Know me well! I am Asrar!

I search for love;

Love alone is my world.

I abhor the mischief of reason;

The wise are wafted away by the sleep of ease;

I am a wakeful poet,

That string on Nature’s instrument

Plucked by the plectrum of pain.

Nature draws its colour from me;

I am the soul of the mountain’s beauty,

The intoxication of the beloved’s narcissus-eyes,

The rouge upon her cheeks.

The fault of Hafiz and Khayyam–

Yes, I too am fond of wine.

What is life? Adam’s sin.

So long as I have life, I will be sinful.

My drunkenness is the envy of a hundred sober moods;

I am so drunk that I am sober.

I carry pearls of poetry;

I buy the moon and stars;

They talk of me in the temple and in the Kaaba;

I am notorious in the market place.

I hate infidelity and heresy,

Religion too.

I may be an embarrassment to worldly people,

But I am the ornament of friends’ gatherings.

In this poverty and want,

Is it no little thing that I shower pearls?

My speech is a messiah’s,

Yet people say I am ill.

Old age is angry with me–

I am guilty of petulant speech;

I don’t talk of houris and beautiful boys–

I worship the species ‘Human.’

Stagnation hovers over the world

And here I am, a wanderer swept away fast;

I am a flame leaping.

 I am a sword slicing.

                      1935

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From: Āhang (Melody; 1938). Dihlī: Āzād Kitāb Ghar. 1956. pp. 52 – 53