Ghazals and Poems I

Ghazals and Poems I

Ghazal: O Lord, what is my state today in the gathering

O Lord, what is my state today in the gathering,
that someone is drawing my heart out and carrying it off?

O burning of grief, see that what I have gained is not ruined:
every mirror of the heart is the picture of my heart.

Who knows what happens till morning in separation?
From evening on, my heart is not in my control.

In love I found comfort in seeking pain:
now grief is my life, and pain is now my heart.

The colour of your playful gait is found in it:
if only my heart would go on beating in my side.

Alas the fate of the man who became the heart's companion!
Alas the destiny of the heart that became my heart!

Something keeps pricking in my side now and then:
God knows now whether it is the memory of you, or my heart.

Ghazal: Man meets man

Man meets man,
but the heart rarely meets anyone.

I forget her cruelties,
she meets me with such simplicity.

What is it today, that the colour
of the flowers matches your laughter?

The chain of the Resurrection's mischief
goes back to your fine stature.

The one who, even when met, is never truly met:
the heart meets him with all its might.

The affairs of the world fall into place
when awareness meets self-forgetting.

The soul too finds the pleasure of love
through being the heart's neighbour.

Ghazal: Dwelling in my eyes, filling my heart, they went away

Dwelling in my eyes, filling my heart, they went away:
life was asleep; they woke it and went away.

Showing the glory of the eternal Beauty, they went away:
reminding me of something like an event, they went away.

Bringing the sleeve up to the face, they went away:
what was the secret they hid as they went away?

They filled every vein in such a way and went away
as if they had stolen me from myself and gone away.

Giving my life of love the madness of longing,
making me all awareness, they went away.

Making me understand the lowliness of my highest perfection,
showing their own heights, they went away.

Showing the expanse of the radiance of their beauty,
widening the bounds of my longing, they went away.

For the sake of my unhappy heart,
making everything a mirror of beauty, they went away.

They had come to quench the thirst of the heart;
setting another kind of fire, they went away.

They had come to fulfil the longing of the eager eye;
making me a glance from head to foot, they went away.

Where now have I leisure from the business of love?
Increasing the pain of both worlds, they went away.

Along with thanks for their kindness, let this complaint too be accepted:
why did they not make me like themselves before they went away?

The lips trembled and were still, but, O Jigar,
as they left they met my eyes and went away.

Ghazal: The fault was neither the eyes' nor the heart's

The fault was neither the eyes' nor the heart's:
what came before me was my own pride.

The light of the eyes was dark as a sigh:
from morning on, the evening of calamity had appeared.

She was not far from me, nor was I far from her:
if she was not seen, the fault was the sight's.

Every moment a kind of hangover, every breath a high:
was it a bottle under my arm, or an impatient heart?

There was surely some heart full of pain, some impatient heart:
granted you were not there, someone like you surely was.

At the first knock the instrument of longing broke;
as soon as eyes met, the glass of the heart lay shattered.

Where in spring is there such a surge of colour?
Someone's blood of longing must surely have been mixed in.

What can one say of the Saqi's drunken eye?
There was so much rapture that I too was in rapture.

O failed sigh, you who turned back halfway,
tell me at least how far the door of effect was.

The heart that you made your own with kindness
surely had a lancet hidden in it.

No one could escape that wine-selling eye:
everyone was drunk to the measure of his heart's capacity.

Yesterday I saw Jigar on the road to the tavern:
he had drunk so much that he was dead drunk.

Ghazal: The effect of my heart's lament did not suit me

The effect of my heart's lament did not suit me:
now that I have met you, I have no news of myself.

Taking my heart, you give me a scar on the liver:
this is a thing I will not forget all my life.

On every side I see her shining forth:
how my own sight deceives me!

I do not find the pleasure of the liver's pain:
may the mischief-making glance not have forgotten me.

Self-forgetting has set me on a strange road:
there are eyes, and I see nothing.

