Their forbearance, like fine choice wine, mounts by nice degrees up to the brain.
مست را بین زان شراب پرشگفت ** هم‌چو فرزین مست کژ رفتن گرفت2095
Behold the man drunken with that marvellous (earthly) wine: the drunken man has begun to move crookedly like the queen (in chess).
مرد برنا زان شراب زودگیر ** در میان راه می‌افتد چو پیر
From (the effect of) that quickly-catching wine the (vigorous) youth is falling in the middle of the road, like an aged man.
خاصه این باده که از خم بلی است ** نه میی که مستی او یکشبیست
Especially (consider the effect of) this (spiritual) wine which is from the jar of Balá—not the wine whereof the intoxication lasts (only) one night;
آنک آن اصحاب کهف از نقل و نقل ** سیصد و نه سال گم کردند عقل
(But) that (wine) from which, (by drinking it) at dessert and in migration (from place to place), the Men of the Cave (the Seven Sleepers) lost their reason for three hundred and nine years.
زان زنان مصر جامی خورده‌اند ** دستها را شرحه شرحه کرده‌اند
The women of Egypt drank one cup of that (wine) and cut their hands to pieces.
ساحران هم سکر موسی داشتند ** دار را دلدار می‌انگاشتند2100
The magicians (of Pharaoh) too had the intoxication of Moses: they deemed the gallows to be their beloved.
جعفر طیار زان می بود مست ** زان گرو می‌کرد بی‌خود پا و دست
Ja‘far-i Tayyár was drunken with that wine: therefore, being beside himself, he was pawning (sacrificing) his feet and hands (for God's sake).
قصه‌ی سبحانی ما اعظم شانی گفتن ابویزید قدس الله سره و اعتراض مریدان و جواب این مر ایشان را نه به طریق گفت زبان بلک از راه عیان
Story of Báyazíd's—may God sanctify his spirit—saying, "Glory to me! How grand is my estate!" and the objection raised by his disciples, and how he gave them an answer to this, not by the way of speech but by the way of vision (immediate experience).
با مریدان آن فقیر محتشم ** بایزید آمد که نک یزدان منم
That venerable dervish, Báyazíd, came to his disciples, saying, “Lo, I am God.”
گفت مستانه عیان آن ذوفنون ** لا اله الا انا ها فاعبدون
That master of the (mystic) sciences said plainly in drunken fashion, “Hark, there is no god but I, so worship me.”
چون گذشت آن حال گفتندش صباح ** تو چنین گفتی و این نبود صلاح
When that ecstasy had passed, they said to him at dawn, “Thou saidest such and such, and this is impiety.”
گفت این بار ار کنم من مشغله ** کاردها بر من زنید آن دم هله2105
He said, “This time, if I make a scandal, come on at once and dash knives into me.
حق منزه از تن و من با تنم ** چون چنین گویم بباید کشتنم
God transcends the body, and I am with the body: ye must kill me when I say a thing like this.”
چون وصیت کرد آن آزادمرد ** هر مریدی کاردی آماده کرد
When that (spiritual) freeman gave the injunction, each disciple made ready a knife.
مست گشت او باز از آن سغراق زفت ** آن وصیتهاش از خاطر برفت
Again he (Báyazíd) became intoxicated by that potent flagon: those injunctions vanished from his mind.
نقل آمد عقل او آواره شد ** صبح آمد شمع او بیچاره شد
The Dessert came: his reason became distraught. The Dawn came: his candle became helpless.
عقل چون شحنه‌ست چون سلطان رسید ** شحنه‌ی بیچاره در کنجی خزید2110
Reason is like the prefect: when the sultan arrives, the helpless prefect creeps into a corner.
عقل سایه‌ی حق بود حق آفتاب ** سایه را با آفتاب او چه تاب
Reason is the shadow of God: God is the sun: what power hath the shadow to resist His sun?