Writing fiction
I loved Guardian's feature on Ten rules for writing fiction.
Elmore Leonard: Using adverbs is a mortal sin
1 Never open a book with weather. If it's only to create atmosphere, and not a character's reaction to the weather, you don't want to go on too long. The reader is apt to leaf ahead look ing for people. There are exceptions. If you happen to be Barry Lopez, who has more ways than an Eskimo to describe ice and snow in his book Arctic Dreams, you can do all the weather reporting you want.
2 Avoid prologues: they can be annoying, especially a prologue following an introduction that comes after a foreword. But these are ordinarily found in non-fiction. A prologue in a novel is backstory, and you can drop it in anywhere you want. There is a prologue in John Steinbeck's Sweet Thursday, but it's OK because a character in the book makes the point of what my rules are all about. He says: "I like a lot of talk in a book and I don't like to have nobody tell me what the guy that's talking looks like. I want to figure out what he looks like from the way he talks."
3 Never use a verb other than "said" to carry dialogue. The line of dialogue belongs to the character; the verb is the writer sticking his nose in. But "said" is far less intrusive than "grumbled", "gasped", "cautioned", "lied". I once noticed Mary McCarthy ending a line of dialogue with "she asseverated" and had to stop reading and go to the dictionary.
Ajoka’s new play on “Dara Shikoh”
It is absolutely a significant cultural landmark in Pakistan. Ajoka has decided to stage a play on a personality that has been neglected by India and Pakistan. His views and role in history challenges the myths of Indian and Pakistani nationalism and confronts religious militancy rampant in the two countries. Had Dara - the visionary, sage and believer in humanism - lived, we may have avoided blood, carnage and violence that defines South Asia of today. Those interested to explore the hidden history, removed from textbook propaganda must watch this play. The venue and timings can be found at the end of this post. Now the formal introduction to the play:
Dara - A play on the life and times of Mughal prince Dara Shikoh
Ajoka’s new play “Dara” is about the less-known but extremely dramatic and moving story of Dara Shikoh, eldest son of Emperor Shahjahan, who was imprisoned and executed by his younger brother Aurangzeb. Dara was not only a crown prince but also a poet, a painter and a Sufi. He wanted to build on the vision of Akbar the Great and bring the ruling Muslim elite closer to the local religions. His search for the Truth and shared teachings of all major religions is reflected in his scholarly works such as Sakeena-tul-Aulia, Safina-tul-Aulia and Majma-ul-Bahrain. The play also explores the existential conflict between Dara the crown prince, and Dara the Sufi and the poet.
Jaipur, Faiz and Ali Sethi
Ali Sethi recently attended the Jaipur literary festival and his extraordinary performance is now accessible to those who were not there. I should thank him for sharing this video. Ali's instructions were also meticulous but I will not post them here except his concluding comment: the whole of the rest of the session is fantastic, and includes an excellent performance by Shabana Azmi as well as a very funny story told by Javed Akhtar about his first meeting with Faiz Sahib..
Click and enjoy!
Mazhub – a voice for peaceful South Asia
In 2006, I read this brilliant poem by Brijinder"Sagar (found here on Adnan's brilliant site). I had kept it with me for an adequate translation. I have been unable to do justice and therefore I will rework my draft to post here. In the meantime, this poem will be accessible to Urdu-Hindustani speakers. This poem is about bigotry and extremism in the name of religion that has overtaken India as well as other South Asian countries. Pakistan is no exception and Bangladesh is also witnessing the rise of Islamism, though not as alarming as India and Pakistan. Sri Lanka has also seen ethnic warfare, different in its manifestation but akin to the violence and death that comes in its wake. In such a charged environment, voices for peace are delightful.
SadioN ki pehchaanaiN sub bhool aayaayChal Way Bullehya Chal O’thay Chaliyay – Let’s go where everyone is blind
Tilism means magic (book review)
Raza Rumi relives the enchantment of the dastans (published in The Friday Times)
Musharraf Ali Farooqi and the Urdu Project have revived a tradition that was fading in the age of instant communication, sms lingo and a dying reading culture. When I started reading the book, I could not help remember the day when my Uncle, Zaheer Ahmad Bhutta, a man of letters and book-lover handed over a set of Tilism-e-Hoshruba to me in my early childhood. I distinctly remember the summer when I devoured all the abridged versions, feeling thirsty for more. So I read them again. As a young man I dared to read the originals and could not help being pleased with myself. Tilism and its magical kingdom remains a part of me, and of many others of my generation who grew up on its diet of bravery, magic, lust and a peculiar aesthetic.
Tilism is a wonderful product of our composite Indo-Muslim culture that took centuries to evolve. This is why it defies the clergy’s diktat and religious bigotry, and its characters are a mix of all that the Indian context offered to outsiders such as Arabs and Central Asians. It is a larger than life metaphor for our past that has been lost now. Perhaps forever.
Hoshruba, Book One: The Land and the Tilism begins by telling us how Amir Hamza and his armies have chased the giant Laqa to the dominions of King Suleiman Amber-Hair on Mount Agate. While out hunting nearby, Hamza’s son, Prince Badiuz Zaman, follows a unique fawn and enters the land of Hoshruba.
