Here Soar, Here Love

From the Sufi Poet Hafiz, as rendered by Daniel Ladinsky:

Not With Wings (1)  

Here soar
Not with wings, 

But with your moving hands and feet
And sweating brows-- 

Standing by your Beloved's side
Reaching out to comfort the world 

With your cup of solace
Drawn from your vast reservoir of Truth. 

Here soar
Not with your eyes and senses 

That turn their backs
On the earth's sweet stumbling dance
Which needs you. 

Here love, O here love... 

And with your heart on duty
To the souls of rivers, children, forest animals,
All the shy feathered ones, 

O here, Pilgrim,
Love
On the holy battleground of life 

Where there are bleeding men
Who are calling for a sacred drink, 

A gentle word or touch from man
Or God...

From Thomas Merton, a 20th-century Cistercian monk (2):

All the worst sins are denials and rejections of love, refusals to love. The chief aim...is not to sin against love.  

[A] total surrender to the power of love [i]s the sole basis of spiritual authority...So many Christians exalt the demands and rigors of law because, in reality, law is less demanding than [love].

(1) The Subject Tonight is Love: 60 Wild and Sweet Poems of Hafiz (1996, 2003)
(2) Mystics and Zen Masters (1967)