masjid-e qurt̤ubah
*stanza eight*

  ....  
1) in the valley of the foothills
the cloud is drowned in sunset
  
vādī-e kuhsār meñ ġharq-e shafaq hai saḥāb
heaps of rubies of Badakhshan,
the sun has left behind		  
laʿl-e badaḳhshāñ ke ḍher chhoṛ gayā āftāb !
     
2) simple and full of burning is
the song of the farmer's daughter
  
sādah-o-pur-soz hai duḳhtar-e dihqāñ kā gīt
for the boat of the heart,
the season of youth is a flood		  
kishtī-e dil ke liye sail hai ʿahd-e shabāb !

= Conspicuously, the highly Persianized
duḳhtar-e dihqāñ is singing a very simple,
folksy, entirely Indic gīt .

= Cf. the 'flood of time' imagery from 1:6
and 2:3.

    
     
3) great moving river!
on your shore someone
  
āb-e ravān-e kabīr ! tere kināre koʾī
is seeing a dream
of some other time		  
dekh rahā hai kisī aur zamāne kā ḳhvāb

= Cordoba is on the Guadalquivir
(itself derived from 'Vadi al-Kabir').

= Now the 'flood of time' imagery culminates
in the invocation of this 'great moving river'.

    
     
4) the new world is as yet
behind the veil of destiny
  
ʿālam-e nau hai abhī pardah-e taqdīr meñ
in my sight
its dawn is unveiled		  
merī nigāhoñ meñ hai us kī saḥar be-ḥijāb
   
5) if I would lift the veil
from the face of my thoughts
  
pardah uṭhā dūñ agar chahrah-e afkār se
the European will not be able
to bear the heat of my songs		  
lā nah sakegā farang merī navāʾoñ kī tāb
     
6) in which there would be no revolution--
that life is death
  
jis meñ nah ho inqilāb , maut hai vuh zindagī
the life of the spirit of the peoples--
the tug-of-war of revolution		  
rūḥ-e umum kī ḥayāt kashmakash-e inqilāb !
= inqilāb is not narrowly political, but has the
broader sense of 'change', a 'revolving' of the
wheel of time and fate.		    
     
7) [it] is like a sword in the hand
of destiny, that community
  
ṣūrat-e shamshīr hai dast-e qaẓā meñ vuh qaum
that in every age keeps
an account of its deeds		  
kartī hai jo har zamāñ apne ʿamal kā ḥisāb !
     
8) all forms are incomplete
without the blood of the liver
  
naqsh haiñ sab na-tamām , ḳhūn-e jigar ke baġhair
a song is half-baked madness,
without the blood of the liver		  
naġhmah hai saudā-e ḳhām , ḳhūn-e jigar ke baġhair !
   

*Masjid-e Qurtubah index page*

 
 
 

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