Iqbal – The Universal Reformer
Discovering Five Dials
Accessibility of Five Dials: As for new technology, Five Dials is a very lean and flexible entity. We do not need to worry about paper stock and production cost. Unlike Granta, we’re able to turn around issues
The romance of Raja Rasalu
colonial storytellers, the book twists the narrative in a manner that brings us closer to the origins of our cultural sensibilities. The tales are sheer magic. The romance, the intrigue, the bravery and the integrated nature of human existence where it finds communication even with birds and trees comes to a full life throughout the narrative.Bulleh! to me, I am not known
Live a fresh story
A quatrain by Rumi
happiness is to reach
the next post every day
like flowing water
free from stillness
and melancholy
yesterday is gone and
took away its talk
today we must live
a fresh story again
Kabir on thirsty fish in water
Thanks to ID, I found this beautiful translation of a verse by Kabir. The idea is profound and is truly representative of Kabir's philosophy shaped by the yogis, Sufis and mystical traditions of the Indian subcontinent.
"I laugh when I hear that the fish in the water is thirsty.
I laugh when I hear that men go on pilgrimage to find God."
~Kabir
My earlier post on Kabir - click here, which resulted into a full fledged paper published by Jamia Millia's journal
Sacred Kerala–Transcending Communal Boundaries
Book Review
Name of the Book: Sacred Kerala—A Spiritual Journey
Author: Dominique-Sila Khan
Publisher: Penguin, New Delhi, 2009
Reviewed by: Yoginder Sikand
The southern Indian state of Kerala has a unique population mix. A little less than half of Kerala’s inhabitants are Hindus, who belong to various castes. The rest are Muslims and Christians, in roughly equal number, and a miniscule number of Jews, who form India’s oldest Jewish community. In contrast to much of north India, inter-community relations in Kerala have always been fairly harmonious, although the situation is beginning to change today. At the popular level, economic and social ties and inter-dependence between Kerala’s different religious communities have given birth to a strong sense of Malayali identity that transcends religious boundaries. This has been facilitated by the use of the Malayalam language by all of the state’s communities as well as a long-standing tradition of religious overlapping or shared religious identities, which is what this fascinating book is all about.
Literature in the time of terror
My piece that appeared in The Friday Times (May 29-4 June, 2009 issue). I have argued that the silence of Pakistani writers on terrorism and extremism is finally breaking
 |
|
 |
|
|
‘Fallen Indus’, a painting by the author |
|
 |
|
|
‘Ignorance Is Bliss’, a miniature by Saira Wasim |
|
 |
Since the invasion of Afghanistan by the United States and the global hysteria about 'terror' and 'terrorism', Pakistan has faced the greatest of existential challenges after its dismemberment in 1971. As a frontline ally of the US in the war on terror, Pakistani society and polity have been engulfed by growing militancy and acts of violence. Whilst there is no single definition of 'terrorism', the mainstream media and policymakers – in the service of imperial rhetoric aimed to justify and perpetuate the occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq – have established terrorism as the major threat to domestic and regional peace in South Asia. Acts of premeditated and organised violence in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh have thus assumed a central place in discourse on regional cooperation or its converse: the rivalries between the constructed nation states and their irresponsible power-elites.
In this milieu, South Asian citizens have been the victims of violence, uncertainty and acrimony that have only led to the exacerbation of poverty, inequality, ascendancy of militarism and the war-mantra. All of this is taking place when globalization is relentlessly seeping into domestic economies, cultures and social systems. Where does this leave the writers and poets of the
Joseph’s Box by Suhayl Saadi
I am sharing a message from Suhayl Saadi here: The website associated with my forthcoming novel, Joseph's Box has been launched. There are stories - fables, one might say - tangential to, and drawing from, the main narrative of the book as well as other information. The site will develop over time. If you pre-order the books now from the site, you will get them early. Happy reading!
About the novel: 
Recently bereaved Zuleikha Chashm Framareza MacBeth wades into the Clyde one morning and recovers a large box, with which she becomes obsessed. The discovery brings her together with Alex, a lute-playing clerk, and they manage to open the box – only to find six more boxes inside, each of which can be opened only by following a cryptic clue. The clues lead Zulie and Alex on a physical and emotional journey, modulated through music, across Glasgow, Argyllshire, Lincolnshire, Sicily, Lahore, and finally the frozen peaks of the ‘Roof of the World’. Meanwhile Zulie, a troubled doctor, has been sucked into the vortex of the terminally ill Archie MacPherson, an ambivalent, visionary Second World War airman and Glasgow shipyard worker. In the manner of a lord of misrule, Archie’s dying consciousness begins to shape and ultimately define Zuleikha and Alex’s quest as they progress through the seven Sufi stations of sacrifice, truth, power, obedience, life, memory and beauty. Drawing on a wide framework of cultural and spiritual reference, uniquely blending contemporary Western literature and traditional Arabo-Persian storytelling, this is an extraordinary and ambitious novel with a visceral sensuality and subtle touches of magical realism, in the vein of Okri, Murakami and Pamuk.
