Take good heed! Whether you speak praise (of God) or thanksgiving, know that it is even as the unseemly (words) of that shepherd.
هان و هان گر حمد گویی گر سپاس ** همچو نافرجام آن چوپان شناس
Though your praise is better in comparison with that, yet in relation to God it too is maimed (feeble).1795
حمد تو نسبت بدان گر بهتر است ** لیک آن نسبت به حق هم ابتر است
How often will you say, when the lid has been raised, “This was not what they were thinking (it was)!”
چند گویی چون غطا برداشتند ** کاین نبوده ست آن که میپنداشتند
This acceptance (by God) of your praise is from (His) mercy: it is an indulgence (which He grants), like (the indulgence granted in the case of) the prayers of a woman suffering from menorrhagia.
این قبول ذکر تو از رحمت است ** چون نماز مستحاضه رخصت است
Her prayers are stained with blood; your praise is stained with assimilation and qualification.
با نماز او بیالوده ست خون ** ذکر تو آلودهی تشبیه و چون
Blood is foul, and (yet) it goes (is washed away) by a (little) water; but the inward part (the inner man) hath impurities
خون پلید است و به آبی میرود ** لیک باطن را نجاستها بود
Which fail not (are not removed) from the interior (the heart) of the man of works except by the water of the grace of the Maker.1800
کان به غیر آب لطف کردگار ** کم نگردد از درون مرد کار
Would that in your bowing low in prayer you would turn your face (to attentive consideration) and apprehend the meaning of “Glory to my Lord!”
در سجودت کاش رو گردانیای ** معنی سبحان ربی دانیای
Saying, “Oh, my prostration (in prayer), like my existence, is unworthy (of Thee): do Thou give good in return for evil!”
کای سجودم چون وجودم ناسزا ** مر بدی را تو نکویی ده جزا
This earth has the mark of God's clemency, in that it got filth and gave flowers as the produce;
این زمین از حلم حق دارد اثر ** تا نجاست برد و گلها داد بر