The following is my translation of a ghazal composed by Ustád Muḥammad-ʻAlí Salmání, the Baháʼí barber of Baháʼuʼlláh, to Whom this poem is addressed. The verses of this translation follow an AABB rhyme scheme and are set to iambic heptameter.
The heart You’ve taken from the friend—and from the stranger, too
Both friend and stranger harbor in their hearts their love for You
The Paradise of heaven mirrors forth Your charming face
Your prickly rose and thornless narcissus do I embrace
A mirror of my heart I’ve made; I pray it may reflect
The secrets of Your self—that lovely face I find perfect
The heavens turn, the stars revolve and planets run their course
They circle round Your holy sanctum day and night perforce
To see Your winsome face have every people sought their way
No matter drunk or sober, sleeping or awake be they
To look upon Your face, my heart and faith I’d gladly trade
Your sorc’rous eyes, those dang’rous curls that down Your face cascade
So long as Your attractive form continues to remain
Both show’r of spring and sanguine torrent of my eyes will rain
The cry of love I’d raise though painful death be well in store
Though it be hangman’s noose or wrathful crowd I stand before
Apart from praises of Bahá, no work have I perused
All other books and tracts and scrolls and such have I refused
A typescript of the original Persian text of this ghazal appears below.
Adib Masumian 