ISBN 9781906120443; trade pbk 216x138mm (with coloured endpapers); 688 pages.Joseph's Box will be available on publication date as an e-book via this website and the publishers' website only.
Ajoka Theatre and the Caucasian Chalk Circle
My piece published in The Friday Times (October 24 issue)
Who is entitled to keep the child - one who is a better, nurturing mother, or the one who may be the natural mother but could not care for the child? The larger question then haunts the audience: who is entitled to ownership – the one who has the deed or the one who tills the land?
Ajoka Theatre has revived a production that was first staged twenty three years ago. A deft adaptation of Bertolt Brecht's The Caucasian Chalk Circle, its vernacular version, Chaak Chakkar, is a timeless comment on the viciousness of Pakistan's exploitative culture of power politics. Perhaps the duo, Shahid Nadeem the playwright, and Madeeha Gauhar the director, would have tried to capture bits of social reality in the mid 1980s when General Zia was still the Lord Master of Pakistan. Why did Ajoka choose to stage this after a gap of two decades?
As Madeeha Gauhar explained: "In 2008 one marvels at how Brecht had foreseen the chaos, the anarchy, the shameless switching of loyalties of recent years, especially since the return of the popular leadership exile." The seat of total power, "symbolized as Lal Mahal, is uncannily similar to Lal Masjid and Lal Haveli of our times," she added.
Know the true definition of yourself
Rumi on knowing ourselves
Suppose you know the definitions of all substances
and their derivatives,
what good is this to you?
Know the true definition of yourself.
That is indispensable.
Then, when you know your own definition, flee from it,
that you may attain to the One who cannot be defined,
O sifter of the dust.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Adieu Mahmoud Darwaish
Courtesy AHRC
I come from there
I come from there and I have memories
Born as mortals are, I have a mother
And a house with many windows,
I have brothers, friends,
And a prison cell with a cold window.
Mine is the wave, snatched by sea-gulls,
I have my own view,
And an extra blade of grass.
Mine is the moon at the far edge of the words,
And the bounty of birds,
And the immortal olive tree.
I walked this land before the swords
Turned its living body into a laden table.
I come from there. I render the sky unto her mother
When the sky weeps for her mother.
And I weep to make myself known
To a returning cloud.
I learnt all the words worthy of the court of blood
So that I could break the rule.
I learnt all the words and broke them up
To make a single word: Homeland.....
*****************
Identity Card
Record!
I am an Arab
And my identity card is number fifty thousand
I have eight children
And the nineth is coming after a summer
Will you be angry?
The Veil – Attar
by Farid al-Din 'Attar (1142-1220)
1
We are the Magians of old,
Islam is not the faith we hold;
In irreligion is our fame,
And we have made our creed a shame.
2
Now to the tavern we repair
To gamble all our substance there,
Now in the monastery cell
We worship with the infidel.
3
When Satan chances us to see
He doffs his cap respectfully,
For we have lessons to impart
To Satan in the tempter's art.
4
We were not in such nature made
Of any man to be afraid;
Head and foot in naked pride
Like sultans o'er the earth we ride.
5
But we, alas, aweary are
And the road is very far;
We know not by what way to come
Unto the place that is our home.
6
And therefore we are in despair
How to order our affair
Because, wherever we have sought,
Our minds were utterly distraught.
7
When shall it come to pass, ah when,
That suddenly, beyond our ken,
We shall succeed to rend this veil
That hath our whole affair conceal?
8
What veil so ever after this
Apparent to our vision is,
With the flame of knowledge true
We shall consume it through and through.
9
Where at the first in that far place
We come to the world of space,
Our soul by travail in the end
To that perfection shall ascend.
10
And so shall 'Attar Shattered be
And, rapt in sudden ecstasy,
Soar to godly vision, even
Beyond the veils of earth and heaven.
Translated by A. J. Arberry
Nahaj ul Balagha – Looking back to Get Ahead
Fahmida Riaz is Pakistan’s premier female poet. She became a sensation in the early 1970s when her bold, feminist poetry created a stir in the convention ridden world of Urdu poetry. Riaz was expressive, sometimes explicit, and politically charged. She created a completely new genre in Urdu poetry with a post-modern sensibility. Later, she remained prominent with her defiance of General Zia’s martial law, her exile to India and the continuous evolution of her fiction and poetry.
Since the late 1990s, Fahmida Riaz has discovered Jalaluddin Rumi, the 12th century Turkish poet and jurist, and now an international celebrity. Her recent publication – Yeh Khana-e aab-o-gil – is a unique translation of Rumi’s ghazals in the same rhyme and meter. Since her navigation of the Rumi universe, she has explored another dimension of her individual and cultural consciousness, where the influence of Islamic scholars and Sufis is paramount.
