Allama Iqbal's Poetry
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The Gift from Hijaz-Urdu

Content

The Devil’s Conference
The Advice Of An Old Baluch To His Son
Painting and the Painter
The State Of Barzakh
A Deposed Monarch
Litany of the Damned
The Late Masud
A Voice from Beyond
Quatrains
What fruit will the bough of my hope bear–
Set him free of this world’s affairs
Upset this world of morn and eve,
My poor estate makes proud men covetous,
Rescue me please from wisdom’s narrowness
Iqbal said to the Shaykh of the Ka‘bah:
The old flame of desires has grown cold
The talk of Muslim is interesting,
The clairvoyance of the zephyr
Of love and losing what words need be said?
Why is there no storm in your sea?
If with the heart’s eye the intellect would see aright
Sometimes by rising from the ocean like a wave
The Poetic Notebook of Mullazade Zaigham of Laulab
Your springs and lakes with water pulsating and quivering...
Harder than death is what thou call’st slavery,
Downtrodden and penniless is Kashmir now;
When the enslaved people’s rage boils and they rise in...
The partridge flies with the majesty of the falcons;
The dissolute know the Sufi’s accomplishments
Come out of the monastery and play the role of Shabbir
Thou think’st it a mere drop of blood; well
When flowers’ bookshop opened in the garden
The freeman’s veins are firm as veins of granite
All of the self dwell ignorant, whether by Light touched...
Nations in whom life marches to action
It is the sign of living nations
How heretically do you play the game of life?
The ways of the West are calculating, the ways of the East...
O land of charming and sweet flowers what need is there to...
Self-awareness has made the mujahid forget his body,
Nourish that lofty will and burning heart,
I walk lonely the earth; hear my lament,
To Sir Akbar Hyderi the Chief Minister Of Hyderabad Deccan
Husain Ahmad
The Human Being

The State Of Barzakh

The Corpse (To Its Grave)
What is it, this Resurrection Day? Of what present is it the future?
O my ancient sleeping‑chamber, What is Resurrection Day?
The Grave
O corpse of a hundred years, don’t you know
That every death implies a call for resurrection?
The Corpse
A death that implies resurrection­
Such a death does not entrap me!
It is true that I have been dead for a hundred years,
But I am not tired of this dark chamber in the earth.
The soul should once again ride the poor body­
If this is resurrection, then I am not a taker!
A Voice From The Unseen
Death is not for snakes and scorpions, Or for birds and beasts of prey,
Eternal death is the lot of slave nations alone.
Even Israfil’s trumpet cannot bring back to life those
Whose bodies, when they lived, had no souls.
To spring back to life after death ‑only the free can do that,
Even though all living beings are headed Into the arms of the grave.
The Grave
(To Its Corpse)
You vicious creature! In the world you were a slave!
I had failed to understand why my soil was as hot as fire!
Your corpse makes my darkness even darker.
It rips the earth’s veil of honour.
Beware, beware a hundred times of a slave’s corpse!
O Israfil! O Lord of the universe! O soul that is chaste and pure!
The Voice From The Unseen
Resurrection upsets the order of the universe,
But it is this commotions that reveals the secrets of existence.
An earthquake makes mountains fly like clouds,
But it also starts new springs flowing in the valleys.
Total destruction must come before any re‑creation –
For in this way the problems of existence are resolved.
The Earth
Oh, this eternal death! Oh, this struggle that marks life!
Will this conflict in the world ever end?
Reason cannot free itself from its idols;
The commoners and the elite‑all are slaves to Lat and Manat.
How abject Adam‑ the man with divine attributes ‑has now become!
That such a world should continue to exist is more than heart and eye can bear.
Why does man’s night not turn into dawn?

Translated by: Mustansir Mir
The State Of Barzakh

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