Today I must face the reverend counsellor:
let me have your glance for a moment or two.

I am crossing the road of love drunkenly:
now let the pull of longing take me wherever it will.

I am afraid, seeing the splendour of the beloved's face,
that my own sight may make me its own.

The colour of the intoxications of beauty and love is the same:
she has no news of herself, nor I of myself.

I must die with my head of devotion laid at her feet:
today I must cut short the story of grief.

The heart is dearer than the breast, and you dearer than the heart,
but dearer to me than all is your glance.

If I am far away, why address your words to me?
If you are near, why do I not see you?

Who knows what will happen in the cage?
So far my wings and feathers are dear to me.

Ghazal: Now there is not even this awareness left

Now there is not even this awareness left,
whether there is pain or not.

Until love has disgraced him,
a man is of no use.

The love that bursts out all at once
is mostly not lasting.

There comes a time, too, when
the other-than-God is not other. [TN: *ma-siwa*, "what is other (than God)", the created world.]

Ah, what has happened to my nature?
Even grief no longer gives comfort.

Is the heart ours or yours?
We cannot decide.

The one on whom your glance does not fall,
God is not on his side.

I, weary for a lifetime;
the heart, not parted from me for a moment.

She is near us
when there is no trace of us.

What peace comes to the heart
when there is no support!

Once one has faced her,
one never faces anything again.

Ghazal: The awareness of love has made me a stranger

The awareness of love has made me a stranger:
often someone has driven one mad like this too.

What hope can I have of you now, O beloved's beauty?
You have smiled and driven me mad.

God alone can deal with you: O heart, you have driven someone
even madder than me.

Again my eyes long to see the one,
God bless the memory, who drove me mad.

If I have any complaint against my madness, it is this:
it has made my loves into a tale.

O ever-increasing beauty, may you live long:
you have made me a stranger to both worlds.

When one stirring of the glance came into the heart,
it called me mad and drove me mad.

She asks me, of all people: just see this playfulness!
"Who has driven my Jigar mad?"

Ghazal: I never saw any escape from the hands of this love

I never saw any escape from the hands of this love:
the more I looked that way, the more the longing grew.

At first love was a sort of game, but when my eyes opened
I saw that arrow of the glance sunk in every vein.

The whole night, rising and rising, was sacrificed to the candle: [TN: the first line is obscure in the source.]
who knows what the moths saw at dawn?

Those tear-filled eyes and pain-filled laments:
may God never show anyone what I saw at dawn.

I am the sacrifice of your eyes, the sacrifice of your glances:
the wound in the liver I saw was the gain of a hundred darts.

All grievances and complaints vanished in a moment
when that soul of neglect gave a single look.

In the age of the grief of separation, what were heart and liver?
I found a wound here, I saw a scar there.

Though my madness was a cause of disgrace,
she found no peace either until she had looked this way.

I found that gazelle eye a tavern of the heart;
I saw that painted face as a paradise for the eye.

There must after all be some reason for the heart to writhe like this:
either the pain has turned over, or you have looked this way.

Who knows what happened in the hour of madness,
but when some sense returned, I saw a ruined house.

Why the sweat on the brow, why the moisture in the eyes?
Is all well? Have you seen the state of Jigar? [TN: *jigar*, "liver", the seat of grief, is also the poet's pen name.]

Ghazal: In her eyes I was chosen

In her eyes I was chosen:
the heart was ruined by a wondrous beauty.

The magic of love succeeded:
I became yours, and you became my answer.

Every breath became a wave of restlessness:
what became of life? It became a torment.

The passion of longing succeeded:
today she felt shy of me.

Why should I not become drunk on wine?
Why did someone become youth in bodily form?

O coquettish glance, take notice, or else
the beloved pain will turn to restlessness.

My ruin is right and proper, but
tell me, what merit did you gain by it?

At once nearness and separation:
ah, that drop which became a bubble!

Intoxications wander on every side:
who has become the plunderer of wine?

