Sad spring

Spring has appeared. Hyacinths and tulips and daffodils rise laughing from all their beds. But where are you? Where are you? The earth holds you fast in her darkness. I shall weep like the Spring’s clouds, perhaps then you shall rise from your depths, as Spring’s most beautiful flower.

Wishes

I wish I were a morning-clear lake and you the sun, reflecting in it. I wish I were a spring in the meadows and you the flower, laughing at yourself in it. I wish I were a green thorn on a bush and you the rose, shimmering red around it. I wish I were a small grain of sand and you the bird, picking it swiftly up.

The only medicine

Yes, I am ill, I know, I know, but leave me! The very best doctor cannot help me. There is no cure for these wounds, which burn so devastatingly in my breast. Only one can help me, that one who gave me the sweet poison, on which I sicken If she only loved me! I would recover instantly.

The burning tulips

Some day countless red tulips, red tulips flames shall sprout from my grave. Do not be amazed at this wonder, rather, splendid one, consider, consider, the mighty glow, a glow of love devoted to you, which once burned so much in life, that in death it still glows.

Dance

Today all dance, all, all dance! Divine is dance! Divine, divine is dance! Some dance in their stockings, some only in their shoes, some naked! High! High, you naked dancers, high! You beautiful and bold ones! Today all dance, all, all dance! Divine is dance! Divine is dance!

The lovesick East wind

O unhappy me! Who will give me news of my dearest? The east wind did indeed come and whisper a rushed message in my ear, but he whispered so confusedly and a-stutter, that I could not understand him! How well I know, how well I know, He is himself the most miserable, totally drunk and deranged by the beauty of my dearest.

The Love Songs of Hafiz, (German: Des Hafis Liebeslieder) is the name of two song cycles by Karol Szymanowski

(On Wikipedia.org – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Love_Songs_of_Hafiz)