Saqi Farooqi
An Injured Tomcat in an Empty Sack
Jan Muhammad Khan
the road is hard
This empty rice-sack
stifles me
The stiff jute bars pierce my heart
And into the yellow bowls
of my eyes
Coins of moonlight clink, chink
Night spreads through my body
Now who will light fires
on your naked back?
Who will fan the coals?
Who will make the bloody flowers of struggle
burst into bloom?
From my flint-and-steel claws
the life is gone
Today the road is hardQuite soon this path
breaks and falls into a dirty pond
Alone in my coffin
I’ll curl up and sleep
I’ll dissolve into water
And you must go on –
go on deep-sleep-walking
And the sack that you don’t see –
you don’t know your own empty sack.
Jan Muhammad Khan
the road is hard.
Translated by Frances W Pritchett
Page(s) 131-132
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