O breeze of grace, do not touch the heart:
this heart has now become as fragile as a bubble.

At the hands of a love that makes no distinctions,
beauty itself was defeated.

When she came, before anything else
my eyes were given leave to sleep.

Everything in the heart lit up:
perhaps today she was unveiled.

Do not ask about the age of the tumult of joy:
now all that has become a thought and a dream.

The tear you cast your glance on
boiled up and became wine.

I swear by the beloved's special cruelty:
the beloved's kindness has been beyond reckoning.

Ghazal: He has no concern with ecstasy or talk, nor with stations and stopping

He has no concern with ecstasy or talk, nor with stations and stopping, [TN: *hal* and *qal*, "state" and "speech"; *maqam*, a station on the Sufi path.]
who has some special bond with your beauty that moves like lightning.

She comforts me with every fresh message,
now coming into the open view, now withdrawing from it.

Why was there always this struggle with dangers at every step,
from the half-finished road of longing to the roof of complete love?

I have no concern with anyone, no business; my business is my own:
your mention, your thought, your memory, your name.

My Saqi, my Saqi, bravo to you, bravo to you!
Keep pouring, keep pouring, cup after cup, from that same eye.

What is your morning of pleasure? If you have the courage, O sky,
come and contend some time with the evening of the grief of the beloved's absence.

Do not mix me with the dust like this, though I am your footprint:
the lasting of your splendour depends on my longing, name by name.

What can I say of your drunken eye, that every glance is a spell?
All this awareness, all this madness, comes from this one turn of the cup.

These are verses of the book of the heart; how can I tell what bonds there are
between my endless prostrations and the prints of your gait?

Saqi, I want the one that pours, the one that overflows,
from your beauty with the flask in hand, from your eye like wine in the cup.

Let the pain that has risen go on rising; let anyone complain of it,
who hates the mention of beauty, who is irked by the name of love.

At once the houri's eye quivered; she was tipsy before she drank,
when it suddenly spilled from some drunken reveller's cup.

You may make a thousand excuses, but we envy something else, Jigar:
the restlessness of your glance, the care of your speech.

Ghazal: If God does not grant the grace, it is beyond man's power

If God does not grant the grace, it is beyond man's power:
the bounty of love may be common, the knowledge of love is not common.

What is this you have said, foolish one, that nature's generosity is not common?
Just bring forth thought and sight: what is there that is not a gift?

O Lord, what station of love is this? Though eye and heart are not disappointed,
there is comfort and no comfort, there is rest and no rest.

Why should those drunk on the wine of pleasure and joy take the trouble to attend?
It is only the sound of a heart breaking, not the sound of a cup breaking.

If you would come to the beloved's gathering, come having broken the conceit of self:
O you madman of sense and reason, here sense and reason have no work.

The ascetic drank in such a style that the Saqi's glances began to fall on him;
till now the drinkers had thought he was not fit for the round of the cup.

Let love itself bear its own utter defeat, without conditions:
the heart too has some part in her plot; this is not the glance's work alone.

What all call captivity is in fact sovereignty, but
what freedom is there here that is not its own snare?

Ghazal: God, the state of this garden of creation

God, the state of this garden of creation!
The state of the prey is the state of the hunter.

Ah, the state of the colour of the face of the author of cruelty:
like the state of some oppressed one's cry.

For hours not even the sound of a beat has come:
who knows what the state of the unhappy heart is.

Mansur gave his head and was lightened, but [TN: Mansur al-Hallaj, executed for crying "I am the Truth".]
let someone ask the executioner about the executioner's state.

I, and a complaint of your endless separation?
The state of your memory is your own state.

Who knows what my local ascension is?
The world is only the state of my downfall.

Do not ask the people of the garden; ask the garden
what they call the state of a scattered fragrance.

Why should the fire of the rose burn my nest?
Within the straws is the state of the garden-born lightning itself.

