28 जून 2009

For Iran

If the flames of anger rise any higher in this land
Your name on your tombstone will be covered with dirt.

You have become a babbling loudmouth.
Your insolent ranting, something to joke about.
The lies you have found, you have woven together.
The rope you have crafted, you will find around your neck.
Pride has swollen your head, your faith has grown blind.
The elephant that falls will not rise.
Stop this extravagance, this reckless throwing of my country to the wind.
The grim-faced rising cloud, will grovel at the swamp's feet.
Stop this screaming, mayhem, and blood shed.
Stop doing what makes God's creatures mourn with tears.
My curses will not be upon you, as in their fulfillment.
My enemies' afflictions also cause me pain.
You may wish to have me burned , or decide to stone me.
But in your hand match or stone will lose their power to harm me.

Simin Behbahani, Iran's national poet.
June 2009 Translated by Kaveh Safa and Farzaneh Milani
In this poem, she speaks out against the crackdown of Iranian government on their own people.

25 जून 2009

The sun rises

Take heed
My wounded eyes melt
Drop by drop
My rebellion my shadow
Surrenders to the light
Take heed

Everything that I am crumbles
My love’s fire surrenders
Carries me to the end
Crucifies me
Take heed
Stars hail in the night

You came from a far
From fields of scent, of light
To carry me, floating
Through clouds of ivory and crystal
Take me away my solace, my hope
Take me to a city of sonnets and passion

Towards the path of milky way draw me
Higher than every star lift me
Take heed
I’ve been set aflame by this light
Fevered, burnt by this light
Like a goldfish in a pool of night
I gnaw helplessly at the stars

How far-flung is anything
From the earth, from everything
From this crimson ceiling sky
I hear again from a distance
Your voice
The flutter of an angel’s wings
Take heed
How far I’ve come
To the stars
To the endlessness of life

Now that I’ve reached so high above the waves
Immerse me, cleanse me, intoxicate me
Envelope me in a cocoon of kisses
Take me in this night of forever young
Do not let go of my hand
Do not let me fall

Take heed
Our night’s path melts away
Drop by drop
My cup thirsty, empty, black
With you it overflows
With wine with sleep with dreams
Upon this cradle of a poem
Take heed
You utter, and the sun rises.

It is written by famous Iranian Poetess and film director Forough Farrokhzad and translated from persian to english by Ali Sadri.

4 जून 2009

Russian Folk Song

1-
In the islands, the hunter
Roams all day long
But no luck for him
And the courses himself
What's he going to do
How is he to serve
He cannot be cheerful
So what
He'll try to aim better
So the hunter goes to warmer waters
Where the fish were frolicking in the beautiful weather
There on the shore.....

2-
You, my eagle with blue-black wings
Where have you been flying
for so Long
I was flying there over the mountains
Where it all was silence.

This song was taken from the movie Dersu Uzala directed by Akira Kurosawa.

1 जून 2009

Ghazal-2

लापता लोग भी मंजिल का पता देते हैं
डूबने वाले ही साहिल का पता देते हैं

ऐसे - ऐसे भी यहाँ कितने ही कातिल है कि,
जो कत्ल करते हैं औ बिस्मिल का पता देते है

कोई जब पूछता है हमसे कहाँ रहते हो
पूछने वाले को हम दिल का पता देते हैं

आपके हंसने - हंसाने के अजब ये तेवर
आने वाली किसी मुश्किल का पता देते हैं

आईने झांकते हैं जब भी मेरी आंखों में
मेरे भीतर छुपे कातिल का पता देते हैं.

Written by Deepak Gupta. Source of this ghazal is traced to 'Sahitya Shilpi'.Weblink.

27 मई 2009

A paragraph from Vaani

वे कहते,
मैं भाव नही, केवल प्रभाव हूँ।
सूझ नही, केवल सूझाव हूँ
सच यह!
मैं केवल स्वाभाव हूँ।

---Written by Sumitranand Pant in 'Vaani'.

