I was looking up this famous Urdu poet and his words reflect such a beautiful and indomitable spirit of people resisting oppression:
Stanza
If they snatch my ink and pen,
I should not complain,
For I have dipped my fingers
In the blood of my heart.
I should not complain
Even if they seal my tongue,
For every ring of my chain
Is a tongue ready to speak.
4 comments:
For a Political Leader (Mahatma Gandhi)
Years these chained hands scraped,
Like straw waging war on the sea,
At the hard black breast of the night,
Like moths assailing the rock:
Until in the stony dark breast of the night
So many wounds opened the light,
Wherever you looked, wove a pattern,
And pulse of morning, far off, started to beat.
Your stock, your hopes, are these hands.
What else have you got but these hands?
You cannot accept victory of the dark,
But countenance the sword on these hands
And let the day laying wait in the east
Fall under the night's iron corpse.
Such incredible images... straw waging war on the sea?! moths assailing the rock?! no matter how materially or physically weak you might be, no matter how tightly they try to chain you or how darkly they try to smother you... you shall fight and you shall win as long as your pulse is beating and your heart is speaking! Such inspiring poetry!!!!!
More by Faiz:
Speak
Speak, your lips are free.
Speak, it is your own tongue.
Speak, it is your own body.
Speak, your life is still yours.
See how in the blacksmith's shop
The flame burns wild, the iron glows red;
The locks open their jaws,
And every chain begins to break.
Speak, this brief hour is long enough
Before the death of body and tongue:
Speak, 'cause the truth is not dead yet,
Speak, speak, whatever you must speak.
this is 1 of my faves of all times!!! so beautifully breathtaking even in the most life-challenging moments:
A Prison Evening
Each star a rung,
night comes down the spiral
staircase of the evening.
The breeze passes by so very close
as if someone just happened to speak of love.
In the courtyard,
the trees are absorbed refugees
embroidering maps of return on the sky.
On the roof,
the moon - lovingly, generously -
is turning the stars
into a dust of sheen.
From every corner, dark-green shadows,
in ripples, come towards me.
At any moment they may break over me,
like the waves of pain each time I remember
this separation from my lover.
This thought keeps consoling me:
though tyrants may command that lamps be smashed
in rooms where lovers are destined to meet,
they cannot snuff out the moon, so today,
nor tomorrow, no tyranny will succeed,
no poison of torture make me bitter,
if just one evening in prison
can be so strangely sweet,
if just one moment anywhere on this earth.
(wish i can copy and paste the urdu script here too. it looks overflowing with love and soulful being...)
We shall see/certainly we, too, will see/
that day that has been promised us
When these high mountains
Of tyranny and oppression/ turn to fluff
And evaporate
And we oppressed
Beneath our feet will have
this earth shiver, shake and beat
And heads of rulers will be struck
With crackling lightening and
thunders roar.
When from this God’s earth’s (Kaa’ba)
All falseness (icons) will be removed
Then we, of clean hearts–condemned by zealots those keepers of faith,
We, will be invited to that altar to sit and Govern–
When crowns will be thrown off–and over turned will be thrones
We shall see/certainly we, too, will see
that day that has been promised us
Then God’s name will remain (Allah will remain)
Who is invisible and visible too
Who is the seer and is seen
Then will rise one cheer———I am God!
Who I am too
And so are you
Then the masses (Khalq e Kuda) people of God will rule.
Who I am too
and so are you
Then will rise one cheer———I am God!
Who I am too
And so are you
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