Part 3

"Ay, let us sleep. The window pane Grows pale against the purple sky. The dawn is with us once again, The dawn; which always means good-bye."

Within her little trellised room, beside the palm-fringed sea, She wakeful in the scented gloom, spoke of her youth to me.

Ojira, to Her Lover

I am waiting in the desert, looking out towards the sunset, And counting every moment till we meet. I am waiting by the marshes and I tremble and I listen Till the soft sands thrill beneath your coming feet.

Till I see you, tall and slender, standing clear against the skyline A graceful shade across the lingering red, While your hair the breezes ruffle, turns to silver in the twilight, And makes a fair faint aureole round your head.

Far away towards the sunset I can see a narrow river, That unwinds itself in red tranquillity; I can hear its rippled meeting, and the gurgle of its greeting, As it mingles with the loved and long sought sea.

In the purple sky above me showing dark against the starlight, Long wavering flights of homeward birds fly low, They cry each one to the other, and their weird and wistful calling, Makes most melancholy music as they go.

Oh, my dearest hasten, hasten! It is lonely here. Already Have I heard the jackals' first assembling cry, And among the purple shadows of the mangroves and the marshes Fitful echoes of their footfalls passing by.

Ah, come soon! my arms are empty, and so weary for your beauty, I am thirsty for the music of your voice. Come to make the marshes joyous with the sweetness of your presence, Let your nearing feet bid all the sands rejoice!

My hands, my lips are feverish with the longing and the waiting And no softness of the twilight soothes their heat, Till I see your radiant eyes, shining stars beneath the starlight, Till I kiss the slender coolness of your feet.

Ah, loveliest, most reluctant, when you lay yourself beside me All the planets reel around me—fade away, And the sands grow dim, uncertain,—I stretch out my hands towards you While I try to speak but know not what I say!

I am faint with love and longing, and my burning eyes are gazing Where the furtive Jackals wage their famished strife, Oh, your shadow on the mangroves! and your step upon the sandhills,— This is the loveliest evening of my Life!

Thoughts: Mahomed Akram

If some day this body of mine were burned (It found no favour alas! with you) And the ashes scattered abroad, unurned, Would Love die also, would Thought die too? But who can answer, or who can trust, No dreams would harry the windblown dust?

Were I laid away in the furrows deep Secure from jackal and passing plough, Would your eyes not follow me still through sleep Torment me then as they torture now? Would you ever have loved me, Golden Eyes, Had I done aught better or otherwise?

Was I overspeechful, or did you yearn When I sat silent, for songs or speech? Ah, Beloved, I had been so apt to learn, So apt, had you only cared to teach. But time for silence and song is done, You wanted nothing, my Golden Sun!

What should you want of a waning star? That drifts in its lonely orbit far Away from your soft, effulgent light In outer planes of Eternal night?

Prayer

You are all that is lovely and light, Aziza whom I adore, And, waking, after the night, I am weary with dreams of you. Every nerve in my heart is tense and sore As I rise to another morning apart from you.

I dream of your luminous eyes, Aziza whom I adore! Of the ruffled silk of your hair, I dream, and the dreams are lies. But I love them, knowing no more Will ever be mine of you Aziza, my life's despair.

I would burn for a thousand days, Aziza whom I adore, Be tortured, slain, in unheard of ways If you pitied the pain I bore. You pity! Your bright eyes, fastened on other things, Are keener to sting my soul, than scorpion stings!

You are all that is lovely to me, All that is light, One white rose in a Desert of weariness. I only live in the night, The night, with its fair false dreams of you, You and your loveliness.

Give me your love for a day, A night, an hour: If the wages of sin are Death I am willing to pay. What is my life but a breath Of passion burning away? Away for an unplucked flower. O Aziza whom I adore, Aziza my one delight, Only one night, I will die before day, And trouble your life no more.

The Aloe

My life was like an Aloe flower, beneath an orient sky, Your sunshine touched it for an hour; it blossomed but to die.

Torn up, cast out, on rubbish heaps where red flames work their will Each atom of the Aloe keeps the flower-time fragrance still.

Memory

How I loved you in your sleep, With the starlight on your hair!

The touch of your lips was sweet, Aziza whom I adore, I lay at your slender feet, And against their soft palms pressed, I fitted my face to rest. As winds blow over the sea From Citron gardens ashore, Came, through your scented hair, The breeze of the night to me.

