SHIKWA

ALLAMA IQBAL

Why must I forever lose, forever forgo profit that is my due,

Sunk in the gloom of evenings past, no plans for the morrow pursue.
Why must I all attentive be to the nightingales’ lament,
Friend, am I as dumb as a flower? Must I remain silent?
My theme makes me bold, makes my tongue more eloquent,
Dust fills my mouth, against Allah I make complaint.

We won renown for submitting to Your willand it is so;

We speak out now, we are compelled to repeat our tale of woe.
We are like the silent lute whose chords are full of voice;
When grief wells up to our lips, we speak; we have no choice.
Lord God! We are Your faithful servants, for a while with us bear,
It is in our nature to always praise You; a small plaint also hears.

That Your Presence was primal from the beginning of time is true;
The rose also adorned the garden but of its fragrance no one knew.
Justice is all we ask for. You are perfect, You are benevolent.
If there were no breeze, how could the rose have spread its scent?
We Your people were dispersed, no solace could we find,
Or, would Your Beloveds following have gone out of its mind?

Before our time, a strange sight was the world You had made:
Some worshipped stone idols, others bowed to trees and prayed.
Accustomed to believing what they saw, the peoples vision wasnt free,
How then could anyone believe in a God he couldnt see?
Do you know of anyone, Lord, who then took Your Name? I ask.
It was the muscle in the Muslims arms that did Your task

Here on this earth were settled the Seljuqs and the Turanians,
The Chinese lived in China, in Iran lived the Sassanians.
The Greeks flourished in their allotted regions,
In this very world lived the Jews and Christians.
But who did draw their swords in Your Name and fight?
When things had gone wrong, who put them right?

Of all the brave warriors, there were none but only we.
Who fought Your battles on land and often on the sea.
Our calls to prayer rang out from the churches of European lands
And floated across Africas scorching desert sands.
We ruled the world, but regal glories our eyes disdained.
Under the shades of glittering sabres Your creed we proclaimed

All we lived for was no battle; we bore the troubles that came
And laid down our lives for the glory of Your Name.
We never used our strength to conquer or extend do
we have played with our lives for nothing but worldly gain?
If our people had run after earths goods and gold,
Need they have smashed idols, and not idols sold?

Once in the fray, firm we stood our ground, never did we yield,
The most lion-hearted of our foes reeled back and fled the field.
Those who rose against You, against them we turned our ire,
What cared we for their sabres? We fought against canon fire.
On every human heart the image of Your oneness we drew,
Beneath the draggers point, we proclaimed Your message true
You tell us who were they who pulled down the gates of Khyber?
at was the pride of Caesar?
Fake gods that men had made, who did break and shatter?
Who routed infidel armies and destroyed them with bloody slaughter?
Who put out and made cold the sacred flame in Iran?
Who retold the story of the one God, Yazdan?

Who were the people who asked only for You and no other?
And for You did fight battles and travails suffer?
Whose world-conquering swords spread the might over one and all?
Who stirred mankind with Allah-o-Akbars clarion call?
Whose dread bent stone idols into fearful submission?
They fell on their faces confessing, God is One, the Only One!

In the midst of raging battle if the time came to pray,

Hijazis turned to Mecca,kissed the earth and ceased from fray.
Sultan and slave in single file stood side by side,
Then no servant was nor master, nothing did them divide.
Between serf and lord, needy and rich, difference there was none.
When they appeared in Your court, they came as equals and one.

In this banquet hall of time and space, from dawn to dusk we spent,
Filled with the wine of faith, like goblets round we went.
Over hills and plains we took Your message; this was our task.
Do you know of an occasion we failed You? Is all we ask.
Over waste and wildernesses of land and sea,
Into the Atlantic Ocean we galloped on our steed.
We blotted out the smear of falsehood from the pages of history,
We freed mankind from the chains of slavery.
The floors of Your Kaaba with our foreheads we swept,
The Koran you sent us we clasped to our breast.
Even so you accuse us of lack of faith on our part:
If we lacked faith, you did little to win our hearts.

There are people of other faiths, some of them transgressors,

Some are humble; drunk with the spirit of arrogance are others.
Some are indolent, some ignorant, some endowed with brain,
Hundreds of others there are who even despair of Your Name.
Your blessings are showered on homes of unbelievers, strangers all.
Only on the poor Muslim, Your wrath like lightning falls.

In the temples of idolatry, the idols say, The Muslims are gone!
They rejoice that the guardians of the Kaaba have withdrawn.
From the worlds caravanserais singing camel-drivers have vanished;
The Koran tucked under their arms they have departed.
These infidels smirk and snigger at us, are You aware?
For the message of Your oneness, do You anymore care?

Our complaint is not that they are rich, that their coffers overflow;
They who have no manners and of polite speech nothing know.
What injustice! Here and now are houris and palaces to infidels given
hile the poor Muslim is promised houris only after he goes to heaven.
Neither favor nor kindness is shown towards us anymore;
Where is the affection You showed us in the days of yore?
Why amongst Muslims is worldly wealth rarely found?
Great is Your power beyond measure, without bound,
If it were Your will, water would bubble forth from the bosom of arid land,
And the traveler lashed by waves of mirages in the sand.
Our lot is strangers taunts, ill-repute and penury;
Must disgrace be our lot who gave their lives for You?

