The Garden of Bright Waters One Hundred and Twenty Asiatic Love Poems

Excerpt

THE PRINCESS OF QULZUM

(BALLADE BY NUR UDDIN)

I have seen a small proud face brimming with sunlight;
I have seen the daughter of the King of Qulzum passing from grace to grace.
Yesterday she threw her bed on the floor of her double house
And laughed with a thousand graces.
She has a little pearl and coral cap
And rides in a palanquin with servants about her
And claps her hands, being too proud to call.
I have seen a small proud face brimming with sunlight.

"My palanquin is truly green and blue;
I fill the world with pomp and take my pleasure;
I make men run up and down before me,
And am not as young a girl as you pretend.
I am of Iran, of a powerful house, I am pure steel.
I hear that I am spoken of in Lahore."
I have seen a small proud face brimming with sunlight.

I also hear that they speak of you in Lahore,
You walk with a joyous step,
Your nails are red and the palms of your hands are rosy.
A pear-tree with a fresh stem is in your palace gardens,
I would not that your mother should give my pear-tree
To twine with an evil spice-tree or fool banana.
I have seen a small proud face brimming with sunlight.

"The coins that my father gave me for my forehead
Throw rays and light the hearts of far men;
The ray of light from my red ring is sharper than a diamond.
I go about and about in pride as of hemp wine
And my words are chosen.
But I give you my honey cheeks, dear, I trust them to you."
I have seen a small proud face brimming with sunlight.

The words of my mouth are coloured and shining things;
And two great saints are my perpetual guards.
There is never a song of Nur Uddin but has in it a great achievement
And is as brilliant as a young hyacinth;
I pour a ray of honey on my disciples,
There is as it were a fire in my ballades.
I have seen a small proud face brimming with sunlight.

COME, MY BELOVED!

Come, my beloved! And I say again: Come, my beloved!
The doves are moaning and calling and will not cease.
  Come, my beloved!

"The fairies have made me queen, and my heart is love.
Sweeter than the green cane is my red mouth."
  Come, my beloved!

The jacinth has spilled odour on your hair,
The balance of your neck is like a jacinth;
You have set a star of green between your brows.
  Come, my beloved!

Like lemon-trees among the rocks of grey hills
Are the soft colours of the airy veil
To your rose knee from your curved almond waist.
  Come, my beloved!

Your light breast veil is tawny brown with stags,
Stags with eyes of emerald, hunted by red kings.
  Come, my beloved!

Muhammad Din is wandering; he is drunken and mad;
For a year he has been dying. Send for the doctor!
  Come, my beloved!

BALLADE OF MUHAMMAD KHAN

She has put on her green robe, she has put on her double veil, my idol;
My idol has come to me.
She has put on her green robe, my love is a laughing flower;
Gently, gently she comes, she is a young rose, she has come out of the garden.

Gently she has shown her face, parting her veil, my idol;
My idol has come to me.
She has put on her green robe, my love is a young rose for me to break.
Her chin has the smooth colour of peaches and she guards it well;
She is the daughter of a Moghol house and well they guard her.

She put on her red jewels when she came with a noise of rings, my idol;
My idol has come to me.
She has put on her green robe, my love is the stem of a rose;
She breaks not, she is strong.
She has a throne, but comes into the woods for love.

I was well and she troubled me when she came to me in the evening, my idol;
My idol has come to me.
She has put on her green robe, her wrist is a sword.
The villages speak of her; the child is as fair as Badri.
She has red lips and six hundred and fifty beads upon her light blue scarf.
Give your garland to Muhammad Khan, my idol;
My idol has come to me.

GHAZAL OF TAVAKKUL

To-day I saw Laila's breasts, the hills of a fair city
From which my heart might leap to heaven.

Her breasts are a garden of white roses
Having two drifted hills of fallen rose-leaves.

Her breasts are a garden where doves are singing
And doves are moaning with arrows because of her.

All her body is a flower and her face is ;
She has fruits of beautiful colours and the doves abide there.

Over the garden of her breasts she combs the gold rain of her hair....
You have killed Tavakkul, the faithful pupil of .

GHAZAL OF SAYYID KAMAL

I am burning, I am crumbled into powder,
I stand to the lips in a tossing sea of tears.

Like a stone falling in Hamun lake I vanish;
I return no more, I am counted among the dead.

I am consumed like yellow straw on red flames;
You have drawn a poisoned sword along my throat to-day....