Naat: Here is a drunkard, and the praise of the Sultan of Medina

Here is a drunkard, and the praise of the Sultan of Medina: [TN: a *naat*, a poem in praise of the Prophet Muhammad, "the Sultan of Medina".]
yes, some glance of the mercy of the Sultan of Medina.

You are the dawn of pre-eternity and the mirror of eternal Beauty too:
O blessings upon him, the face of the Sultan of Medina! [TN: *salli 'ala*, "send blessings upon (him)".]

O dust of Medina, I am a sacrifice to your lanes:
you are Paradise, you are the garden of the Sultan of Medina.

Outwardly the poorest of the poor, and yet such is the state:
greater than kings is the majesty of the Sultan of Medina.

In such a way that every breath is busy in worship,
let me see the door of the house of the Sultan of Medina.

The grief of both worlds, the remembrance of God, the pain of intercession:
this is the wealth, the wealth of the Sultan of Medina.

O God, do not turn Your face from this sinful community:
very tender is the honour of the Sultan of Medina.

O life that has come to the lips, be wary, take heed:
there before you is his holiness the Sultan of Medina.

Jigar, I have no other business with anyone:
enough for me is one bond with the Sultan of Medina.

Ghazal: This tale is the least of the word "love"

This tale is the least of the word "love":
drawn in, it is the lover's heart; spread out, it is the whole age.

Whose imagining is this, whose tale is this?
The tear in the eyes is a bead of the rosary.

Though the heart is the target of the stone of reproach,
the heart is still my heart: the heart itself is the world.

The tale of us who are stricken by love is only this:
there is no one to weep for us, and the world to laugh.

She, and the enemy of faithfulness: they will not agree, and never have;
it is all the heart's mischief, the eyes are only an excuse.

I am a poet, I am a poet, the age is mine:
nature is my mirror, creation my comb.

Who has ever known what passes over them?
It is one's own trouble, one's own tale.

What has beauty understood, what has love known?
The world lies under the kick of us who sit in the dust.

It is the beginning of love: there is no coming, no going;
it is the rule of tears, the age of sighs.

There is a kind of moisture in her eyes; she sits rather quiet:
in the delicate glances there is a delicate tale.

We, our hearts in pain, lamenting; she, hand on heart, bewildered:
O love, what a tyrant you are; the age is yours alone.

Either she was angry with us, or we are angry with her:
yesterday was her time, today is ours.

O love whose trade is madness, yes, love whose trade is madness,
today a tyrant must be made to weep, laughing and laughing.

A little leave too, O gathering-place of existence:
we have come out for a moment; we must weep and make others weep.

This love is not easy; understand just this much:
it is a river of fire, and one must cross it by drowning.

Are her own beauty and youth any lesser rivals of ours?
Whenever you look, now there she is, with mirror and comb.

Life and the grief of the beloved are two sides of one picture:
one image must be hidden, one image must be shown.

This beauty and grace of hers, this love and youth of ours:
there is the longing to live, and the time to die.

I must spend every moment in this one thought:
now she comes, now she comes; she is bound to come.

Self-respect and deprivation, deprivation and self-respect:
now God keep the heart; now is the heart's time.

In the smile of tears, in the music of sighs,
is the innocent tale of an innocent love.

There are many tears in the eyes, Jigar, but
what is strung becomes a pearl; what stays loose is a grain.

Ghazal: If it did not pass among the Venus-browed

If it did not pass among the Venus-browed,
how then would this life be spent, where would it pass?

The moments that passed between your cheek and your locks,
sometimes those very moments passed as a torment to the soul.

For a long time I had this fear, that the boldness of longing
might weigh heavy on an innocent heart.

Every station of love was very charming,
but we people of love passed through, dragged along.

Even the hard stages of madness, with the memory of you,
looked lovely and passed fresh and young.

For the sake of seeking you, before my eyes
not just this one world, hundreds of worlds have passed.