Last winter, she read a letter by Hazrat Ali bin Abi Talib (AS), the fourth Caliph and son-in-law of the Prophet Mohammed (PBUH), while browsing a translation of Nahaj ul Balagha (a collection of sermons, letters and sayings of the Caliph). Later, in an email, she related to her friends across the globe how angry she felt for not knowing about this letter all her life, and how the real jewels of Muslim history were concealed “generation after generation.”
Tabish Khair on Cartoon Wars
I am growing fond of Tabish Khair's poetry. Just read this remarkable poem:
Cartoon Wars
Let’s spell out this world.
Generally speaking, we are civilised.
Evil is something others do, mostly.
Not that we are perfect. No, that’s not what I mean.
Occasionally we make mistakes.
Criticism of it should bear that in mind.
It happens: a bomb gone bad, some brutal soldiers.
Doesn’t mean our intentions were not good.
Evil is something others do, mostly.
Germans, or at least Nazis, and communists, Muslims:
Evil is something they do, mostly.
Now the difference between us and them is this:
On every occasion we were willing to meet them, but they
Could not imagine a world with us, with people like us
In it. No, they can’t. That’s the problem. They
Don’t mean what they say, say what they mean. Damn.
Evil is something they do, always.
To Muslims: Smash the Doors, Wash your brains..
Came across this excellent article by Farooq Suleria that rather candidly talks about the dearth of creativity in Muslims of today. I love the poem by the Syrian poet Nizar Qabbani at the end. First an excerpt from this piece and then the poem:
...the solution to all our problems is always simple: return to an imagined past which, mercifully for the people of the seventh century, never existed. Every time, a scientist in the West is ready with an invention, our readymade answer is: we knew about it 1,400 years ago what the West has found only now. We kill Theo van Gogh when confronted with a film. We burn down our own cities in response to a blasphemous and racist caricature. Still, we refuse to understand that our answer to every "provocation" is either a fatwa or mindless violence – perhaps because creativity is anathema to us. Not because we lack fertile minds, but because we lack liberation and freedom -- liberation from self-imposed mental, moral, and cultural censors. And freedom to think and express. Time to heed the great Syrian poet Nizar Qabbani, who said:
Five thousand years
Growing beards
In our caves.
Our currency is unknown,
Our eyes are a haven for flies.
Friends,
Smash the doors,
Wash your brains,
Wash your clothes.
Friends,
Read a book,
Write a book,
Grow words, pomegranates and grapes,
Sail to the country of fog and snow.
Nobody knows you exist in caves.
People take you for a breed of mongrels.
No bar to love
Christian Spurrier on the tragedy of Gramsci's prison years as revealed in letters to his wife and sons (Guardian)
When I see the actions and hear the words of men who have been in prison for five, eight or 10 years, when I observe the spiritual deformations they have undergone, it gives me a cold shiver and I begin to doubt my own power to watch over myself." So wrote Antonio Gramsci to his Russian wife Julka, two years into the prison sentence that ended with his death in 1937. Gramsci's subsequent fame rests on his prison notebooks - political essays on fascism and capitalism written while in Mussolini's jails. But his letters, of which there were more than 500, tell the story behind that work. And they are a remarkable account of imprisonment.
Arrested on November 8, 1926, aged 35, Gramsci was a Sardinian-born journalist and agitator who had fought his way to the leadership of the Italian communist party. He was famous for his campaigning articles and had worked closely with Mussolini in the days when Il Duce was still a socialist and editor of the worker's paper L'Avanti. Perhaps because of this, from the moment Mussolini seized power in 1922, Gramsci knew his position was precarious. Aged 35, he was arrested on November 8, 1926 despite parliamentary immunity and sent to the prison island of Ustica, where he expected to spend five years.
His letters from Ustica are combative, optimistic and full of fascination at the strange new world into which he had been flung. He recounts seeing a pig arrested and treated as a felon and being instructed in the rivalries of the Sicilian and Calabrian mafias. He told his mother: "I felt I was living in a fantastic novel." To Julka, he wrote: "We two are still young enough to look forward to seeing our children grow up together."
Rumi and Sufism
An Interview with Seyyed Hossein Nasr on Islam's Spiritual Science in the Modern Age
By WAJAHAT ALI
Rumi, the best selling poet in America today, was a practicing Muslim and a Sufi master who lived nearly eight hundred years ago. His poetry and lyrical verses exalting his desire for the Divine, as well as describing his ecstatic pain and yearning for his “beloved†continue to inspire lovers to this day. Due to mass commercialization and weak translations of Rumi’s poetry, Sufism has unfortunately become synonymous with a saccharine, Hallmark card, Deepak Chopra’d simplification of Islam’s most profound spiritual science. Even within the global Muslim community, significant controversies and acrimonious debates have arisen around the validity of Sufism within the theological framework of the religion. Many, such as Seyyed Hossein Nasr, one of the most prolific and well known Muslim American scholars, argue that Sufism represents the spiritual engine and heart of Islam, which is rooted within the core of its scholastic traditions, and is capable of revitalizing modern day Islam rooted in literalism and political extremism. In discussing his latest work, “The Garden of Truth: The Vision and Promise of Sufism, Islam’s Mystical Tradition,†we talked about Rumi’s spiritual influence on the modern world, the role of Sufism in Islamic history and tradition, and the critique of Sufism as an antiquated model of esotericism.
