Tag Archives: tyranny

A Few Days More

A few days more, my dearest, only a few days
We are forced to draw breath in the shadow of tyranny
Bear this injustice a while longer, and tremble, and weep
By our forefathers’ legacy we have been crippled

Our bodies imprisoned, our feelings enchained
Our thoughts captive, our speech sanctioned
Credit to our courage that we still go on living
Is life but a pauper’s loose cloak, on which
Every hour a patch of pain is stitched?

But now the period of cruelty has few days left
A little more patience, our pleading has few days left
A long time in the scorched wilderness of this world
We have to exist, but this is not how we have to live
Alien hands causing unspeakably heavy oppression
Bear it today, but it will not be borne always

This dust of sorrow flames out from your beauty
This the measure of your defeated two-day youth
The pain of the useless glow from moonlit nights
The heart’s pointless beat, the body’s hopeless cry
A few days more, my dearest, only a few days.

( my translation of a poem by Faiz Ahmed Faiz).

(c) Satori Publishing, 2020.

Hum Dekhenge (We Shall Witness)

We shall witness
Inevitable that we too shall witness
The day which has been promised
Written on the tablet of eternity
We shall witness

When mountains of tyranny will be rend asunder
Blown away like cotton fluff
Under the aching feet of the oppressed
The earth will tremble, quake, and shudder
And over the heads of the brutal rulers
The lightning will flash, strike, and thunder
We shall witness

When from the Kaaba, on god’s sacred earth,
All idols will be removed
We the dispossessed, exiled from the holy place,
Will be seated on cushioned thrones
All crowns will be flung aloft
All seats of power will be overturned
We shall witness

The only name to remain will be Allah
He who is absent and omnipresent
He who is the creator and the beholder
The clarion call “I am the Truth” will rise
As I am, so are you
And we, creations of God, will reign

We shall witness
As I am, so are you
We shall witness
Inevitable that we too shall witness
We shall witness.

( My take on a poem by the peerless, and ever-relevant, Faiz Ahmed Faiz).

(c) Satori Publishing,2020.