Let the ascetics sing of the garden of Paradise
by Mirza GhalibEnglish version by Jane Hirshfield
Original Language Urdu
Let the ascetics sing of the garden of Paradise --
We who dwell in the true ecstasy can forget their vase-tamed bouquet.
In our hall of mirrors, the map of the one Face appears
As the sun's splendor would spangle a world made of dew.
Hidden in this image is also its end,
As peasants' lives harbor revolt and unthreshed corn sparks with fire.
Hidden in my silence are a thousand abandoned longings:
My words the darkened oil lamp on a stranger's unspeaking grave.
Ghalib, the road of change is before you always:
The only line stitching this world's scattered parts.
-- from The Enlightened Heart: An Anthology of Sacred Poetry, by Stephen Mitchell |
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Each couplet of this ghazal dances, don't they?
In our hall of mirrors, the map of the one Face appears
As the sun's splendor would spangle a world made of dew.
Those lines could just as easily appear in a Buddhist poem. In the myriad objects of the world, everything is a mirror reflecting the one Reality. Each person, each thing, is like a drop of dew shining like the sun.
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