Table of Contents

Preface Introduction: The Life and Work of Hafiz

One: Startled by God
Startled by God Let's Eat When the Violin Looking for Good Fish A Hunting Party This Sane Idea We Have Not Come to Take Prisoners I Can See Angels You're It I Rain

Two: I Have Learned So Much
I Have Learned So Much God Just Came Near The Sun Never Says The Seed Cracked Open Why Just Ask the Donkey Who Wrote All the Music Your Mother and My Mother Mismatched Newlyweds Your Seed Pouch That Magnificent Storm

Three: Removing the Shoe from the Temple
Removing the Shoe from the Temple Against My Own Hand Out of This Mess If God Invited You to a Party To Build a Swing A Crystal Rim This One Is Mine Curfews The Ear That Was Sold to a Fish An Infant in Your Arms

Four: I Hold the Lion's Paw
I Hold the Lion's Paw If the Falling of a Hoof What the Hell Someone Untied Your Camel When I Want to Kiss God For a Single Tear That Shapes the Eye So Many Gifts Love Is the Funeral Pyre Allah, Allah, Allah

Five: Don't Die Again
Don't Die Again Like a Life-Giving Sun The Great Work Effacement Some Fill with Each Good Rain The Vintage Man Everywhere Lifts beyond Conception God's Bucket Just Looking for Trouble

Six: The Gift
The Gift Laughing at the Word Two Life Starts Clapping The Foundation for Greatness Courteous to the Ant His Winter Crop The Scent of Light No Conflict Stop Calling Me a Pregnant Woman A Strange Feather

Seven: I Am Really Just a Tambourine
I Am Really Just a Tambourine The Stairway of Existence What Do White Birds Say?
How Do I Listen?
The Earth Braces Itself The Difference Between The Angels Know You Well Crooked Deals The Millstone's Talents Let Thought Become Your Beautiful Lover

Eight: Get the Blame Straight
Get the Blame Straight Rewards for Clear Thinking Please This Constant Yearning The Sad Game That Regal Coat Stop Being So Religious Friends Do Things Like This It Felt Love Look! I Am a Whale Two Bears The Sky Hunter Forgive the Dream

Nine: The Prettiest Mule
The Prettiest Mule Today Wise Men Keep Talking About Back into Herself The Mule Got Drunk and Lost in Heaven Why Abstain?
The Warrior Dividing God I Saw Two Birds Muhammad's Twin

Ten: Tiny Gods
Tiny Gods This Union When You Can Endure This Talking Rag Who Will Feed My Cat?
Burglars Hear Watchdogs A Still Cup That Lamp That Needs No Oil Too Wonderful

Eleven: Elephant Wondering
Elephant Wondering An Old Musician The Fish and I Will Chat The Heart Is Right Out of God's Hat The Clay Bowl's Destiny I Hope You Won't Sue This Old Man Faithful Lover Now Is the Time

Twelve: Counting Moles
Counting Moles Hafiz The Body a Tree A Great Need There Could Be Holy Fallout Trying to Wear Pants This Sky It Is Unanimous Two Puddles Chatting His Ballet Company

Thirteen: Reverence
Reverence That Tree We Planted I Vote for You for God A One-Story House The Great Religions What Happens to the Guest I Want Both of Us Like Passionate Lips Cucumbers and Prayers

Fourteen: A Cushion for Your Head
A Cushion for Your Head These Beautiful Love Games The Bag Lady The Ambience of Love Tired of Speaking Sweetly A Root in Each Act and Creature Our Hearts Should Do This More Turn Left a Thousand Feet from Here Imagination Does Not Exist Throw Me on a Scale The Hatcheck Girl Damn Thirsty

Fifteen: Two Giant Fat People
Two Giant Fat People Scratching My Back If You Don't Stop That Elegance A Hole in a Flute Until Why Aren't We Screaming Drunks?
Dropping Keys All the Talents of God The Great Expanse I Imagine Now for Ages

Sixteen: Spiced Manna
Spiced Manna A Hard Decree And For No Reason Sometimes I Say to a Poem The Suburbs She Responded We Might Have to Medicate You The Idiot's Warehouse When You Wake This Teaching Business Isn't Easy The Mountain Got Tired of Sitting

Seventeen: Where Is the Door to the Tavern?
Where Is the Door to the Tavern?
Becoming Human In Need of the Breath The Heart's Coronation The Thousand-Stringed Instrument Then Winks And Then You Are The Intelligent Man The Chorus in the Eye Find a Better Job The Lute Will Beg

Eighteen: When the Sun Conceived a Man
When the Sun Conceived a Man A Mime The Quintessence of Loneliness Needing a Mirror Zikr The Tender Mouth Greeting God Reaching Toward the Millet Fields

Nineteen: Lousy at Math
Lousy at Math The Sun in Drag Between Our Poles Stay Close to Those Sounds An Invisible Pile of Wood It Has Not Rained Light Berserk No More Leaving Wow What Should We Do about That Moon?

Twenty: Cupping My Hands Like a Mountain Valley
Cupping My Hands Like a Mountain Valley Why Not Be Polite

Twenty-one: The God Who Only Knows Four Words
The God Who Only Knows Four Words You Were Brave in That Holy War Bring the Man to Me Too Beautiful My Eyes So Soft The Diamond Takes Shape That Does Perish Chain You to My Body Covers Her Face with Both Hands Dog's Love

Twenty-two: Stay with Us
Stay with Us I Am Full of Love Tonight Many Lives Ago It Will Stretch Out Its Leg Some of the Planets Are Hosting What Is the Root?
The Same Suntan For Three Days

Twenty-three: A Clever Piece of Mutton
A Clever Piece of Mutton Who Can Hear the Buddha Sing?
Buttering the Sky How Fascinating Where Great Lions Love to Piss A Potent Lover An Astronomical Question I Wish I Could Speak Like Music In a Circus Booth Maybe Even Lucrative Troubled

Twenty-four: The Silk Mandala
The Silk Mandala A Forest Herb Your Camel Is Loaded to Sing Stealing Back the Flute Where the Drum Lost Its Mind Every City Is a Dulcimer Ruin Between Your Eye and This Page Practice This New Birdcall

Twenty-five: I Know I Was the Water
I Know I Was the Water With That Moon Language Without Brushing My Hair Integrity There When Space Is Not Rationed Birds of Passage Act Great The Only Material I Got Kin Only One Rule Your Thousand Limbs And Love Says