ALI: Let’s talk about Rumi. I’m sure you know Coleman Barks [“Translator†of countless Rumi poetry books], correct?
NASR: Yes.
ALI: Even though Coleman Barks and others try to divorce Rumi from his God consciousness, it nonetheless emanates in his poetry. Rumi is the best selling poet in America today. What is it about his work, which is thoroughly rooted in Islam and Islamic sciences, that appeals to mainstream audiences?
Amrita Pritam: 1919-2005
Amrita Pritam never woke up on the afternoon of October 31, 2005 and the world is emptier without her musings. She embodied the fullness of poetic expression, creativity and the intensity of a woman in the perpetual state of love. Amrita’s voice was rooted in the South Asian idiom with all its contradictions, diversity and a faint recognition of fate. Her remarkable affinity with the depths of the Punjabi language adds to her iconoclastic status in India, Pakistan and wherever Punjabi is spoken and appreciated. Yet her audience has been global as well: her work was translated into dozens of world languages.
One of her poems makes the following confession:
Today I have erased the number of my house
And removed the stain of identity on my street’s forehead
And I have wiped the direction on each road
But if you really want to meet me
Then knock at the doors of every country
Every city, every street
And wherever a glimpse of a free spirit exists
That will be my home
(translation by author)
Through the course of her life, this ‘free spirit’ generated controversy but she never concerned herself with the mundane. Outspoken, prolific and deeply spiritual, Amrita existed within self-defined, non-conformist parameters. She lived with her partner for 41 years, shunned religious and sectarian identities and rejected the political divide of the left and right:
No absolutes for something as relative as a human life
No rules for something so tender as a heart..
Amrita was born in 1919 in the Gujranwala district and educated in Lahore. Her first collection of poetry, Amrit Lehran (Ripples of Nectar) was published in 1936 when she was hardly 17. By the early 1940s, five collections of her poetry had been published. However, it was in the tragic turn of events during Partition that Amrita’s poetic genius found the real groundswell of expression. Her meteoric fame is often ascribed to the masterpiece poem "Aj Aakhaan Waris Shah Nu" when a neo-Heer emerged on the literary landscape of the Punjab during the 1947 trauma. This poem, addressed to Waris Shah – the author of the Punjabi epic of immortal love, Heer Ranjha – summed up the anguish of millions, particularly women in the Punjab who suffered a disproportionate share of the tragedy.
I say to Waris Shah today, speak from your grave
And add a new page to your book of love
Once one daughter of Punjab wept, and you wrote your long saga;
Today thousands weep, calling to you Waris Shah:
Arise, o friend of the afflicted; arise and see the state of Punjab,
Corpses strewn on fields, and the Chenaab flowing with much blood.
Someone filled the five rivers with poison,
And this same water now irrigates our soil.
Where was lost the flute, where the songs of love sounded?
And all Ranjha’s brothers forgot to play the flute.
Blood has rained on the soil, graves are oozing with blood,
The princesses of love cry their hearts out in the graveyards.
Today all the Quaidos have become the thieves of love and beauty,
Where can we find another one like Waris Shah?
Waris Shah! I say to you, speak from your grave
And add a new page to your book of love.
(Translation by Darshan Singh Maini)
Doors in Metal
"Doors in Metal" by Rumi
Tell me, O Love,
Who is more elegant,
You or this vast garden of yours?
Shine, O moon,
You are an inspiration
to all who look upon the night sky.
Sour will turn to sweet,
Blasphemy will turn to truth,
Thorn bushes will turn to jonquil,
A hundred bodies will spring to life
with one breath of yours.
You place doors in the sky.
You place wings on the human heart.
You enchant every mind
and bewilder both worlds.
Four poems by Bulleh Shah (new translations)
Who I am
I know not who I am,
I am neither a believer going to the mosque
Nor given to non-believing ways.
Neither clean nor unclean,
Neither Moses nor Pharaoh.
I know not who I am.
I am neither among sinners nor among saints,
Neither happy nor unhappy,
I belong neither to water nor to earth.
I am neither fire nor air,
I know not who I am.
Neither do I know the secret of religion,
Nor am I born of Adam and Eve.
I have given myself no name,
I belong neither to those who squat and pray,
Nor to those who have gone astray.
I know not who I am.
I was in the beginning; I'd be there in the end.
I know not any one other than the One.
Who could be wiser than Bulleh Shah
Whose Master is ever there to tend?
I know not who I am.
Come my Love, take care of me
Come my Love, take care of me,
I am in great agony.
Ever separated, my dreams are dreary,
Looking for you, my eyes are weary.
All alone I am robbed in a desert,
Waylaid by a bunch of waywards.
The Mulla and Qazi show me the way,
Their maze of dharma that is in sway.
They are the confirmed thieves of time.
They spread their net of saintly crime.
