Monday 30 March 2015

Ganga Ma


Can Indra's wing-shorn salients capture every Schelling focality?
Or Tara's tear born Buddhas forever renew non-locality?
That all sons she drowns till her true mate reminds
Shekinah's spate not saves but binds.

Sunday 15 March 2015

Ghalib 53


āmad-e ḳhat̤ se huʾā hai sard jo bāzār-e dost

dūd-e shamʿ-e kushtah thā shāyad ḳhat̤-e ruḳhsār-e dost

ay dil-e nā-ʿāqibat-andesh ẓabt̤-e shauq kar

kaun lā saktā hai tāb-e jalvah-e dīdār-e dost

ḳhānah-vīrāñ-sāzī-e ḥairat tamāshā kījiye

ṣūrat-e naqsh-e qadam hūñ raftah-e raftār-e dost

ʿishq meñ bedād-e rashk-e ġhair ne mārā mujhe

kushtah-e dushman hūñ āḳhir garchih thā bīmār-e dost

chashm-e mā raushan kih us bedād kā dil shād hai

dīdah-e pur-ḳhūñ hamārā sāġhar-e sarshār-e dost

ġhair yūñ kartā hai merī pursish us ke hajr meñ

be-takalluf dost ho jaise koʾī ġham-ḳhvār-e dost

yih ġhazal apnī mujhe jī se pasand ātī hai āp

hai radīf-e shiʿr meñ ġhālib z bas takrār-e dost

This adolescent lucubration so stinks of the lamp as to make a fugitive of Truth 
Like a Platonic pederast back pedaling from a now bristly cheeked youth.

Oh my heart! Be thou, no mountebank Moses, but Mt. Tur to the vision of that face
As Ganga to Himavant; Torah's graven terrors let Shekinah's tears erase

So fleetly fled from that foot-print, mine eyes still mirror in amaze
No Adam's peak, far to seek, but a dazzled Arafat all my days

See how the envy of my rival, my one resource of survival, with mimetic unfairness fails
Now my death is at his door, all Hope's revival defames the eidetic plague Love entails

So her heart know Hedon, mine eyes grow bright & all arterial gout
Blood red wine to her cup over-brim & callow humanity rout

Ghalib, Tho' She is ever with thee... NOT!, she is far
Such be-takkalluf Borats is all Friends are
       





Friday 6 March 2015

Ghalib's Parrondo game

Even if Love is only ever either Puerile or Profane
& Faith the Loss by which but Book-makers Gain
 A Ghalib can yet sequence as a Parrondo's game
Vigils at her door & Prayer's Walk of Shame.