In the crowd of splendours, what a flight of longing!
As if the soul were passing among the stars.

Forgive me: grown suspicious of the world,
what doubts passed through us even about your faithfulness!

I was complaining of separation when I felt
that she had suddenly passed close by me.

On the road of faithfulness such a station came too
that we passed suspicious even of ourselves.

An age of love and desire in which sincerity is mixed
never passed in vain, nor will it pass in vain.

This is what they call Paradise, and Hell too:
the life that passes among the beautiful.

Even the loveliest scenes of nature's beauty,
who knows why they weighed on my spirit today.

Nests from whose very shadow the lightnings trembled,
some such nests too have passed before my eyes.

My duty is only to lay out the garden of the world:
what do I care whether spring comes or autumn passes?

What beauty? Love itself did not know of it:
such tests too passed on the road of seeking.

Do not ask about the plundering of the garden in full spring:
God grant that scene never passes before my eyes again.

Matters that no one could see but the hearts themselves,
some such matters too passed between us.

Sometimes, round this one handful of dust,
the seven heavens passed, circling.

The company of roses may be very lovely, but
life is what passes among the thorns.

Already, my friend, you find them very hard to bear,
those events that have flowed by till now.

The revolutions that only the poet's eye can see,
when did they pass before you?

Very dear to me, Jigar, is the memory, how should she know,
of those events of love that passed so suddenly.

Ghazal: O beloved's beauty, for shame, what revolution is this

O beloved's beauty, for shame, what revolution is this?
Your pain is more successful than you.

Neglect is no answer to the lover's dejection:
its only answer is a surge of love.

Your favours, that the offering of my life is not accepted!
Your kindnesses, that the world is wicked!

O beauty, just look at how you encourage it,
though I grant the eager eye is very unveiled.

I am self-sufficient love, you are unbounded beauty:
there is no match for me, nor for you.

The tavern is his, this world is his,
the thirsty one who holds the cup of wine in his hand.

What can I tell of the ruined heart's story to one
who cannot even bear to hear that the world is wicked?

O inspector, do not throw it out, my inspector, do not throw it out:
tyrant, it is wine! O tyrant, it is wine!

Let no one go beyond his own bounds in love:
every speck, where it is, is a sun.

She may be right before me, but what can be done?
The heart will not believe the eye has succeeded.

My eager glance is no less, yet still
your youth is your youth alone.

Why did you make me used to trusting your grace?
Now every fault of longing is its answer.

I am her mirror, she is my mirror:
her glance succeeds through my glance.

Be a sacrifice to the loneliness of separation:
there is I, and the thought of the beloved, and a tearful eye.

Ah, Jigar, do not ask about the wealth of separation:
now what life there is, is a torment to itself.

Ghazal: You who pass by, avoiding me as you go

You who pass by, avoiding me as you go:
these laments are not ones to go without effect.

They know nothing of where they must go,
yet the travellers keep going on.

Take the restlessness of my heart too,
you who leave on tiptoe with your face turned away.

At one sign from you they stand still,
those who say "no" and pass by everyone.

In love we have lived and we will live:
they must be others, the ones who die.

Ghazal: The heart is without rapture, and I go on living

The heart is without rapture, and I go on living;
the glass is empty, and I go on drinking.

When I keep sighing "ah, ah" without a pause,
grief is wealth: I go on paying its alms. [TN: *zakat*, the obligatory alms paid on wealth.]

Just see the helplessness of love's perfection:
I do not accept living, and I go on living.

Where is that heart now that one could love?
There are constraints; I go on keeping it company.

Life took its leave along with youth:
it is only a manner of speaking that I go on living.

Once the wine was life; now life is the wine:
someone is pouring, and I go on drinking.

Ghazal: From You is the beginning, and You alone will one day be the end

From You is the beginning, and You alone will one day be the end:
there will be the sound of the instrument, and no instrument without sound.