Their time-worn norms are seldom right,
With these they chain my feet so tight!
My love cares not for caste or creed.
To the ritual faith I pay no head.
My Master lives on yonder bank
While I am caught in the gale of greed.
With his boat at anchor, He stands in wait,
I must hasten I can’t be late.
Bulleh Shah must find his love,
He needn’t have the least fright.
His Love is around, yet he looks for him
Misled in the broad daylight.
Come my love take care of me,
I am in great agony.
**************
Strange are the times!
Crows swoop on hawks
Sparrows do eagles stalk
Strange are the times!
The Iraqis are despised
While the donkeys are prized
Strange are the times!
Those with coarse blankets are kings;
The erstwhile kings watch them from the ring.
Strange are the times!
Its not without reason or rhyme,
Strange are the times
Says Bulleh, kill your ego
And throw away your pride.
You need to forget yourself
To find Him by your side.
It’s all in One contained
Understand the One and forget the rest.
Shake off your ways of an apostate pest.
Leading to the grave to hell and torture,
Rid your mind of dreams of disaster.
This is how is the argument maintained,
It’s all in One contained.
What use is it bowing one’s head?
To what avail has prostrating led?
Reading Kalma you make them laugh,
Absorbing not a word while the Quran you quaff.
The truth must be here and there sustained,
It’s all in One contained.
Some retire to the jungles in vain.
Others restrict their meals to a grain.
Misled they waste away unfed
And come back home half alive, half dead.
Emaciated in the ascetic postures feigned,
it’s all in One contained,
Seek your master, say your prayers and surrender to God,
It will lead you to mystic abandon
And help you to get attuned to the Lord.
It’s all the truth that Bulleh has gained.
It’s all in One contained.
Bulleh Shah, a renowned Muslim spiritual leader of the sub continent of Indo-Pakistan, was a Punjabi Sufi poet. His spiritual master was Shah Inayat Qadiri of Lahore and because of this Bulleh was referred to as a saint or spiritual leader. Bulleh's real name was Abdullah Shah, but he was known as Bulleh to his family and that was the name he chose to use as a poet.
Dumbfounded by Love
Dear soul, Love alone cuts arguments short,
for it alone comes to the rescue when you cry for help against
disputes.
Eloquence is dumbfounded by Love: it dares not wrangle;
for the lover fears that, if he answers back,
the pearl of inner experience might fall out of his mouth.
Rumi - translation by Camille and Kabir Helminski
"Rumi: Jewels of Remembrance"
Threshold Books, 1996
Voices of the oppressed – Dalit literature
by K G Sankarapillai
Dalit means broken, oppressed, untouchable, downtrodden, and exploited. They come from the poor communities which under the Indian caste system used to be known as untouchables. They constitute nearly 16% of the Indian population.
The caste system, with a history of more than 3000 years in India, is a shameful system of social segregation, which works on the principle of purity and impurity. Purity is rich and white or whitish, impurity is poor and dark. Hidden powers of wealth can be easily traced in every feudal Brahmanical concept of the ideal. Material milieu of purity and beauty and prominence and command and comforts is also wealth. Economic division is reflected in the social classifications. But it should not be registered that caste is racial or economic. Dr. Ambedkar says that the caste system came into being long after the different races of India had commingled in blood and culture. To hold that distinctions of caste are really distinctions of race and to treat different castes as though they were so many different races is a gross perversion of the historical facts. Ambedkar asks: What affinity is there between the Untouchable of Bengal and the Untouchable of Madras? The Brahman of Punjab is racially the same stock as the Chamar of the Punjab and the Brahman of Madras is the same race as the Pariah of Madras. The caste system does not demarcate racial division. (Annihilation of caste – in writings and speeches vol.1 .p.49 Dr .B.R. Ambedkar)
Dear Che – A poem by K.G. Sankarapillai
A Poem by K.G. Sankarapillai
Dear Che
Dear Che,
you came to our university campus
in mid sixties
with a comrade and a modernist friend
with visuals of jungles past and present
with a vision of a new battle for justice.
Like a fresh wind of October
you joined us
moved us
renewed us
and smoothened our entry into history
with love, dreams and plans.
You told us about the sleeping rebel powers
of mountains and forests of the new minds;
quite often you talked of the day when
‘the Andes would become
the Sierra Maestra of America.’
Our modernist friend said:
you are the red star over the world
tarnished by America;
you are the future of the world
crippled by America;
you are the Jesus of the modern age
crucified by America.
Although you remained evergreen in us
showed us the exit to the oceans
from the lyrical ponds of our
post Independent Indian youth;
the exit to the storm from the water lily breeze
of our weeping romantic poems;
dear doctor, you redefined us
living with us
living for us
living in us
passing the confidence of torrents into our deserts
weaving sunlit paths into our prodigal nights.
You brought world into our words
and future into our past.
You opened blast-furnaces for our ore.
