Let It
Mammals with no fur,
walking the earth,
we need so many things
to keep us warm —
thick socks, sweaters,
four walls and a roof,
an embrace,
another embrace, another embrace,
another embrace.
Vulnerable babe, tender one,
take cover—and don’t.
There’s an undying love eager
to wrap itself around you.
(Let it.)
Used with the permission of the author.
Haleh Liza Gafori
Haleh Liza Gafori, is an Iranian American translator, poet, performance artist, and composer born in New York City. Her book Gold, which features her translations of poems by the thirteenth-century sage and mystic Rumi, was published by New York Review Books Classics/Penguin Random House in 2022, followed by Water (New York Review Books Classics, 2025), which expands on the previous collection of translations.