My enemy has sent me word
that his soldiers ring me round;
on every tower and minaret of the city wall
his archers stand, bows in hand.
Note
The title means “The Siege”. ग़नीम is an enemy in war, and siege language runs through the poem: the ring of soldiers, the city wall, archers on the towers.
The current of lightning has been cut
whose heat once woke a volcano in our bodies of dust.
Gunpowder has been laid in the water
of the stream that used to reach my lane.
Everyone who spoke out now has a torn body;
everyone who held his head high has gone to the gallows.
Note
बर्क़ means lightning and also electricity. दुरीदा-दहन and बदन-दरीदा use the same word for “torn”: those who tore their mouths open in speech now have their bodies torn.
All the Sufis and seekers, the sheikhs and imams,
wait in the palace of the man in the tilted cap, hoping for favours;
the honourable judges, ready to swear the oath,
sit by the road like beggars who will not leave.
Note
कज-कुलाह, “tilted cap”, is an old image of a proud ruler. The oath probably refers to the new oath Pakistani judges were required to take under martial law in 1981.
You writers, who sang the praises of self-respect:
look at those stars of the sky of art;
at a single nod from a courtier
they come in crowds, begging with their verses.
Look what the faithful dervishes have left to stand on;
look around you, see who is still at your side.
So here are the terms: if you want your life spared,
lay your tablet and your pen down at the killing ground.
Otherwise the archers this time
have only you to aim at. Leave your pride in the road.
Note
लौह-ओ-क़लम, “tablet and pen”, is the writer’s equipment, with an echo of the tablet and pen on which fate is written. These are the enemy’s terms; the poet replies from the next stanza.
When I read this list of terms I told the envoy:
your master has not learned what history teaches,
that when the night puts some sun to death,
the morning carves a new one and brings it up.
Note
ख़ुर्शीद and सूरज both mean the sun; the first is Persian, the second Hindi.
So this is my answer to my enemy:
I crave no favours and I do not fear the cost.
He is very proud of the power of his sword;
he has no measure of the power of the pen.
My pen does not act the part of that guardian
who lays siege to his own city and is proud of it.
My pen is not the begging bowl of some small man
who honours usurpers with odes.
Note
The मुहाफ़िज़, “guardian”, who besieges his own city is usually read as the army that took over its own country. A क़सीदा is a formal ode in praise of a patron.
My pen is not the tool of that burglar
who breaks through the roof of his own house.
My pen is no friend of that midnight thief
who throws his rope over the walls of dark houses.
Note
कमंद is a noose-rope thrown up to climb a wall. बे-चराग़, “without a lamp”, also means poor.
My pen is not the rosary of that preacher
who keeps accounts even of his prayers.
My pen is not the scales of that kind of judge
who wears a double mask.
My pen is held in trust for my people;
my pen is the court where my conscience sits.
So whatever I wrote, I wrote with my whole heart,
and it bends like a bow and speaks like an arrow.
Whether I am cut down or live, I know
someone will pull down this fortress of oppression.
I swear by a lifetime of pain:
my pen has not travelled for nothing.
Note
हिसार means a fort or a siege wall, and brings back the poem’s title.
Love was not made to lie down in the dust;
you measure the cypress by its shadow and never see how tall it stands.
Note
The last line is in Persian. The cypress stands for upright dignity: the enemy measures its shadow and misses its height.