Recent Comments
- wasyed on Abr mi barad-o man shovm-e az yar-e judaa (The cloud weeps…)
- javed rushdi on Support the documentary on Dr Abdus Salam
- krish on My blog is a stranger to me & Mir – saare aalam mein bhar raha hai ishq
- wasyed on the two insomnias
- Bloggers Pakistan - Pakistani Blog Aggregator on Emperor Jahangir receiving his two sons, c1605-06
- Abida Parveen sings “teray ishq nachaya..” « Jahane Rumi on A red card for the Secular Indian Muslim
- ?ि?्??-???्?: ?ै?्??ा?्? ?ें ?ि?्?ी ?ा?े on Emperor Jahangir receiving his two sons, c1605-06
- Pres on I am a child of love
- Emperor Jahangir receiving his two sons, c1605-06 « Jahane Rumi on Khusrau: The shadow of power
- Ranbir Kaleka on Bulleh Shah and Nukta – In a dot the whole mystery is solved
Recent Posts
- Emperor Jahangir receiving his two sons, c1605-06
- I am a child of love
- A red card for the Secular Indian Muslim
- Abr mi barad-o man shovm-e az yar-e judaa (The cloud weeps…)
- Karachi Literary Festival
- the two insomnias
- Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan – Man Kunto Maula
- Rumi – Guest House
- Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and Peter Gabriel- Signal to noise
- Pak Nobel laureate’s Ahmedi status hurdle for documentary
- Old Nusrat recordings dressed up in dub reggae beats
- Allah Hoo by Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan
- Lovers have nothing to do with existence
- Support the documentary on Dr Abdus Salam
- In memoriam – Asim Butt (1978-2010)
Categories at Jahane Rumi
- 'Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan' (1)
- Afghanistan (10)
- All My Posts (923)
- Arts & Culture (342)
- Bangladesh (12)
- Blog Babble (70)
- books (72)
- Buddhist (7)
- business and economy (4)
- Central Asia (5)
- China (3)
- Cinema (19)
- Culture (4)
- development (2)
- diaspora (7)
- education (7)
- Egypt (3)
- Environment (4)
- Extremism (1)
- Faiz (2)
- fiction (3)
- folklore (3)
- fundamentalism (24)
- Ghalib (2)
- Globalization (26)
- governance (8)
- Guest Writer (32)
- Health (2)
- heritage (84)
- History (111)
- human rights (17)
- humour (1)
- India (131)
- India-Pakistan History (151)
- Indo Pak peace (53)
- Indus (3)
- Iran (10)
- Iraq (3)
- Islam (98)
- Islamophobia (46)
- Journalism (47)
- Karachi (7)
- Knowledge (3)
- Kosovo (1)
- Lahore (47)
- Law (1)
- Left (1)
- Loss (21)
- Love (52)
- Malaysia (3)
- media (40)
- Middle East (13)
- Motivated (1)
- Mughal (23)
- Music (46)
- My paintings (9)
- My poems (1)
- Nature (4)
- new writers (2)
- NWFP (3)
- On Pakistan (275)
- Pakistan (31)
- Pakistani Art (53)
- Pakistani Literature (20)
- Partition (10)
- Peace (30)
- Personal (214)
- Photo stories (67)
- Poetry (269)
- Politics (141)
- Poverty (5)
- published in DAWN (3)
- Published in Himal Magazine (4)
- Published in HT (3)
- Published in The Friday Times (79)
- Published in the NEWS (31)
- Punjab (48)
- Punjabi (2)
- qawwali (2)
- Random musings (139)
- Religion (91)
- Research (6)
- Rumi (148)
- SAARC (3)
- science (4)
- Sindh (21)
- Soul (36)
- South Asian Art (94)
- South Asian Literature (180)
- SouthAsia (9)
- Sport (5)
- stuckism (1)
- Sufi poetry (244)
- Sufism (186)
- Technology (4)
- terrorism (12)
- theatre (2)
- Tragic (26)
- Translations (21)
- Travel (51)
- Turkey (5)
- Uncategorized (83)
- Urdu (103)
- Urdu Literature (78)
- video (24)
- War (37)
- women (2)
- World Artists (53)
- World Literature (127)
- World Writers (131)
- Sufism and Sufi poetry (25)
Posts Archive
Raza Rumi @ flickr
- Asim Butt's mural for T2F, Karachi
- T2F remembers Asim Butt
- Haris Gazdar at the memorial
- Asim's friends will always miss him
- George recites his poem
- Sabeen speaking about Asim Butt
- In attendance -
- The tribute to Asim Butt
- Asim's picture published by GT
- Another mural for The Second Floor-Asim Butt
Pak Tea House
- Lord Chief Justice Of Lahore High Court Is At It Again!
