Pencil Poems

Pencil

       (I)

Sitting on a bench

A girl in blue jeans

Pares a pencil

And a rose sprouts.

The pencil writes

Black words

On a white paper

As if black butterflies.

The pencil writes

Words white

On the canvass of heaven

As if the moon and the stars!

The pencil carves

Golden wings

On the lap of the universe

As if the dreams of a girl!

              (II)

Near the leg of a table,

A paralyzed hand asked

To a broken blue pencil:

“Can you write?”

Hesitant, the pencil answered:

“Yes. I can write”

And I can paint

Even your portrait!

If only

You could pare with a blade

The plaster from my soft skin!”

Amazed! I

Kept listening to the Zee TV

The voice of Hussein Bakhsh:

“Rahne Do Abhi Sagar-O-Mina…!”

“Let the goblet of wine near me…!”

  (III)

My lovely little daughter

Lights a pencil

With a sharpener!

In the space of white paper

Light begins to scatter.

A black sparrow takes flight with a tree

A fountain springs off the peacock’s eyes

In the air Agni on his chariot flies

An aeroplane taxis on a road

A tiger talks to a cow.

On the top of a black tree

Rises the one-eyed sun

And above it a piece of cloud

And on the cloud’s forehead

A bluefish flying.

In the waves of a stream

A golden butterfly swimming!

My dear daughter

In her merriments

Draws many pictures!

But when the school teacher

Gives homework to her

My doll often casually in anger

Breaks the nib.

The flame of pencil extinguishes

And the horizon of white paper

Is left with only spirals of smoke!

Jayant Parmer © translation Ashaq Hussain Parray

The tower of Babel

Did you hear about the tower of Babel?

Did you hear about its top storey?

Seers and prophets told me

There is a high throne

At the top storey of the tower

On which sits God 

God and his God

His holy existence

And under the ground of Babel,

Jacob’s children

Are kept living in dying pain.

This is their fate

While God sits relaxed since genesis.

Jaun Elia ©translation Ashaq Hussain Parray

Routine

Since how long

I don’t even remember how long

It has been: we leave home─ together

And in the evening

We return ─ together.

But we never inquire about

Each other.

Nor do we ever address each other

By name

Who knows who we are?

 Jaun Elia © translation by Ashaq Hussain Parray

Susurrations

Tonight!

My heart wishes;

You were with me

And we sleep side by side.

I miss your robes;

The heaven is crystal clear;

The stars and the moon

Enraptured in ecstasy.

Each particle of earth

Sparkles fresh.

But O my helplessness!

Come tonight!

And be my confidant.

Come at last.

Seize! Drunk and rapturous

Clouds rushing your way

Without leaving a trail.

And the droplets of water.

You too come;

Tonight!

We will sing at last,

In each other’s company,

The song of love.

Your body is beautiful

Your look and every act

Is so dear to me.

Your lovely youth ─ a fresh flower

 And your look─ frank and tawny;

Those champak flowers in your hair;

The garland kissing your soft hand;

And a necklace dangling your neck-

O all your decorations

Take away the wires of my heart.
A slight sound

Lost track in the vast horizon.

Come, my little fairy;

Come, my enchantress;

Tonight!

I wish you too were with me.

 By Meeraji

©Translation by Ashaq Hussain Parray

Saki

Blushed is the rose; pale turns sun’s visage, Saki

Your beauty mums all mouths to silence, Saki.

Like fire-pot my heart still blazes, the soul is thirsty,

How it can be our past scores are settled, Saki?

To drink without moonlight does not seem propitious,

Moon shall have regrets; take off the veil, Saki.

Why should they be surprised to see the goblet empty?

 Yester night revellers must have dreamt of something, Saki.

My desires seek pearls in the deep ocean of agonies,

It is the pain of fire blesses candle with light, Saki.

Offering its blood, love waters the deserts of life,

May like this, beauty’s mirage shine always, Saki.

Now the pious cannot protect the chastity of his hem

Free of cost somebody began to vend wine, Saki.

Keeping the ecstasy, Rahi tells the meaning of words,

Violin and harp further beauty of my Ghazal, Saki

 A Ghazal by Rahman Rahi translated by Ashaq Hussain Parray

I Fear

My father pesters me every day

With a single thought:

“When will you get married?” He says in a casual way.

I evade it every time turning the topic

To Kashmir politics and argue:

“There ought to be a direction to our struggle.”

He calms my fears with a genuine concern

“Look, son it has been there, and I too married.”

We enter into an exchange daily over the

Prospect of a good marriage.

My mother sits silently with a wrinkled

Face perhaps endorsing my views.

I don’t know what goes on in her mind?

She does not usually intervene.

“Women ought not to have an opinion,” she says.

Every night I retire to bed, strange thoughts

Begin to drip in my mind.

They feel raindrops falling on,

The roof of a tin shed making crash sounds.

Every night I think of ‘you’ and wonder:

"What if we could get married?

Would you be you and I still be- I

Would YOU and I be We when

We are different.”

I fear every night, I might steal

Your thoughts, or read your mind

And doubt yore fidelity.”

I fear if I can talk to the people with

Whom I have spent the cloudless nights.

I fear if you come to know by mistake

What goes in my head? The fact that

I love you as much as I love other women

Would be too much for you to bear.”

Each night I think of you and our marriage,

I close my eyes thinking perhaps

You would come to me and ask for more

Time to decide whether love exists

On earth or whether we are at a mutual

Play, playing our part and dancing

Naked in the absence of candles.

The Word

In the beginning was the Word,

And the Word was with God,

And the Word was God.  (Holy Bible, John 1:1)

Hush! Hush! How

                 Does

A word
                        Break

Its silence?

Does it behave like

An unruly boy at the last

Row of a crowded class?

Or a school teacher in hurry?

How does the word break its shell?

To unfurl its pock-marked heart.

Does it toss like a fish, caught

Fresh, in the hands of a fisherman?

Or the tail of a rounded eel?

What if the word were a

Woman?

A poor one,

Dreaming of a fine

Gold necklace from her lover.

Would you strangle her- in bed?

With your muscles,

Before dawn jumps in her shed.

Or would you be drowned

In her helpless breath?

Bark tonight! O heart! Bark!

With a spade, in memory’s field

Like a farmer, dig deep trenches

Only to unearth your memories

Like some fossils.

All day and night the word sings:

“I am neither the loosening of a song

Nor the close-drawn tent of music;

I’m the sound, simply,

Of my own breaking.” ¹

                                        (Ashaq Hussain Parray)

1. Note: The last four lines are from Mirza Ghalib