DEPARTURE TO THE PALACE
OF THE KINGS OF THE EAST:
NADIR, ABDALI,
THE MARTYR – KING
| The voice of Bartari penetrated into my soul; | |
| I was intoxicated with Bartari’s song. | |
| Rumi said: ‘It is better to open your eyes, | |
| better to step outside the circle of your thoughts. | 3130 |
| You have passed by the banquet of dervishes; | |
| give one glance also at the palace of kings. | |
| The sovereigns of the East are here assembled, | |
| the might of Iran, Afghanistan and Deccan — | |
| Nadir, who knew the secret of unity | 3135 |
| and conveyed to the Moslems the message of love; | |
| heroic Abdali, his whole being a sign, | |
| who gave the Afghans the foundation of nationhood; | |
| that leader of all the martyrs of love, | |
| "glory of India, China, Turkey and Syria", | 3140 |
| whose name is more resplendent than the sun and the moon, | |
| the dust of whose grave is more living than I and you. | |
| Love is a mystery, which he revealed in the open plain— | |
| do you not know how yearningly he gave his life? | |
| By grace of the gaze of the victor of Badr and Hunain | 3145 |
| the poverty of the king became heir to Husain’s ecstasy; | |
| the King departed from this tavern of seven days, | |
| yet still to this day his trumpet sounds in Deccan.’ | |
| My words and voice are immature, my thought imperfect: | |
| how can I hope to describe that place? | 3150 |
| The beings of light from its reflected glory derive vision, | |
| vitality, knowledge, speech, awareness; | |
| a palace whose walls and gates are of turquoise | |
| holding in its bosom the whole azure sky; | |
| soaring beyond the bounds of quantity and quality, | 3155 |
| it reduces thought to mean impotence. | |
| The roses, the cypresses, the jasmines, the flowering boughs | |
| delicate as a picture painted by the hand of spring; | |
| the petals of the flowers, the leaves of the trees every moment | |
| put on new colours out of the joy of growth— | 3160 |
| such a spellbinder the zephyr is | |
| that as you wink, gold is turned to scarlet; | |
| on every side pearl -scattering fountains, | |
| birds born of Paradise in clamant song. | |
| Within that lofty palace was a chamber | 3165 |
| whose motes held the sun in a lasso; | |
| the roof, walls and columns were of red agate, | |
| the floor of jasper, enclosed in carnation. | |
| To the right and left of that lodge | |
| houris with golden girdles stood in ranks, | 3170 |
| and in the midst, seated on thrones of gold, | |
| sovereigns stately as Jamshid, splendid as Bahram. | |
| Rumi, that mirror of perfect refinement, | |
| with utmost affection opened his lips | |
| saying, ‘Here is a poet from the East— | 3175 |
| either a poet, or an eastern magician; | |
| his thoughts are acute, his soul impassioned; | |
| his verses have kindled a fire in all the East’. |
Nadir
| Welcome to you, eastern weaver of subtleties | |
| whose lips the Persian speech so well beseems! | 3180 |
| We are your intimate friends; tell us your secret, | |
| reveal what you know of Iran. |
Zinda-Rud
| After long ages she opened her eyes on herself, | |
| but then she fell into the snare of a trap, | |
| slain by the charm of bold and elegant idols, | 3185 |
| creator of culture-and slavish imitation of Europe. | |
| Lost in the cult of ‘rulership’ and ‘race’, she acclaims | |
| the glory of Shapur, and despises the Arabs; | |
| her day today being empty of new achievements | |
| she seeks for life in ancient sepulchres. | 3190 |
| Wedded to the ‘fatherland’, having abandoned her self | |
| she has given her heart to Rustam, and turned from Haidar. | |
| She is accepting a false image from Europe, | |
| she takes the version of her history from Europe. | |
| Iran was aged already in the time of Yazdajird, | 3195 |
| her cheeks were lack-lustre, her blood was cold. | |
| ancient her religion, her laws, her system, | |
| ancient the light and dark of her dawn and eve; | |
| in her vine’s flask no wine foamed, | |
| no spark glowed in her heap of dust, | 3200 |
| till from the desert a resurrection came to her | |
| which endowed her with new life. | |
| Such a resurrection is a grace of God: | |
| Persia lives on-where is Rome the mighty? | |
| He from whose body the pure spirit has departed | 3205 |
| cannot rise from the dust without a resurrection. | |
| The desert-dwellers breathed life into Iran | |
| and then sped back to their sandy wastes; | |
| they erased from our tablet all that was old, and departed, | |
| they brought the apparatus of a new age, and departed. | 3210 |
| Alas, Iran has not recognized the benefaction of the Arabs; | |
| she has melted away in Europe’s fire. |