O, Noorjahan, thou know’st,
I have been sick all these days?
‘Justice, O Queen, on this brutal sinner,
Who tortured the world?
The river Jamuna was reddened
And run thinner every day.
Now see, I being sick,
Destined to be howled in the next world.
I, for myself, pained other’s heart,
The shame must be borne alone,
Bows my head and trembles my knees.
I am a kefir, vexed others, and cursed by God.
.O, Noorjahan, thou young, I old,
Sad he who lives here, on silk carpets,
All kind of fruits, grape syrup, apple, colored ice,
Cherries served in diamond plates,
I have meat, wine and virgins at will,
And palaces of treasure, nor enjoy these.
As my body and soul, both sick.
Crippled with deficiency syndrome,
Unknown are my real father and mother,
Borne by the magic of a fakir,
And one among thirty usurp wives and,
Five thousand concubines may be my mother.
Grey bearded corrupt courtiers never wrote,
Misdeeds my father did, nor the thousands did he slay,
He loved brutalities and lived long,
Cursed my childhood, with the cold, dull soil.
Youth blackened with follies and ill thoughts,
Doomed, absurd and arrogant.
Even the mighty name, I have,
Will soon be forgotten, when I am dead,
So have I neither fame nor joy.
Death’s harsh brush, dimmed thy cruel brow,
A life that wrote havoc with the sword,
Power made it imbecile.
Molded itself in wine, women and wealth
A life with vigor dimmed and decayed,
Now chocked, my faltering soul and tongue,
A brutal heart not to be wrecked by countless dead,
Will be buried under fretted stones’ tomb,
In a dark corner of Agra.
From:
DR. Yogesh SHARMA