Your Shape Of Laughter — Hafiz Poem | The Hafiz Series

'Your Shape of Laughter' is Hafiz casting himself as a divine potter, his words and music working like skilled hands on clay — quieting, smoothing, and opening the reader until the cosmos hidden inside them, a night-sky jar full of giggling planets and stars, comes spilling out.

God's purpose, he says, is to perfect every movement of your mind and body and bring forth your own ascending, unique shape of laughter — and Hafiz is simply the wheel that spins you there.

'Your Shape of Laughter', a selection from 'The Subject Tonight Is Love: 60 Wild and Sweet Poems Inspired by Hafiz' by Daniel Ladinsky, copyright 1996, 2003, with permission.

Transcript

Your shape of laughter. Let my words become like a skilled potter's hands, Quieting, Smoothing your life with their knowledge. Reaching into your tender core and spreading you out like the morning that leaps from the sun's amused wink onto hills, Brows, And the backs of so many beautiful laboring beasts. God's duty is to make perfect all your movements of mind, Of limb, And your ascending shape of laughter. Watch the way my hands dance with their diamond-edged brilliance, Cutting you open with music, Reaching into your heart, And spilling the night sky jar you carry. It is always full of giggling planets and stars. My words are a divine potter's wheel if you stay near to me. Please stay near to me and Hafiz will spin you into love. Bye!