output of a harvest. There is tilling, sowing, watering, weeding, pruning, feeding, and scaring pests away. To reach the point of harvest in spiritual terms means we’ve been doing something right. We’ve been putting in the effort necessary to produce noticeable fruits of the spirit. We are right at the finish line, ready to pluck the bounty from the stems and feast on our reward. Surely, we would never sabotage our own efforts and burn it all to the ground.

But it happens all the time. We become rigid in our ways and begin to try to change aspects of ourselves that we think must be purified even more. In our search for perfection, we become more and more radicalized in our thinking, unwilling to compromise or accept any other ideas. We think we have figured out the truth, the only way, the perfect path, and no one else could possibly be right. We lose humility and set ourselves in the place of judgement as though we know the Will of God. We light the flames of justice and destroy ourselves in the process, hypocrites that we have become in our staunchness.

Maybe we need to go back to the early days of tilling and pruning to be reminded that toiling in the dirt is part of being human. We are made of the stuff. We are not asked to deny our humanness, nor make idols of our belief systems. We are only meant to reap what we sow and give thanks every step of the process. The harvest is no more holy than the weeding. And not allowing ourselves to enjoy the fruits of our labors is a crime against the natural order of things. Hard work deserves to be rewarded and we are worth it.

My Poem 35:

Planting mystery seeds in soil
turned twice, watered with tears,
and weeded by blistered hands,

the bountiful produce gleams
in the sunlight like golden prosperity
waiting to be reaped and gathered.

If only, if only…pride goes before,
and losing the self in the process
hurts nearly as much as the regret.

How many acres of spiritual crops
must burn to ashes before we admit
we might not know everything?

Hafiz. Hafiz’s Little Book of Life. Translated by Erfan Mojib and Gary Gach, Hampton Roads Publishing, 2023.

This poem “The Flint” by Christina Rossetti felt connected somehow. Something in the humble nature of the flint, who retains its flintness without flinching, is inspiring.

Rossetti, Christina. Sing-Song: A Nursery Rhyme Book. George Routledge and Sons, 1872.