اجزای پياله ای که در هم پيوست
بشکستن آ ن روا نميدارد مست
چندين سر و پای نازنين و بر و دست
در مهرکه پيوست و بکين که شکست
source, Dashti 22, p. 248
ajzaa-ye piyaale'i ke dar ham peyvast
beshkastan-e aan ravaa namidaarad mast
chandin sar o paa-ye naazanin o bar o dast
dar mehr-e ke peyvast o bekin-e ke shekast
A lowly cup takes human form and shape,
Creation no mindless drunk would think to break.
And lovely people, heads and legs, bodies and hands...
What love made them? Smashed them in spiteful hate?
Another said -- "Why, ne'er a peevish Boy
Would break the Bowl from which he drank in Joy;
And He that with his hand the Vessel made
Will surely not in after Wrath destroy!"
Edward FitzGerald, stanza 85 (5th ed)
FitzGerald's source, the Ouseley manuscript, varies slightly from the text above
That earthen bowl of such exquisite make,
Not even drunkards would attempt to break;
So many lovely heads and dainty hands --
For whom He makes, for spite of whom does break?
Ahmad Saidi, quatrain 66
Behold these cups! Can He who deigned to make them,
In wanton freak let ruin overtake them,
So many shapely feet and hands and heads, --
What love drove Him to make, what wrath to break them?
E. H. Whinfield, quatrain 42
Translation & Discussion of the quatrain: 1. The parts of a cup which have been assembled --the cup has components or "members," اجزا which correspond to the heads, feet, trunks and hands of human forms, which we see below. And these cup parts are recycled from the dust or clay of those humans who have gone before 2. The smashing of them no drunk will allow --besides "the drunk," مست carries with it the sense of careless, heedless, mindless. I have considered doing away with "drunk" altogether in favor of a word or expression for someone not mindful of higher or spiritual matters 3. So many lovely heads and legs and breasts and hands --The third line has a number of variations, two of which I would like to mention here: چندين سر و پای نازنين از سر دست , the Ouseley manuscript which FitzGerald used, and Hedayat's reading (quatrain 44) چندين سر و ساق نازنين و کف دست. I like the Ouseley reading -- these lovely people were assembled with a turn of the hand, effortlessly, and then smashed in the same way. The Hedayat variation, کف دست, kaf-e dast, brings to mind the hand of the potter who shapes the clay with the palms of his hand, carefully, skillfully, lovingly, although kaf-e dast directly refers to the creation, the human creation. Through this image, Hedayat' s reading reinforces the bewilderment and anger expressed in the last two lines of the quatrain 4. assembled by whose love/for love of whom and smashed by whose hate/for hate of whom -- whether the relationship is whose love/hate or for whom the love/hate was directed, which I think is a purposeful ambiguity on the writer's part, there is no ambiguity about what kind of love is expressed here.
Monday
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