Attempting to translate an Urdu poem of mine (Aarzi) as per some readers’ request, although I am not good at poetry, English, or translations.
And by the way, the poem was based on these 2 lines from a poem of Hazra Rabia Basri R.A. (a female muslim sufi from ancient Baghdad):
May God steal from you
What steals you from himor as I prefer to interpret it:
May God take away from you
What takes you away from Him
———–
Wither
Foggy relations all around
Meaningless disagreements far too many
War-mongering and mourning in the air
Anew and alight is restlessness everyday
No end to lust and greed anywhere
Soul-less soul wandering in futility
Why heart desires the things of past?
Wither is why the fate of joy?
The one who was, is now no more
Now my joy is her’s no more
What is love? What is its taste and realm?
Mortal is a human’s love like a human being
OR
Mortal is a being’s love as if its a being itself
Madly why I desire a mere illusion?
What to say of staying if parting ways is fate?
My heart is nothing but a pile of cold ashes
An unconscious monk’s search in the rugged wild
Shedding tears of blood on
The corpse of his infant son
Muhammad (SAW) exclaimed nothing but this
“Lies nowhere my joy but in Your will”
So from the painful remembrance of every withering joy
From my tiring nerves in every futile quest
From chasing false dreams of love and triumph
From the blind worship of all worldly gods
How to save my troubled soul O’ God?
How to disown this all craze O’ God?
Lord, have You taken away each one of those joys,
From You which were once drifting me away?
If that is so then I would pray just this
That serving You becomes my only wish
That someday I get the courage to face Your Highness
No matter how short this mortal life is
For, even my love of every withering joy
Now seems to be a withering illusion
——–
Some words have been intentionally changed. The Urdu title of the poem “Aarzi” means temporary or mortal/fatal. I used it in the 2nd sense (mortal) in the Urdu piece. Here, in the English version I am using the word Wither but I am open to suggestions. I feel that the word ‘decay’ or ‘fading’ too might be equally good.
Filed under: My Poems, Poems, God, joy, monk, painful remembrance, wither, withering
Beautiful.
Thank you.
Wow! I had no idea that this was the translation! I love the ending couplet. It carries a theme must all confront–realizing that after exhausting ourselves looking contentment in this world, it is only with Allah. (Or dealing with loss and trying to turn back to Allah)
This poem reminds me of a poem I wrote, Final Distance: http://faith786.wordpress.com/2008/11/12/my-poems-final-distance/
You can check it out if you want, but mine is not NEARLY as refined ( for you it is a translation!) and strong in both form and meaning like yours. But the meaning is what amazed me.
Insha’ Allah we all will get past this invisible barrier and return to Allah in goodness and happiness.
Please keep sharing any poetic inspirations you may have!
Oh and idea for a title–Transience? Atrophy? I like Wither, personally….
What are you going on about “I’m not good in poetry…” this is really beautiful.
I love the english translation, I’m not too good in reading urdu….but this I understand.
I’d suggest perish or evanescent maybe? But I like Wither, it makes sense as a title.
@Faith786 & @elementsofblindness:
Thanks for the comments.
Although the other titles suggested by both of you are really good, I will stick with the current title ‘Wither’ as I too like it more.
what does it mean to love another person? to put it crudely, is the purpose of love to be eventually driven towards the idea of embracing divine love? and does divine love mean forsaking the people we love here? is there a contradiction? does loving Allah involve giving up the people we love now?
i know it sounds pedantic, childish even. but while words resign them to mere mortals, the people i love are the ones i have known love through, known love from.
i know the answers in their ambiguous forms. i know what i need to be told. but i do not know what i need to feel.
lovely poem. provokes so much within.
@karachikhatmal:
Thanks for your comments and the complements.
Your comments and questions are equally interesting if not more. (Did you read the urdu piece too btw?)
Your questions are quite right. And perhaps I won’t have answers to every question… but I can try to explain..
The mood in the poem, I guess, is that of ‘utter detachment’… as if a person is departuring.. shedding off everything …
I guess, while writing it the feelings I have had were something like… “If to God we belong and to Him we return, and if our stay here in this world is nothing but a flash of a second what good is it to fall in love with anyone or anything in this world?” Thus the detachment… the rebellion… the bitter reaction… or whatever could it be called as.
Thus the questions you asked quite well in place and relevant.
But I guess, in normal life, what I try to believe in or promote (and which I somewhat tried to ‘mildly’ promote in the poem too) is that the source of the love we feel for our loves ones, relatives etc should be the love of God.
Thus I do not advocate detachment, becoming a monk or anything. There is a poet (perhaps Iqbal) who once kay in order to become a true saint/sufi one does not need to limit themselves to the wilderness, but that one only needs to live in the real world among people and love them.
I guess if we love God with all honesty, dedication and commitment the love for people comes automatically and it is more real, more deep, more pure, more lasting.