We know; hear from us what will happen at the Resurrection:
all will be looking at Him; He will be looking at us.

At the Resurrection, what else will become of sinners like us?
The door of Paradise will not open, but the door of mercy will.

Hell or Paradise, whatever the judgement will be,
is this little, that we shall face Him?

Pre-eternity or post-eternity, both are captives of his honour's tress:
wherever you raise your eyes, there will be this one chain.

This bond of love cannot stay without showing its colour:
whoever belongs to the beloved of God will be the beloved of God. [TN: the beloved of God (*mahbub-e khuda*) is the Prophet Muhammad.]

On this hope we seekers of pain live:
blessed pain, give! Yours will be the incurable pain. [TN: the line is somewhat garbled in the source.]

Even at a wrathful glance the lover sits having lost life and heart:
what will happen if a kind glance falls on him?

The clever one will send us from the Resurrection to Hell, [TN: *sayana*, "the clever one", sense uncertain.]
but what passes over the heart, only the heart will know.

What do you take the madmen of love for, ascetic?
Whichever side they turn to, God will be on that side.

At the Resurrection there will be Jigar's hand and his honour's hem:
whether grievance or complaint, whatever it is will be said openly.

Ghazal: I could not bear the beauty of Your reality

I could not bear the beauty of Your reality:
I looked a thousand times, and yet it never happened.

If, through your joy, there was no joy even in grief,
then that life was not the life of love.

Where? That playful one was not met even by himself:
it happened just once, and never again.

We are those people of love from whose life and heart
great fevers rose, yet the eye never grew dewy.

Wait, wait, restless heart, let me love her a little:
after this, who knows whether we will meet again.

Ah, I stayed distant even from my own thought:
I tried a thousand ways, but could not draw level.

What pride can we take in our drunkenness or our obedience?
Who knows whether the Sultan accepted it or not.

Whether anyone else steps forward or not, we give our lives:
who knows whether such an attentive eye will come again.

All the words and stories, all the eyes and hearts:
even with all this care, love was not explained.

The dejection of love, God save us!
Not even the thought of the beloved brought any bloom.

I tried your kind glance too:
there was to be no lessening of torments, and there was none.

Someone's drunken glance took my hand,
where my self-forgetting did not stand by me.

O breeze, give her this message from us:
since you left, there has been no morning and no evening here.

She may be something or nothing, but still, foolish ascetic,
even the greatest have not managed infidelity in love.

The constraint on that side is somewhat greater than on this:
we at least sighed; she could not even sigh.

Long live the thought of the beloved; God keep you:
without you there was never light in the house.

We too went, Jigar, to the beloved's place of splendour:
she kept on asking, and we could not even speak.

Image and Imagining

She came and went long ago, yet she still fills my sight:
here she walks, there she turns, now she comes, now she goes.

The same tall stature that is a Resurrection, the same face, the same whole form:
a stir on the lips, a tremor in the glance, she stands there smiling.

The same grace, the same delicacy, the same smile, the same melody:
I had become an image of despair; she is making an image of wonder.

Coloured her walk, coloured her order, coloured her speech, coloured her message:
at every step, on every path, she is making new flowers bloom.

Coloured youth, coloured beauty, she is all colour from head to foot:
all colour she has become, all colour she is making.

The manifestation of every grace, the scene of every colour:
steadying, gathering themselves, they all come to one centre.

What is the spring of colour and youth, what are stars and the moon?
All existence bows wherever she lowers her eyes.

The birds drunk on the goblet of wine, slain by the glow of tulip and rose,
each in its own strain, all together, are singing wondrous songs.

Wine is pouring from the eyes, intoxication boiling over from the glance,
spilling over, leaping up: she has drunk, and she is pouring.

She sways in her own intoxication, she kisses her own face:
she has become ruined with rapture, and is ruining others with rapture.

Intoxication is raining from the air, the mind dwells among flowers:
who is it that is still longing? The drinkers are pouring for all.

