![](\"http:\/\/farm4.static.flickr.com\/3247\/2828744417_a09c131e8d.jpg?v=0\")
<\/a>The horse was written into life by Iranian-born painter and print maker Jila Peacock. Jila made a pearlescent color silkscreen on Japanese paper of each of the poems in animal form, to create a book called Ten Poems from Hafez<\/i>. She recreated this painstaking process and bound fifty volumes. The books are large and gorgeous, and the design won the British Book Design Award in 2006.<\/p>\nThe rose opens crimson
And the nightingale is drunk with love
Happy news, you reveling Sufis,
For the rock of your resolve is
Shattered by the crystal chalice.<\/p>\n
Bring only wine to the throne of Heaven,
For when the time of parting comes
From this tavern of two doors,
Sentry and sultan, wise man and fool,
Lofty or low and without worldly gain,
All must pass through.<\/p>\n
Our time of joy comes tied to care,
As bliss was bound to loss at time’s dawn.
Even Assef’s pomp and splendor,
His horse of the winds,
And the language of birds
Are lost with the wind, a traceless void.<\/p>\n
Each shining arrow soars a while
But must return to dust.
So do not waver from the path
Or wrestle with being and nothingness
Love life now,
for oblivion completes all things.<\/p>\n
O Hafez, rejoicing in the beauty of your pen,
See how we pass your words from heart to heart!<\/p>\n
— Hafez of Shiraz<\/p>\n
Sufism is the inner or mystical dimension of the Islamic faith, and the poet, Hafez of Shiraz, was a 14th century practitioner. I’m probably too much a literal thinker to be a good practitioner of mysticism. I have no idea who the historical Assef might be, nor do I know the significance of a crystal chalice to a Sufi. But there is still so much to take from this poem. The use of the animal shape conveys a poetic ideal of motion and life. Living in the now and rejoicing in the beauty of the present is a single facet of the work; another viewpoint is the transience of the natural world, the “here today, gone tomorrow” nature of every living thing. Somehow, the Sufis — and the horse — are happy anyway.<\/p>\n
Please take a few minutes to look at all ten of Jila Peacock’s animal shape poems<\/a>, and learn a little more about the process and the artist.<\/p>\n