- An Article On Tahira Mazhar Ali
- Precautionary Blood Measures
- Be Part of the Change
- Samina Khawar Hayat: 200 kilos of Reason Why The Pakistani Reservation System Is Flawed
- Let Pakistan Make Its Own Progress
- Roving Report – Ayub Khan Era
- Total National Backlash Against Shahbaz Sharif
- Understanding Islamic Revival In Its Proper Context
- DANYAL MUEENUDDIN WINS
Development Industry
- Pakistan: 92 per cent of USAID projects go to US NGOs
- Learn from the UK. Open up data sources in South Asia
- Kiran Bir Sethi teaches kids to take charge
- State of research in Pakistan…
- Reforming Pakistan Civil Service
- Pakistan – Restructuring of PSEs
- Newinpk
- PAKISTAN: Reinventing microfinance
- Dissent as Democracy
- Pakistan 4th on regional list of adult illiterates
World music on NPR
- Solas: America's Wild Irish Rose
- The Thistle And Shamrock: Fiddle Styles
- Umm Kulthum: 'The Lady' Of Cairo
- Los Amigos Invisibles: A 'Commercial' Breakthrough
- The Thistle And Shamrock: Welsh Roots
- SXSW 2010 Preview
- Elis Regina: The Feeling Between The Notes
Tags
- West Bengal in turmoil – end of an era? - 2 emails
- Imam Hussain: The Beloved of the Beloved - 1 email
- Shah Ast Hussain - 1 email
- Holi has a Muslim History too - 1 email
- On Bhagat Singh, his vision and Jinnah’s support for his struggle - 1 email
- Voices of the oppressed – Dalit literature - 1 email
Pages
- “Man-Bitten” Ghalib: introducing himself
- “Seeds of peace on cricket field”
- ‘Author’s Plea’- Foreword of Aag ka Dariya by Qurutul-ain-Haider
- ‘O City of Lights’ by Khalid Hasan – A book review
- About Thumri
- Adieu Naguib Mahfouz
- adsense sample
- Amrita Pritam is no more 2/6
- Amrita Sher Gil’s Lahore
- An Essay on Nizamuddin by Marta Franceschini
- Basant Moods – Lahore and Beyond
- Beautiful Bird
- Bulleh Shah and Rumi 2/5
- Contact
- Dhaka by degrees
- Dhaka by Degrees – TFT
- Documents Archive
- “Iraq’s four-year looting frenzy, the allies have become the vandals”
- “step into the tavern of ruins..”
- A little more recogniton..
- A Little poem
- A recent Book on Faiz Ahmed Faiz
- Against Forgetting and No Poem is Mine
- Another accidental painting
- Fresh translations of Faiz
- Glimpses of nineteenth century Iran
- Go not without me
- Hope – A poem by Ayesha Salman
- How Art made the World
- How the British Raj took roots in India
- I finally moved here – “You lack a foot to travel?”
- Little Flute, Why So Proud?
- Master strokes
- Mother Goddess – Indus Valley
- Murree Ghosts – my recent painting
- Music Master
- My Journey (Mera Safar): Ali Sardar Jafri
- New paintings inspired by the golden Bengal
- New translations of Parveen Shakir
- No Tolerance for Richistans – Obscene Wealth is not victimless!
- Ominous shadows
- Pakistani media – an alternative view
- Qurratulain Hyder
- Sonargaon – A poem by HUR
- Story of a Painting – Mehrgarh, Indus and Ghalib
- Sufi Zikr – inspiration for a painting
- The rescued letter of Mahatama Gandhi
- Waves of anger and fear…
- Welcome Hatshepsut
- What is arrogance?
- Faiz translated by Vikram Seth
- Faiz translations (by Rehan)
- Femme Feryal
- Halaku, when you will come to Baghdad this time…
- I found Roses in Konya… 2/3
- I found Roses in Konya… 3/3
- I will meet you yet again – Amrita Pritam
- Ideology of intolerance
- Images from Data Saheb’s Shrine
- Images from Mahboob Ali
- Jal gaya tha ik roshniyon ka shaher
- Kafka Country – published in the Friday Times
- Kafka Country published in the Friday Times
- Links
- More of Bulleh Shah – keep swooning
- Mughal Princess Zebunnissa
- Muhammad’s Sword
- Muslim Bloggers from India
- On ‘The Great War for Civilisation’
- On Qurratulain Hyder –
- On Vidya Rao
- Open the Door
- Peace to Beirut with all my heart… 2/3
- Petal to Petal …..More of Parveen Shakir
- Qasmi – Urdu literature mourns a giant 2/4
- Qasmi, Literary Fueds and National Neglect
- Rare objects discovery points to ruins treasure
- Raza Rumi
- Revisiting Kabir – the Weaver, the Myth, the Master
- Sadequain 20 years later
- Shared visions: Khushwant Singh and Fahmida Riaz 2/2
- Standing Alone in Mecca (book review)
- Surveys show that Pakistanis (and Muslims) reject “terrorism”
- Teray Ishq Nachaya – Bulleh Shah – full text
- The Lost Jewel – Rediscovering Hazrat Ali’s Letter
- The roar of Rumi – 800 years on
- The Sultan of Hearts – Hazrat Nizamuddin Auliya
- This world without Dr. Schimmel… 2/3
- Tum bilkul hum jaisey nikley
- Ustad Bismillah Khan is no more
- Web resources on Qurrutalain Hyder
- Why I love Pakistan? Top 5 reasons
- Darwin and the grand unity of life
- Khusrau: The shadow of power
