The Martyr

(1)

Look how vast
his sheltering shade
spreads on the Earth
with humility
and with glory!

His hands
alike the branches of
the Holy Tree of Life
glows with the light of love.

His fearless revolt,
his far reaching revlot,
burned the gates of Hell
shook the walls of Hell.

Hi Death,
not from the cold lame of the awaiting razor blades
Or the sentinl of the poisoned swords:
His death landed on his shoulders,
like the spring's last sparrow,
from his smoky cloud of sorrow
running behind him for years.

And that fortress of might,
his Heart,
the Heart whose key,
the candid verse of amity,
collapsed onto itself,
But never fell apart.

(2)

In the era of forceful negation of love
entwined with himself,
with his captive voice:
He such became, himself,
The Anthem of Love.

And he such became,
he such became himself:
The Elegy of Love.

(3)

Look how chaste
Look how vast
he streams on the Earth
with humility and with glory!
And he such engraves
the effigy of nobility and of truth
on the heart of the rocks!

Look how pure he fades away in the Sea
with humility and with glory!

And look how gracious he kneels in front of your thighs
with humility and with glory!

Look!
His death was the birthday of so very many Knights.

---By Ahmad Shamlou
-Translation: Maryam Dilmaghani
The poem's original title translates as: "The Birth of the one who lovingly died on the Earth". It was first published in the anthology Abraham in Fire 1973, Tehran.

The Elegy

For Forough Farrokhzad's death

In the quest for you
I sobbed at the knees of the mount,
at the edge of the sea and the turf.

In the quest for you
I moaned with the wind.
Along the eroded face of the routes,
At the crossroad of seasons.

And over a broken window
which made a wooden frame
for the cloudy blues of the skies.
In hope of your image
How long, long, how long,
this frame will remain plain?

Your charm,
was allowing for the passage of the breeze
and of love, and also of death
which confided in you
their perpetual insights.

Hence you became a pearl
Immense, enviable and precious:
the treasure which bears, solely,
the entire delight of belonging to the land.

Your name is a sunrise,
shining over the vast front of the skies,
Be hallowed you name!

And we are still rotating nights and days,
in this elusive yet.

---By Ahmad Shamlou
- Translation: Maryam Dilmaghani
Translated from the poem "Marthieh" first published in the anthology Marthieh-hay Khak (Elegies of The Earth) 1956, Tehran.

Reign of Winter

And if you ever greet them
they will not pause one instant
to greet you back.
Heads are hanging sternly lowly.

And if you salute the passing friends
They will not raise their heads
They will not move their gaze
to even glance at your face.

The sight is lost in an opaque, thick haze.
No sign of the stars: They no longer blaze!
The eyes see no more-but one step ahead;
We pass silent and sombre with our tumbling tread.

To a passing man, it is your hand that you lend
Only hesitantly he extends his to you, Alas My Friend!
The air is bitter cold and cruel, the route is a dead-end!
You exhale and your breath turns into a dark blur,
raising insolently a wall in front of your eye.
If this is your own breath then what could you expect
from your friends –of far-away or close-by?

O My Honest Saviour!
O My Old Virtuous Companion!
I hail you with reverence and respect!
Welcome me back!
Open me your door!
It is me, it’s me: Your visitor of all nights!
It is me, it’s me: The sorrowful errant!
It is me: The discarded, The beaten stone!
It is me: The injury to Creation; The song out of tune!
Recall? Not the black, not the white: The colourless buffoon!
Come and open me the door!
I am freezing; open the door before!

O Counterpart! O Generous Host!
Your usual guest is trembling in the icy outside!
And if you have ever heard a sound:
It is not raining and in this lane there is not even a soul!
The noise is from the encounter of my teeth
with this overwhelming cold.
Tonight I am here to reimburse you in mass!
I am here to go clear in front of a wine-glass!
Do not say “It’s late; it’s almost the crack of dawn!”
The sky is deceitful with its blushed fawn!
This red is not from the rays of light;
The red is the imprint of this cold’s shameless clout!
The pendant of the bosom of the heavens, Sun,-dead or afoot-
is buried, obscured, beneath the weight of a nine-storey vault!

O Counterpart! O Generous Host!
Pour wine into the glass to light up this bitter exile:
You see? In this winter days and nights are equal.
And if you ever greet them
they will not pause one instant
to greet you back.
The air is heavy, the doors are closed,
Heads hang lowly, and hands are cloaked.
Your breath turns to a dark shadow,
Hearts are fading away under the sway of sorrow.
The trees are naked, like frozen, forsaken bones,
Earth is desolate, Sky is falling down.
Moon and Sun are lost behind Loads of Litter:
It is, indeed,
The Reign of Winter.

