Category: poetry

Crossing the Bar – Lord Tennyson

Crossing the Bar

Sunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea,

But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.

Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark;

For tho’ from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crost the bar.

BY ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON (1809-1892)

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जब साज़ की लय बदल गई थी

जब साज़ की लय बदल गई थी
वो रक़्स की कौन सी घड़ी थी
रक़्स- dance

अब याद नहीं कि ज़िंदगी में
मैं आख़िरी बार कब हँसी थी

जब कुछ भी न था यहाँ पे मा-क़ब्ल
दुनिया किस चीज़ से बनी थी
मा-क़ब्ल- before preceding, former

मुट्ठी में तो रंग थे हज़ारों
बस हाथ से रेत बह रही थी

है अक्स तो आइना कहाँ है
तमसील ये किस जहान की थी
तमसील- allegory, example

हम किस की ज़बान बोलते हैं
गर ज़ेहन में बात दूसरी थी

तन्हा है अगर अज़ल से इंसाँ
ये बज़्म-ए-कलाम क्यूँ सजी थी
अज़ल- eternity, beginning,बज़्म-ए-कलाम-assembly of poetry

था आग ही गर मिरा मुक़द्दर
क्यूँ ख़ाक में फिर शिफ़ा रखी थी
शिफ़ा- healing, cure

क्यूँ मोड़ बदल गई कहानी
पहले से अगर लिखी हुई थी
– परवीन शाकिर (1952-1994)

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image source: perveenshakir.com

તરસ્યા હરણરૂપે – ગની દહીંવાલા

તરસ્યા હરણરૂપે

તમે હાજર હતાં એકાંતમાં વાતાવરણરૂપે,
સુખદ શ્વાસો સમય દેતો હતો એકેક ક્ષણરૂપે.

રૂદનનું બે ઘડી આતિથ્ય સ્વીકાર્યું છે આનંદે,
નિમંત્રણ છે તમોને પણ, પધારો સંસ્મરણ રૂપે.

દિવસ ધોળા કરે છે યાદ જ્યારે શ્યામ રજનીને,
તો એ આવી રહે છે મારા મનની મૂંઝવણરૂપે.

વલખતા વિશ્વના વલખાટનું હું મધ્યબિંદુ છું,
પડ્યો છું એના હૈયામાં વહેતા કોઈ વ્રણ રૂપે.

મૂકી છે દોટ બન્નેએ, હવે જે થાય તે સાચું,
જમાને ઝાંઝવારૂપે, અમે તરસ્યા હરણરૂપે.

અમે પણ કંઈ હકીકતરૂપ વાંચી છે વસંતોને,
દીઠાં છે ઓસબિંદુ પાન ઉપર અવતરણરૂપે.

‘ગની’ આ ગૂંગળામણ છે કોઈ મૂગાની વાચાસમ,
પ્રગટશે કોઈ દિવસ, કોઈમાં પણ કોઈ પણ રૂપે.
– ગની દહીંવાલા
સુખનવર શ્રેણી
સંપાદન: ચિનુ મોદી,કૈલાસ પંડિત.

Holidays – H W Longfellow

The holiest of all holidays are those
Kept by ourselves in silence and apart;
The secret anniversaries of the heart,
When the full river of feeling overflows;—
The happy days unclouded to their close;
The sudden joys that out of darkness start
As flames from ashes; swift desires that dart
Like swallows singing down each wind that blows!
White as the gleam of a receding sail,
White as a cloud that floats and fades in air,
White as the whitest lily on a stream,
These tender memories are;— a Fairy Tale
Of some enchanted land we know not where,
But lovely as a landscape in a dream.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, 1807 – 1882

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ग़ज़ल – मुसव्विर सब्ज़वारी

कोई ख़्वाब सर से परे रहा ये सफ़र सराब-ए-सफ़र रहा
मैं शनाख़्त अपनी गँवा चुका गई सूरतों की तलाश में

सराब-ए-सफ़र – mirage of journey, शनाख़्त – recognition, identification, knowledge

इक कुतुब-ख़ाना हूँ अपने दरमियाँ खोले हुए
सब किताबें सफ़्हा-ए-हर्फ़-ए-ज़ियाँ खोले हुए

