INTRODUCTION
THE world-illuminating moon said to God: | |
"My light turns the night into day; | |
I remember the time when there was neither day nor night | |
And I lay slumbering in the depth of Time; | |
There was no star in my retinue | 5 |
And my nature was unaware of revolution. | |
No vast expanse of desert was illumined by my light | |
Nor did the sea feel commotion on seeing my beauty. | |
Alas! all this was changed by the magic and spell of Being, | |
By the illumination and by the desire for manifestation! | 10 |
I learnt from the sun the art of shining | |
And brightened. this dead earthly abode | |
An abode that possessed splendour but lacked joy and happiness. | |
Its face was distorted by the ugly marks of servitude. | |
Its Adam entrapped in the net like a fish, | 15 |
He has killed God and worships man. | |
Ever since you bound me down to this earth | |
I have been ashamed of revolving round it. | |
This world is not aware of the light of the soul, | |
It is not worthy of the sun and the moon. | 20 |
Cast it away into the space blue | |
Sever the ties that bind us, the celestial beings, to it. | |
Either relieve me of my service to him | |
Or create another Adam out of its soil. | |
It were better if my ever-vigilant eye be blind | 25 |
O God, let this earthly abode remain without light. " | |
Servitude deadens one's heart, | |
It makes the soul a burden for the body. | |
Through servitude the young suffer weakness of old age, | |
A fierce lion of the forest is enervated; | 30 |
A society disintegrates | |
And its members fly at one another's throat. | |
If one is standing, the other is in prostration; | |
Their affairs are disorganised like a prayer without an Imam. | |
Everyone-is fighting with the other | 35 |
Each individual is seeking his own interests. | |
Through servitude even a virtuous man goes astray | |
And his potentialities for good fall to actualise. | |
His branches are shorne of leaves even when there is no autumn. | |
He is always encumbered with the fear of death. | 40 |
Devoid of good taste, he takes the evil for the good, | |
He is dead without death and carries his corpse on his shoulders. | |
He has staked away the very honour of life, | |
And like asses is content with hay and barley. | |
Just look at his "possible" and his "impossible," | 45 |
See how months and years of his life pass. | |
His days bewail of one another, | |
Their movement is slower than the sands of time. | |
Imagine a brackish ground, infested with stings of scorpions, | |
Its ants bite dragons and prey on scorpions. | 50 |
Its strong wind has fire as if from Hell | |
Which is for the barge of Satan steering gail. | |
The fire permeates the air | |
Its flames intermingling and multiplying. | |
A fire that has grown bitter through wreathing smoke - | 55 |
A fire that has the roar of a thunder and the rage of a storming sea. | |
On its outskirts, snakes are biting one another | |
Snakes whose hoods are full of poison. | |
Its flames pounce upon (people) like biting dogs, | |
Are dangerously frightening, burn them alive and their light is dead. | 60 |
To live for millennia in such a dangerous desert | |
Is far better than a moment spent in servitude. |