---Mehdi Akhavan-Sales
-Translation: Maryam Dilmaghani

Ode on a Grecian Urn

Thou still unravish'd bride of quietness!
Thou foster-child of Silence and slow Time,
Sylvan historian, who canst thus express
A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme:
What leaf-fringed legend haunts about thy shape
Of deities or mortals, or of both,
In Tempe or the dales of Arcady?
What men or gods are these? what maidens loath?
What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape?
What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?

Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard
Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on;
Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear'd,
Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone:
Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave
Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare;
Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss,
Though winning near the goal—yet, do not grieve;
She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,
Forever wilt thou love, and she be fair!

Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed
Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu;
And, happy melodist, unwearied,
Forever piping songs forever new;
More happy love! more happy, happy love!
Forever warm and still to be enjoy’d,
Forever panting and forever young;
All breathing human passion far above,
That leaves a heart high sorrowful and cloy’d,
A burning forehead and a parching tongue.

Who are these coming to the sacrifice?
To what green altar, O mysterious priest,
Lead’st thou that heifer lowing at the skies,
And all her silken flanks with garlands drest?
What little town by river or sea-shore,
Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel,
Is emptied of its folk, this pious morn?
And, little town, thy streets for evermore
Will silent be; and not a soul to tell
Why thou art desolate, can e’er return.

O Attic shape! Fair attitude! with brede
Of marble men and maidens overwrought,
With forest branches and the trodden weed;
Thou, silent form! dost tease us out of thought
As doth eternity: Cold Pastoral!
When old age shall this generation waste,
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe
Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say’st,
"Beauty is truth, truth beauty,"—that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.

--- John Keats.
Version from The Poetical Works of John Keats, 1884. Boston.

Bullah ki jaana

Bulla, ki jaana main kaun
Bulla, ki jaana main kaun

Na main moman vich maseetan
Na main vich kufar dian reetan
Na main pakan vich paleetan

Na main andar bed kitaban
Na main rehnda bhaang sharaban
Na main rehnda mast kharaban

Na main shadi na ghamnaki
Na main vich paleetan pakeen
Na main aaabi na main khaki

Na main aatish na paun
Bulla ki jaana main kaun

Na main arabi na lahori
Na main hindi shehar nagaori
Na hindu na turk pashauri

Na main bhet mazhab de paya
Na main aadam hawwa jaya
Na koi apna naam dharaya

Avval-aakhar aap nu jana
Na koi dooja hor pacchana
Maithon na koi har syana

Bulle shauh Kharha hai kaun
Bulla ki jaana main kaun

English Translation:

Bulleh! to me, I am not known

Not a believer inside the mosque, am I
Nor a pagan disciple of false rites
Not the pure amongst the impure
Neither Moses, nor the Pharoh

Bulleh! to me, I am not known

Not in the holy Vedas, am I
Nor in opium, neither in wine
Not in the drunkard`s intoxicated craze
Niether awake, nor in a sleeping daze

Bulleh! to me, I am not known

In happiness nor in sorrow, am I
Neither clean, nor a filthy mire
Not from water, nor from earth
Neither fire, nor from air, is my birth

Bulleh! to me, I am not known

Not an Arab, nor Lahori
Neither Hindi, nor Nagauri
Hindu, Turk (Muslim), nor Peshawari
Nor do I live in Nadaun

Bulleh! to me, I am not known

Secrets of religion, I have not known
From Adam and Eve, I am not born
I am not the name I assume
Not in stillness, nor on the move

Bulleh! to me, I am not known

I am the first, I am the last
None other, have I ever known
I am the wisest of them all
Bulleh! do I stand alone?

Bulleh! to me, I am not known

---This poem is a Kafi (a classical form of Sufi poetry, mostly in Punjabi, Sindhi and Seraiki language) written by the Sufi saint Bulleh Shah.Listen this poetry with music on Youtube;

Reality

In love, nothing exists between heart and heart.
Speech is born out of longing,
True description from the real taste.
The one who tastes, knows;
the one who explains, lies.
How can you describe the true form of Something
In whose presence you are blotted out?
And in whose being you still exist?
And who lives as a sign for your journey?

--- Rabia Basri

O my Lord, if I worship you

O my Lord,

if I worship you
from fear of hell, burn me in hell.

If I worship you
from hope of Paradise, bar me from its gates.

But if I worship you
for yourself alone, grant me then the beauty of your Face.

- by Rabia Basri (Rabia Al-'Adawiyya)