कुतुब-ख़ाना – library, सफ़्हा-ए-हर्फ़-ए-ज़ियाँ – page of wordloss

अपने होने का कुछ एहसास न होने से हुआ
ख़ुद से मिलना मिरा इक शख़्स के खोने से हुआ

….. ….. …… ….. ….. ……

बराबर ख़्वाब से चेहरों की हिजरत देखते रहना
गुज़र चुकने पे भी वो शाम-ए-रहलत देखते रहना

धनक की बारिशें बरफ़ाब शहरों पर नहीं होतीं
यहाँ फूलों का रस्ता उम्र भर मत देखते रहना

किताबों की तहों में ढूँढना ना-दीदा अश्या का
पलट कर फिर कोई ख़ाली इबारत देखते रहना

हुजूम-ए-शहर के सन्नाटे में गुम-सुम वो टीला सा
उसी को आते जाते बे-ज़रूरत देखते रहना

जिसे मैं छू नहीं सकता दिखाई क्यूँ वो देता है
फ़रिश्तों जैसी बस मेरी इबादत देखते रहना

‘मुसव्विर’ कुछ न कहने का ये दुख भी सख़्त ज़ालिम है
तलब कर लेगी लफ़्ज़ों की अदालत देखते रहना

– मुसव्विर सब्ज़वारी (1932-2002)

शाम-ए-रहलत – evening of demise, धनक – rainbow, ना-दीदा – unseen, अश्या – things, objects, इबारत – composition, mode of expression,  हुजूम-ए-शहर – crowd of city

source: Rekhta.org

હું – ગની દહીંવાલા

હું

રસ્તામાં નિજના ભારથી ભાંગી પડેલ હું,
મારી જ આસપાસમાં ટોળે વળેલ હું.

કંઈ ઠાવકાં ઠરેલ શો સાબિત થયેલ હું,
પાંપણ ઉપરથી આંખમાં પાછો ફરેલ હું.

જીવન ભર્યું ભર્યું અને ભયથી ભરેલ હું,
લાખેણી લાગણીની લગોલગ ઊભેલ હું.

વાતાવરણના મોભથી નેવાં વહી રહ્યાં,
ભીના સમયના આંગણે પલળી ગયેલ હું.

નીકળી હતી ચમનથી નનામી વસંતની,
સાથે થયો’તો નિજને ઉપાડી ઊભેલ હું.

વાણી વિના વિષાદને વાચા અપાવવી,
મોઢે નિરાંતે આવીને બેસી ગયેલ હું.

ઊકલી જશે દુઃખોની સમસ્યા બધી ‘ગની’,
તો ક્યાં જઈશ શેષ રૂપે રહી ગયેલ હું?

ગની દહીંવાલા
સુખનવર શ્રેણી
સંપાદન : ચિનુ મોદી, કૈલાસ પંડિત

Gani Dahiwala_thumb

A Large Number – Wislawa Szymborska

A Large Number by Wislawa Szymborska
Four billion people on this earth,
but my imagination is the way it’s always been:
bad with large numbers.
It is still moved by particularity.
It flits about the darkness like a flashlight beam,
disclosing only random faces,
while the rest go blindly by,
unthought of, unpitied.
Not even a Dante could have stopped that.
So what do you do when you’re not,
even with all the muses on your side?

Non omnis moriar—a premature worry.
Yet am I fully alive, and is that enough?
It never has been, and even less so now.
I select by rejecting, for there’s no other way,
but what I reject, is more numerous,
more dense, more intrusive than ever.
At the cost of untold losses—a poem, a sigh.
I reply with a whisper to a thunderous calling.
How much I am silent about I can’t say.
A mouse at the foot of mother mountain.
Life lasts as long as a few lines of claws in the sand.

My dreams—even they are not as populous as they should be.
There is more solitude in them than crowds or clamor.
Sometimes someone long dead will drop by for a bit.
A single hand turns a knob.
Annexes of echo overgrow the empty house.
I run from the threshold down into the quiet
valley seemingly no one’s—an anachronism by now.

Where does all this space still in me come from—
that I don’t know.

– Wislawa Szymborska

ગઝલ ગુચ્છ – 8 રાજેશ વ્યાસ ‘મિસ્કીન’

ગઝલ ગુચ્છ – 8

એ ભલે લાગે છે અક્ષર મોકલું છું,
ઘૂઘવ્યા ભીતર એ સાગર મોકલું છું.

