The Best of Mahjoor

Selections from Mahjoor's Kashmiri Poems

ranga ranga pholimuti vaari gul....

The garden is ablaze with diverse hues.
O bulbul, behold these flowers
In the assembled gorgeous court!

Yemberzal, rose, pomegranate blossom
And hyacinth - each magnificent!
What a lovely roll of colours!

The sensual lover dotes on colour -
The evanescent beauty of spring.
His friendship dies when the bloom is gone.

Beauty's everlasting, the bulbuls say,
For splendid flowers of diverse hues
Are always seen in bloom.

Come to the garden early, and mark
Who helps keep flowers in trim,
And makes them - bloom ere break of dawn,

What keen expectancy fills the air?
The well-groomed beds and the flowers
That strain their eyes on the bush!

A drink of morning dew relieves
The heart that's bowed with grief -
It's only the garden where the sick get healed.

The morning breeze wafts abroad
Praise of the beauty self flowers,
Which fills all lovers with longing.

One with music in his soul
Alone can diagnose pain,
And grade flowers in this saffron field.

Mabjoor, your poems and speech must show you
Not as a florist, but as a flower.
Then only can you claim flowers?