The earth is drunk, time is drunk, the world is drunk, place is drunk:
what of place? The Placeless is drunk; they are drowning us as they pour.

That coloured face and the wave of the sea, like dew on the skirt of the rose:
such is the heat of beauty, she is bathing in sweat.

These drunken nightingales are tipsy, chirping close to the cheek:
the hearts of the roses are pounding as she reaches out her coloured hand.

The wave and the river, the sand and the desert, the bud and the rose, the moon and the stars:
the moment she smiled a little, all of them are smiling.

The air is so filled with songs that the river's wave stands still:
the silence has become a song, as if she were humming something.

Now whatever comes as fate, this will stay as an image on the heart:
we are clutching her hem, she is freeing her hem.

These tears that flow on and on, though they are all the yield of grief,
yet it seems they too are smiling a little.

When for a moment my eye blinked, I saw a new radiance:
she is erasing the spell of form, building the beauty of meaning.

The six directions are brimming with joy, a cry of congratulation on every tongue:
this is the moment when she is joining Jigar's heart to her own.

Ghazal: Knowing me to be one of the tavern's chosen few

Knowing me to be one of the tavern's chosen few,
the cup and goblet will weep for me for ages.

I was the tavern's disgrace; what has the Saqi done?
The drinkers have cried out, "O elder of the tavern!" to me.

Grass and rose, wave and river, stars and sun and moon:
I have a bond with them all, but a rival's bond.

When some time of trial came into my life,
she has looked at me, Jigar, without meaning to.

Ghazal: Little madness, little seeking, little thirst

Little madness, little seeking, little thirst:
why then should even the river not look like dew?

Praise be to God, the heart whose companion is You:
where is there room for grief in that heart?

Boundless attention, and yet few glances:
blessed this regard of an angry beauty!

My eyes have seen that state
in which every state is an unbroken stumbling.

How could the fault, which burns up safety, not have happened,
when Paradise was not the height of Adam's ascent?

Blessed this bond of beauty and love:
wherever we sat, we saw ourselves.

That beauty from head to foot, God, God!
Each of whose graces is a whole world.

Where is the side of the world-illuminating sun,
and where a delicate maiden, the dew?

Joy is another name for life;
the longing for joy is lasting grief.

Ghazal: If even now you will not take the trouble

If even now you will not take the trouble,
you will be left just wringing your hands.

Where will you go, hiding from my eyes?
Wherever you go, you will find me.

When you come to hear of my bad state,
you will come strolling along.

Having wiped me out, you will regret it:
you will feel something missing.

Counsellor, the reality of madness is no game:
when you have understood it, then you may counsel.

I too must see now
how long you will withhold your attention from me.

Do not think cruelty in love is easy:
you will writhe, if you make me writhe.

This is a heart; just let it stay a heart:
if you show it kindness, you will regret it.

Has the tongue of love ever kept silent?
If you do not speak, you will speak.

Congratulations, congratulations on forgetting me,
but on this condition: do not come back to my mind.

I too will find no peace until
you bring tears into those eyes.

"Your passion of longing is unreal":
just say that again, will you?

When I am gone, what colour will the gathering have?
Seeing whom will you be shy?

Granted that having given me the pain of separation,
you will not give me the cure for separation.

Love stays love, but
how long will you go on diverting yourself?

It will not be only our embrace that stays empty:
you will find your own side empty too.

There is some limit to madness after all, Jigar:
how long will you heap cruelty on someone?

Ghazal: Those who are being raised in storms

Those who are being raised in storms
are the very ones who keep changing the world.

The colour of the garden keeps brightening
as the straw and rubbish keep burning.

Right there I see the dust flying
where the springs keep gushing up.

The lamps of temple and Kaaba, God, God!
keep burning in defiance of the wind.

A debate has broken out between youth and beauty:
new aspects keep coming to light.

Ghazal: The ignorance of reason has shown us these days

The ignorance of reason has shown us these days:
men have shrunk, and shadows grown long.