25 मई 2009

Unknown Poem-1

A pound of flesh each, they all claimed

A pound of flesh their very aim

Many pounds lighter now

Happy am no heavy weight

Back to school

Waiting for buddies

At the gate

--- Amol Gupte, the scriptwriterof Taare Zameen Par.

Source : Weblink

23 मई 2009

Ghazal-1

देख पंछी जा रहें अपने बसेरों में
चल, हुई अब शाम, लौटें हम भी डेरों में

सुब्‍ह की इस दौड़ में ये थक के भूले हम
लुत्फ़ क्या होता है अलसाये सबेरों में

अब न चौबारों पे वो गप्पें-ठहाकें हैं
गुम पड़ोसी हो गयें ऊँची मुँडेरों में

बंदिशें हैं अब से बाजों की उड़ानों पर
सल्तनत आकाश ने बाँटी बटेरों में

देख ली तस्वीर जो तेरी यहाँ इक दिन
खलबली-सी मच गयी सारे चितेरों में

जिसको लूटा था उजालों ने यहाँ पर कल
ढ़ूँढ़ता है आज जाने क्या अँधेरों में

कब पिटारी से निकल दिल्ली गये विषधर
ये सियासत की बहस, अब है सँपेरों में

गज़नियों का खौफ़ कोई हो भला क्यूं कर
जब बँटा हो मुल्क ही सारा लुटेरों में

ग़म नहीं, शिकवा नहीं कोई जमाने से
जिंदगी सिमटी है जब से चंद शेरों में

This work of literature is attributed to Gautam Rajrishi and original work can be traced here.

Kabir's Bhajan

18
Talk to my inner lover,
and I say, why such rush?

We sense that there is some sort of spirit
that loves birds and animals and the ants -
perhaps the same one
who gave a radiance to you in your mother's womb.

Is it logical you would be walking around entirely orphaned now?
The truth is you turned away yourself,
And decided to go into the dark alone.

Now you are tangled up in others, and have forgotten
what you once knew,
and that's why
everything you do has some weird failure in it.

28
There is nothing but water in the holy pools.
I know, I have been swimming in them.
All the gods sculpted of wood or ivory can't say a word.
I know, I have been crying out to them.
The Sacred Books of the East are nothing but words.
I looked through their covers one day sideways.
What Kabir talks of is only what has lived through.
If you have not lived through something, it is not true.

Source: The Kabir Book. Forty-four of the Ecstatic Poems of Kabir. Versions by Robert Bly. A Seventies Press Book. Beacon Press-Boston.1977.

16 मई 2009

First they came...

When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.

Then they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews,
I did not speak out;
I was not a Jew.

When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out for me.

"First they came…" is a poem attributed to Pastor Martin Niemöller (1892–1984) about the inactivity of German intellectuals following the Nazi rise to power and the purging of their chosen targets, group after group.

13 मई 2009

The Earth is a Satellite of the Moon

Apollo 2 cost more than Apollo 1
Apollo 1 cost plenty

Apollo 3 cost more than Apollo 2
Apollo 2 cost more than Apollo 1
Apollo 1 cost plenty

Apollo 4 cost more than Apollo 3
Apollo 3 cost more than Apollo 2
Apollo 2 cost more than Apollo 1
Apollo 1 cost plenty

Apollo 8 cost a fortune, but no one minded
because the astronauts were Protestant
they read the Bible from the moon
astounding and delighting every Christian
and on their return Pope Paul VI gave them his blessing.

Apollo 9 cost more than all these put together
including Apollo 1 which cost plenty.

The great-grandparents of the people of Acahualinca were less
hungry than the grandparents.
The great-grandparents died of hunger.
The grandparents of the people of Acahualinca were less
hungry than the parents.
The grandparents died of hunger.
The parents of the people of Acahualinca were less
hungry than the children of the people there.
The parents died of hunger.
The people of Acahualinca are less hungry then the children
of the people there.
The children of the people of Acahaulinca, because of hunger,
are not born
they hunger to be born, only to die of hunger.
Blessed are the poor for they shall inherit the moon.

---Leonel Rugama
translation: Sara Miles, Richard Schaaf & Nancy Weisberg
from: Poetry Like Bread, Curbstone Press, 1994