Thus there is a need to make our intentions, our goals, and the sources of all our good emotions, feelings, attachments right.
well said. but as it is with love, you don’t always choose it as much as it chooses you
Assuming that we are talking about romantic love here, I would not agree with that statement.
That kind of love exists in Mills & Boon, and movies alone I guess.
In real life its our sub-conscious which plays a role apart from the usual needs and wants of one’s heart, soul, body and mind.
Apart from that there is another factor, in my opinion, which I find interesting.
Let me quote in the words of Abu Sa’id, (967 AD in Mayhana/modern Turkmenistan d. 1049; ascetic, an antinomian ecstatic, and a spiritual guide):
“Four thousand years before God created these bodies, he created the souls and kept them beside himself and shed a light upon them. He knew what quantity each soul received and he showed favor to each in proportion to its illumination. The souls remained all that time in light, until they became fully nourished. Those who in this world live in joy and agreement with one another must have been akin to one another in that place. Here they love one another and are called the friends of God, and they are brothers who love one another for God’s sake. These souls know one another by smell, like horses.”
I guess this factor kay we tend to like those with whom we (our souls that is) were once close in the alim-e-arwaah (world of souls) too makes us fall into the illusion or trap or futility of love.
There is no such thing that ‘love chooses us’. May be it is there for those who do not master their emotions and feelings but are slaves of it. Aesop says (or was it Emerson?), “It is with our passion as it is with fire and water; they are good servants but bad masters”.
These romantic feelings, the emotions, desires, dreams all need to be protected or legalized or realized by a proper social contract which goes by the name of marriage. Without that in place, the rights, duties, responsibilities, expectations, social status of both sides and their mutual relation are not that clear and thus one witnesses the instant ‘falling in love’ and the even more instant and increasingly usual break-ups.
And the fact that it hurts to suffer from that ‘love’ thing or a break up is not a proof of love choosing u but a remind of the fact that whenever we transgress the right path, it may lead to suffering. Even if the feelings, the dreams are honest, the path taken to reach the right destination may be wrong…
allow me to wholeheartedly disagree with you here
rationally, intellectually, your post makes a lot of sense.
however, i remember those who used to remind physicians that while they may be able to describe the effects and symptoms of intoxication, their words can never encapsulate the particular experience.
i am personally in a much different place right now than where i was when this conversation began.
that’s why right now, i am convinced that the answer lies not in spurning love, but rather allowing it to completely consume you, because that is when you allow yourself to witness truth.
the reason i say that is because love does not teach you to hold on to this world – in fact it is a constant reminder of how fragile these things are, how it could all disappear in one second. those who are insecure, who cannot love, wish to hold on to this world and this experience alone.
the person who is in love realises that this world is not the epitomy of creation, that our words and thoughts in this life cannot begin to encapsulate the experience of being alive.
i really enjoy the way you think, but i wish that you would open up your heart to this idea one day. perhaps you react this way because love today is hallmark cards, romantic comedies, valentine’s day, ross and rachel, mehndi dance songs and a whole gamut of exploitative constructs eager to expropriate the power of love for their own less-than-admirable needs.
“rationally, intellectually, your post makes a lot of sense.”
i meant to say your last comment makes a lot of rational, intellectual sense.
Hey, thanks a lot.
.
Interesting thoughts really
I did get your ideas, and I don’t disagree with them.
What I fail to understand is that what part of my thoughts regarding love you don’t agree with? I also find it hard to understand as to how how does your last comments differ than mine (or provide an alternative look at love)?
I stand by my original disagreement with your previous remarks (“well said. but as it is with love, you don’t always choose it as much as it chooses you”). I had said that there is no such romantic magical mystical true love of a human being as is shown in movies and all, and also, that love being an emotion (partly at least) one should not let it overtake us. One should keep it under wise rational logical realistic mind-based control.
If you mean that we should let it overtake us, consume us etc (I would guess you aretalking about the Love of God and not anymore of some individual human being) , I understand that and I was commenting on having that kind of love for a human being. I have a problem with that.
As far as loving Allah (the sufi way or any other way) is concenred in a manner that it consumes us, well I don’t have much knowledge about it so can’t really comment on it. But feel free to educate me !
i don’t think i would be the kind of person you can trust to educate you. the stuff i have read is mostly from text books in English, by Annemarie Schimmel, and Idrees Shah. of course, a lot of those thoughts are found in contemporary as well as classical literature and art of our area.
i think what i was saying differently was that love between human in the sense i understand it is not at all like the hallmark etc stuff, it has far greater power.
and to be honest, i think i have – influenced by your input – found my own answer to my original comment – that i guess love is not about what you are trying to achieve, or where you expect it to take you.
I love it!so powerfull…and so well expressed…love it..needed that!
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