Love is an (infinite) ocean, on which the heavens are (but) a flake of foam: (they are distraught) like Zalíkhá in desire for a Joseph.
عشق بحری آسمان بر وی کفی ** چون زلیخا در هوای یوسفی
Know that the wheeling heavens are turned by waves of Love: were it not for Love, the world would be frozen (inanimate).
دور گردونها ز موج عشق دان ** گر نبودی عشق بفسردی جهان
How would an inorganic thing disappear (by change) into a plant? How would vegetive things sacrifice themselves to become (endowed with) spirit?3855
کی جمادی محو گشتی در نبات ** کی فدای روح گشتی نامیات
How would the spirit sacrifice itself for the sake of that Breath by the waft whereof a Mary was made pregnant?
روح کی گشتی فدای آن دمی ** کز نسیمش حامله شد مریمی
Each one (of them) would be (as) stiff and immovable as ice: how should they be flying and seeking like locusts?
هر یکی بر جا ترنجیدی چو یخ ** کی بدی پران و جویان چون ملخ
Every mote is in love with that Perfection and hastening upward like a sapling.
ذره ذره عاشقان آن کمال ** می‌شتابد در علو هم‌چون نهال
Their haste is (saying implicitly) “Glory to God!” They are purifying the body for the sake of the spirit.
سبح لله هست اشتابشان ** تنقیه‌ی تن می‌کنند از بهر جان
The captain deemed (what was really) a pit to be like a (safe) road: to him the sterile soil appeared goodly, (so) he sowed seed (in it).3860
پهلوان چه را چو ره پنداشته ** شوره‌اش خوش آمده حب کاشته
Dormiens cum (aliquis) simulacrum (amatae) in somnio videret, cum eo coivit et aqua (seminis) effusa est. [When the sleeper saw an image (of her) in a dream, he coupled with it and (seminal) fluid flowed from him.]
چون خیالی دید آن خفته به خواب ** جفت شد با آن و از وی رفت آب
Postquam somnium abscessit et ipse extemplo experrectus est, sensit illam pupam sibi jam vigilanti coram non adesse. [When the dream departed and he woke up at once, he saw that that doll was not (present) in wakefulness.]
چون برفت آن خواب و شد بیدار زود ** دید که آن لعبت به بیداری نبود