My lips grew arid and dry, My nerves were tense, Though your beauty soothe the eye It maddens the sense. Every curve of that beauty is known to me, Every tint of that delicate roseleaf skin, And these are printed on every atom of me, Burnt in on every fibre until I die. And for this, my sin, I doubt if ever, though dust I be, The dust will lose the desire, The torment and hidden fire, Of my passionate love for you. Aziza whom I adore, My dust will be full of your beauty, as is the blue And infinite ocean full of the azure sky.

In the light that waxed and waned Playing about your slumber in silver bars, As the palm trees swung their feathery fronds athwart the stars, How quiet and young you were, Pale as the Champa flowers, violet veined, That, sweet and fading, lay in your loosened hair.

How sweet you were in your sleep, With the starlight on your hair! Your throat thrown backwards, bare, And touched with circling moonbeams, silver white On the couch's sombre shade. O Aziza my one delight, When Youth's passionate pulses fade, And his golden heart beats slow, When across the infinite sky I see the roseate glow Of my last, last sunset flare, I shall send my thoughts to this night And remember you as I die, The one thing, among all the things of this earth, found fair.

How sweet you were in your sleep, With the starlight, silver and sable, across your hair!

The First Lover

As o'er the vessel's side she leant, She saw the swimmer in the sea With eager eyes on her intent, "Come down, come down and swim with me."

So weary was she of her lot, Tired of the ship's monotony, She straightway all the world forgot Save the young swimmer in the sea

So when the dusky, dying light Left all the water dark and dim, She softly, in the friendly night, Slipped down the vessel's side to him.

Intent and brilliant, brightly dark, She saw his burning, eager eyes, And many a phosphorescent spark About his shoulders fall and rise.

As through the hushed and Eastern night They swam together, hand in hand, Or lay and laughed in sheer delight Full length upon the level sand.

"Ah, soft, delusive, purple night Whose darkness knew no vexing moon! Ah, cruel, needless, dawning light That trembled in the sky too soon!"

Khan Zada's Song on the Hillside

The fires that burn on all the hills Light up the landscape grey, The arid desert land distills The fervours of the day.

The clear white moon sails through the skies And silvers all the night, I see the brilliance of your eyes And need no other light.

The death sighs of a thousand flowers The fervent day has slain Are wafted through the twilight hours, And perfume all the plain.

My senses strain, and try to clasp Their sweetness in the air, In vain, in vain; they only grasp The fragrance of your hair.

The plain is endless space expressed; Vast is the sky above, I only feel, against your breast, Infinities of love.

Deserted Gipsy's Song: Hillside Camp

She is glad to receive your turquoise ring, Dear and dark-eyed Lover of mine! I, to have given you everything: Beauty maddens the soul like Wine.

"She is proud to have held aloof her charms, Slender, dark-eyed Lover of mine! But I, of the night you lay in my arms: Beauty maddens the sense like Wine!

"She triumphs to think that your heart is won, Stately, dark-eyed Lover of mine! I had not a thought of myself, not one: Beauty maddens the brain like Wine!

"She will speak you softly, while skies are blue, Dear, deluded Lover of mine! I would lose both body and soul for you: Beauty maddens the brain like Wine!

"While the ways are fair she will love you well, Dear, disdainful Lover of mine! But I would have followed you down to Hell: Beauty maddens the soul like Wine!

"Though you lay at her feet the days to be, Now no longer Lover of mine! You can give her naught that you gave not me: Beauty maddened my soul like Wine!

"When the years have shown what is false or true: Beauty maddens the sight like Wine! You will understand how I cared for you, First and only Lover of mine!"

The Plains

How one loves them These wide horizons; whether Desert or Sea,— Vague and vast and infinite; faintly clear— Surely, hid in the far away, unknown "There," Lie the things so longed for and found not, found not, Here.

Only where some passionate, level land Stretches itself in reaches of golden sand, Only where the sea line is joined to the sky-line, clear, Beyond the curve of ripple or white foamed crest,— Shall the weary eyes Distressed by the broken skies,— Broken by Minaret, mountain, or towering tree,— Shall the weary eyes be assuaged,—be assuaged,—and rest.