Now on strangers does the world bestow its favors and esteem,
All we have been left with is a phantom world and a dream.
Others have taken over the world, our days are done;
Say not then, None in the world believed God there is but one.
All we live for is to hear the world resound with Your name;
How can it be that the saqi goes but the goblets remain?

Your mehfil is dissolved, those who loved you are also gone;
No sighs through the nights of longing, no lamenting at dawn.
We gave our hearts to You, took the wages You did bestow;
But hardly had we taken our seats, You ordered us to go.
As lovers we came, as lovers departed with promise for tomorrow.
Now search for us with the light that on Your radiant face does glow.

Leilas love is as intense, Qais desire

On Nejd’s hills and dales, the deer swift-footed as before.
The same love beats in the heart, beauty is as bewitching and magical,
Your messenger Ahmeds following still abides, Your presence is eternal.
Neither rhyme nor reason has Your displeasure, what does it mean?
On the faithful is Your angry eye of censure! What does it mean?

Did we abandon You or Your Arab messenger forsake?

Did we trade in making idols?
Did we not idols break?
Did we forsake love because of the anguish with which its fought?
Give up the traditions of Salman, forget what Ovais Qarani taught?
The flame of Allahs greatness still in our hearts we nourish,
The life of Bilal the Ethiop remains the model that we cherish.

Our love may not be what it was, nor told with the same blandishments;
We may not tread the same path of submission, nor the same way give consent.
Our hearts are troubled, their compass needles from Mecca may have swerved,
Perhaps the old laws of faithfulness we may not have fully observed.
But sometimes towards us, at times to others you have affection shown,
Its not something one should say, You too have not been true to Your own.

On Farans summit You gave religion its final shape and form;
With a single gesture You carried a thousand hearts by storm.
You fired with zeal the pursuit of love which was our aim;
The beauty of Your burning cheeks set the entire mehfil aflame.
Why today no sparks smoulder in our bosoms at all?
We are the same inflammable stuff, dont You recall?

The valley of Nejd no longer rings with the sound of Qais chains:
No more is he crazed to glimpse Leilas litter, no more his eyes he strains.
We have lost the daring of former days; we are not the same. Our hearts are cold.
You are no longer the spirit of the mehfil, ruin is on our household.
O happy day, return a hundred times with all Your grace!
Drop Your veil and let us gaze upon your lovely face.
Strangers revel in the garden, beside a stream they are sitting;
Wine goblets in their hands, hearing the cuckoo singing.
Far from the garden, far away from its notes of revelry,
your lovers sit by themselves awaiting the moment to praise You.
Rekindle in Your moths’ passion to burn themselves on the flame;
Bid the old lightning strike, brand our breasts with Your name.

A lost and wandering people towards Hejaz turn their longing eyes,
As a wingless bulbul takes to wing for the love of open skies.
Every bud in the garden longs to bloom to release the fragrance in its body,
So awaits the lute the plectrum, touch its chords, listen to its melody.
Impatient and agitated are notes to burst forth from the strings;
The mountain of Moses trembles eagerly to be ignited by Your lightning.

A people You had blessed, lighten the burdens they bear,

Raise the poor down-trodden ant and make it Solomon’s peer.
Make abundant that rare commodity love, so that all may buy and sell,
Convert to Islam Indians millions who still in temples dwell.
Long have we suffered, see how griefs blood flows down the drain,
From a heart pierced by the scalpel, hear this cry of pain.

The scent of the rose stole out, and the gardens secret is betrayed:
What calamity! A flower itself should the traitor’s role have played.
The lute of the garden is broken, the season of flowers gone,
Trees branches are bare, the gardens songsters have flown.
Remains alone the bulbul, in its songs raptures lost.
Its breast is full of melodies that are still tempest-tossed.
The ring-doves have left the cypress and from its garden flown;
Flowers have shed their petals which are at random strewn.
The beaten paths of the garden lie desolate and forlorn;
Branches are stripped of leaves that they once had worn.
He alone from the chains of changing seasons remained unbent;
Alas! Not one there was in the garden to hear his lament.

In giving up our lives there is no gladness, nor is there joy in living;

The only pleasure is in writing verse and in our own hearts blood drinking.
My minds mirror is studded with many gems sparkling bright;
In my breast are locked visions aching to burst into light.
But there are none in the garden with eyes to attest;
Not one bleeding tulip baring a scar within its breast.

Let the lament of this lonely bulbul pierce the hearts of all,
Arouse the hearts of the sleeping, with this my clarion call.
Transfused with fresh blood, a new compact of faith well sign.
Let our hearts thirst again for a strip of the vintage wine.
What If the pitcher be Persian, from Hejaz is the wine I serve?
What if the song be Indian, it is Hejazi in its verve?

Translated by:
Khudeja Naeem