Ah, how should he divert his heart,
whom even grief does not suit?

If love sets its mind to it,
it sprinkles water and sets things on fire.

Such a time has come upon the heart:
it runs, but finds no way.

What is the metaphorical, and what the real?
One's own splendours, one's own shadows.

Every joy is false
if the soul does not find peace.

The work of the world, the more
it is made, the more it is marred.

Restraint in love is the condition of love,
but the tyrant heart keeps welling up.

That beauty alone is beauty, which, tyrant,
lets one touch it, and does not come into one's hand.

That song alone is a song
which the soul hears and the soul sings.

The road of madness has become easy
in the shade of the locks and lashes.

Ghazal: Infidel beauty, the state of youth

Infidel beauty, the state of youth:
the state of wine from head to foot.

The shining face beaded with sweat:
the state of the dew and the sun.

At my boundless declaration of longing,
her state of some modesty, some anger.

God, God, that delicate blend:
the state of shyness in her playfulness.

A world all light and rapture,
a state all beauty and youth.

That edge of the stream and the season of roses,
that state of the moonlit night.

On the knee of longing, in the last watch of night,
the state of the half-sleeping narcissus.

Long intimacy of secrets and devotion,
then suddenly the state of withdrawal.

Against all my colourful speeches,
the state of one simple answer.

Every wave of grief a storm-raising wave:
the heart's state, the state of a bubble.

The minstrel's heart may perhaps understand
the state of a broken lute.

I still remember that scene, Jigar,
yes, but like the state of a dream.

Ghazal: Reverence for beauty has killed me

Reverence for beauty has killed me;
love without shame or name has killed me.

The unfulfilled promise has killed me;
the daily morning and evening have killed me.

Ah, do not ask about the trembling of the hand of longing:
the slip of half a step has killed me.

Leave aside the simplicity of love:
the elaborate care of longing has killed me.

God, God, the coming and going of breath:
this message and greeting has killed me.

Ah, love would not have died its own death:
the honourable lovers have killed it.

May they become the life of Khizr,
those half-baked thoughts that have killed me.

I am not slain by Khayyam, Jigar:
sweet-spoken Hafiz has killed me. [TN: Omar Khayyam and Hafiz of Shiraz, Persian poets of wine.]

Ghazal: Blessed cruelty! It is the blood of longing for cruelty

Blessed cruelty! It is the blood of longing for cruelty:
you invent tyranny, and kindness is invented.

Outwardly she says nothing, yet there is a pronouncement:
"I belong to the one who is ruined for me in every way."

When she is unhappy at my staying unhappy,
how can I tell what state of lament I am in?

This is the secret of freedom, as far as I remember:
when the eyes are imprisoned, the heart is free.

What a collection of opposites the lover's heart is!
On this side it flourishes, on that it is ruined.

Every event that takes the form of a mishap,
I seem to remember having seen something like it before.

With great difficulty is that one son of Adam born
who is himself free, and whose every breath is free.

Let alone the eyes, for hours even the heart cannot grasp it:
such things too are said by the tongue of beauty.

You are the one who taunts me; you yourself say in fairness:
does anyone ruin his home of his own free will?

Granted, the free man has nothing to do with the shame of restraint,
but he is free even of the shame of freedom.

The state of your picture in my imagination is such
as if something were now being said by those delicate lips.

There is perhaps no limit at all to the tale of love:
each goes on telling it as much as he remembers.

Ghazal: I could not tell her the story of my heart's grief

I could not tell her the story of my heart's grief:
things had gone so wrong that they could not be put right.

In the surge of madness we forgot everyone, but
there was one memory of you that could not be forgotten.

The wet eye had no control over love:
the fire it lit could not be put out.

The heart on which the reflection of the beloved's face fell,
even mixed with the dust, its purity did not go.

How will the breeze lift my dust from that door?
This Resurrection could not be raised even by her.