"Lost Delight"

After the Hazara War

I lie alone beneath the Almond blossoms, Where we two lay together in the spring, And now, as then, the mountain snows are melting, This year, as last, the water-courses sing.

That was another spring, and other flowers, Hung, pink and fragile, on the leafless tree, The land rejoiced in other running water, And I rejoiced, because you were with me.

You, with your soft eyes, darkly lashed and shaded, Your red lips like a living, laughing rose, Your restless, amber limbs so lithe and slender Now lost to me. Gone whither no man knows.

You lay beside me singing in the sunshine; The rough, white fur, unloosened at the neck, Showed the smooth skin, fair as the Almond blossoms, On which the sun could find no flaw or fleck.

I lie alone, beneath the Almond flowers, I hated them to touch you as they fell. And now, who killed you? worse, Ah, worse, who loves you? (My soul is burning as men burn in Hell.)

How I have sought you in the crowded cities! I have been mad, they say, for many days. I know not how I came here, to the valley, What fate has led me, through what doubtful ways.

Somewhere I see my sword has done good service, Some one I killed, who, smiling, used your name, But in what country? Nay, I have forgotten, All thought is shrivelled in my heart's hot flame.

Where are you now, Delight, and where your beauty, Your subtle curls, and laughing, changeful face? Bound, bruised and naked (dear God, grant me patience), And sold in Cabul in the market-place.

I asked of you of all men. Who could tell me? Among so many captured, sold, or slain, What fate was yours? (Ah, dear God, grant me patience, My heart is burnt, is burnt, with fire and pain.)

Oh, lost Delight! my heart is almost breaking, My sword is broken and my feet are sore, The people look at me and say in passing, "He will not leave the village any more."

For as the evening falls, the fever rises, With frantic thoughts careering through the brain, Wild thoughts of you. (Ah, dear God, grant me patience, My soul is hurt beyond all men call pain.)

I lie alone, beneath the Almond blossoms, And see the white snow melting on the hills Till Khorassan is gay with water-courses, Glad with the tinkling sound of running rills,

And well I know that when the fragile petals Fall softly, ere the first green leaves appear, (Ah, for these last few days, God, grant me patience,) Since Delight is not, I shall not be, here!

Unforgotten

Do you ever think of me? you who died Ere our Youth's first fervour chilled, With your soft eyes and your pulses stilled Lying alone, aside, Do you ever think of me, left in the light, From the endless calm of your dawnless night?

I am faithful always: I do not say That the lips which thrilled to your lips of old To lesser kisses are always cold; Had you wished for this in its narrow sense Our love perhaps had been less intense; But as we held faithfulness, you and I, I am faithful always, as you who lie, Asleep for ever, beneath the grass, While the days and nights and the seasons pass,— Pass away.

I keep your memory near my heart, My brilliant, beautiful guiding Star, Till long life over, I too depart To the infinite night where perhaps you are.

Oh, are you anywhere? Loved so well! I would rather know you alive in Hell Than think your beauty is nothing now, With its deep dark eyes and tranquil brow Where the hair fell softly. Can this be true That nothing, nowhere, exists of you? Nothing, nowhere, oh, loved so well I have never forgotten. Do you still keep Thoughts of me through your dreamless sleep?

Oh, gone from me! lost in Eternal Night, Lost Star of light, Risen splendidly, set so soon, Through the weariness of life's afternoon I dream of your memory yet. My loved and lost, whom I could not save, My youth went down with you to the grave, Though other planets and stars may rise, I dream of your soft and sorrowful eyes And I cannot forget.

Song of Faiz Ulla

Just at the time when Jasmins bloom, most sweetly in the summer weather, Lost in the scented Jungle gloom, one sultry night we spent together We, Love and Night, together blent, a Trinity of tranced content.

Yet, while your lips were wholly mine, to kiss, to drink from, to caress, We heard some far-off faint distress; harsh drop of poison in sweet wine Lessening the fulness of delight,— Some quivering note of human pain, Which rose and fell and rose again, in plaintive sobs throughout the night,

Spoiling the perfumed, moonless hours We spent among the Jasmin flowers.

Story of Lilavanti

They lay the slender body down With all its wealth of wetted hair, Only a daughter of the town, But very young and slight and fair.