તું સ્વયમ્ ઝળહળ છે જાણું છું છતાંયે
કોડિયું મારું આ થરથર મોકલું છું.

થઈ ગયું મોડું પડ્યું જન્મોનું છેટું,
તો ય લાગે છે સમયસર મોકલું છું.

હાંસિયામાં ક્યાં લગી ઊભું રહે એ,
તેં કદી દોર્યું ‘તું એ ઘર મોકલું છું.

નામ, જાતિ, ધર્મ તો આ દેહને છે,
છે બધાથી પર એ ભીતર મોકલું છું.

તેં સતત ઝંખ્યો ને હું ઊજવી શક્યો ના,
એ જ હા, હા એ જ અવસર મોકલું છું.
રાજેશ વ્યાસ ‘મિસ્કીન’
(કોઈ તારું નથી માંથી)

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Before Sleep

Before Sleep

I was in love with anatomy
the symmetry of my body
poised for flight,
the heights it would take
over parents, lovers, a keen
riding over truth and detail.
I thought growing up would be
this rising from everything
old and earthly,
not these faltering steps out the door
every day, then back again.

by Catherine Anderson (1954 born)

canderso

Catherine Anderson (b. 1954) was born in Detroit, Michigan, and is the author of In the Mother Tongue (1983), a book of poems published by Alice James Books of Cambridge, Massachusetts. She was the Cornelia Ward Fellow for Poetry at Syracuse University in 1976, where she received an M.A. in English and creative writing in 1979. Anderson has published in many journals, including The American Voice, The Antioch Review, and The Harvard Review.

Catherine Anderson now lives in Kansas City where she works with the region’s growing immigrant and refugee communities. Her poem “Womanhood” from The Work of Hands (2000) was chosen by Billy Collins for “Poetry 180,” a project to promote poetry in public schools across the country every day of the school year.

source : famouspoetsandpoems.com

A Day Dream – Emily Bronte

A Day Dream

On a sunny brae, alone I lay
One summer afternoon;
It was the marriage-time of May
With her young lover, June.

From her mother’s heart, seemed loath to part
That queen of bridal charms,
But her father smiled on the fairest child
He ever held in his arms.

The trees did wave their plumy crests,
The glad birds caroled clear;
And I, of all the wedding guests,
Was only sullen there!

There was not one, but wished to shun
My aspect void of cheer;
The very grey rocks, looking on,
Asked, “What do you here?”

And I could utter no reply;
In sooth, I did not know
Why I had brought a clouded eye
To greet the general glow.

So, resting on a heathy bank,
I took my heart to me;
And we together sadly sank
Into a reverie.

We thought, “When winter comes again,
Where will these bright things be?
All vanished, like a vision vain,
An unreal mockery!

The birds that now so blithely sing,
Through deserts, frozen dry,
Poor spectres of the perished spring,
In famished troops, will fly.

And why should we be glad at all?
The leaf is hardly green,
Before a token of its fall
Is on the surface seen!”

Now, whether it were really so,
I never could be sure;
But as in fit of peevish woe,
I stretched me on the moor.

A thousand thousand gleaming fires
Seemed kindling in the air;
A thousand thousand silvery lyres
Resounded far and near:

Methought, the very breath I breathed
Was full of sparks divine,
And all my heather-couch was wreathed
By that celestial shine!

And, while the wide earth echoing rung
To their strange minstrelsy,
The little glittering spirits sung,
Or seemed to sing, to me.

“O mortal! mortal! let them die;
Let time and tears destroy,
That we may overflow the sky
With universal joy!

Let grief distract the sufferer’s breast,
And night obscure his way;
They hasten him to endless rest,
And everlasting day.

To thee the world is like a tomb,
A desert’s naked shore;
To us, in unimagined bloom,
It brightens more and more!

And could we lift the veil, and give
One brief glimpse to thine eye,
Thou wouldst rejoice for those that live,
Because they live to die.”

The music ceased; the noonday dream,
Like dream of night, withdrew;
But Fancy, still, will sometimes deem
Her fond creation true.

by Emily Bronte (1818-1848)

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