The eyes, whose light one cannot see, Are sombre doubtless, like the tresses, The mouth's soft curvings seem to be A roseate series of caresses.

And where the skin has all but dried (The air is sultry in the room) Upon her breast and either side, It shows a soft and amber bloom.

By women here, who knew her life, A leper husband, I am told, Took all this loveliness to wife When it was barely ten years old.

And when the child in shocked dismay Fled from the hated husband's care He caught and tied her, so they say, Down to his bedside by her hair.

To some low quarter of the town, Escaped a second time, she flew; Her beauty brought her great renown And many lovers here she knew,

When, as the mystic Eastern night With purple shadow filled the air, Behind her window framed in light, She sat with jasmin in her hair.

At last she loved a youth, who chose To keep this wild flower for his own, He in his garden set his rose Where it might bloom for him alone.

Cholera came; her lover died, Want drove her to the streets again, And women found her there, who tried To turn her beauty into gain.

But she who in those garden ways Had learnt of Love, would now no more Be bartered in the market place For silver, as in days before.

That former life she strove to change; She sold the silver off her arms, While all the world grew cold and strange To broken health and fading charms.

Till, finding lovers, but no friend, Nor any place to rest or hide, She grew despairing at the end, Slipped softly down a well and died.

And yet, how short, when all is said, This little life of love and tears! Her age, they say, beside her bed, To-day is only fifteen years.

The Garden by the Bridge

The Desert sands are heated, parched and dreary, The tigers rend alive their quivering prey In the near Jungle; here the kites rise, weary, Too gorged with living food to fly away.

All night the hungry jackals howl together Over the carrion in the river bed, Or seize some small soft thing of fur or feather Whose dying shrieks on the night air are shed.

I hear from yonder Temple in the distance Whose roof with obscene carven Gods is piled, Reiterated with a sad insistence Sobs of, perhaps, some immolated child.

Strange rites here, where the archway's shade is deeper, Are consummated in the river bed; Parias steal the rotten railway sleeper To burn the bodies of their cholera dead.

But yet, their lust, their hunger, cannot shame them Goaded by fierce desire, that flays and stings; Poor beasts, and poorer men. Nay, who shall blame them? Blame the Inherent Cruelty of Things.

The world is horrible and I am lonely, Let me rest here where yellow roses bloom And find forgetfulness, remembering only Your face beside me in the scented gloom.

Nay, do not shrink! I am not here for passion, I crave no love, only a little rest, Although I would my face lay, lover's fashion, Against the tender coolness of your breast.

I am so weary of the Curse of Living The endless, aimless torture, tumult, fears. Surely, if life were any God's free giving, He, seeing His gift, long since went blind with tears.

Seeing us; our fruitless strife, our futile praying, Our luckless Present and our bloodstained Past. Poor players, who make a trick or two in playing, But know that death must win the game at last.

As round the Fowler, red with feathered slaughter, The little joyous lark, unconscious, sings,— As the pink Lotus floats on azure water, Innocent of the mud from whence it springs.

You walk through life, unheeding all the sorrow, The fear and pain set close around your way, Meeting with hopeful eyes each gay to-morrow, Living with joy each hour of glad to-day.

I love to have you thus (nay, dear, lie quiet, How should these reverent fingers wrong your hair?) So calmly careless of the rush and riot That rages round is seething everywhere.

You do not understand. You think your beauty Does but inflame my senses to desire, Till all you hold as loyalty and duty, Is shrunk and shrivelled in the ardent fire.

You wrong me, wearied out with thought and grieving As though the whole world's sorrow eat my heart, I come to gaze upon your face believing Its beauty is as ointment to the smart.

Lie still and let me in my desolation Caress the soft loose hair a moment's span. Since Loveliness is Life's one Consolation, And love the only Lethe left to man.

Ah, give me here beneath the trees in flower, Beside the river where the fireflies pass, One little dusky, all consoling hour Lost in the shadow of the long grown grass

Give me, oh you whose arms are soft and slender, Whose eyes are nothing but one long caress, Against your heart, so innocent and tender, A little Love and some Forgetfulness.

Fate Knows no Tears

Just as the dawn of Love was breaking Across the weary world of grey, Just as my life once more was waking As roses waken late in May, Fate, blindly cruel and havoc-making, Stepped in and carried you away.