The Traveller

Ae jazba-e-dil, gar main chaahun, har cheez muqaabil aa jaae,
Manzil ke liye do gaam chalun, aur saamane manzil aa jaae.

Muqaabil = in front of, saamne; gaam = steps, kadam
How I wish, if I wanted, everything should be possible,
I should walk but a few steps, and there my manzil should be!

ai rahabar-e-kaamil chalane ko tayyaar to huun par yaad rahe
us vaqt mujhe bhaTakaa denaa jab saamane manzil aa jaaye

Rahbar = guide; Kaamil=accomplished.
Oh you who guide the chosen few, I am ok to be led by you,
But do let me go astray, when The Manzil is but a step away...

- Behzad Lucknawi

A contrast within the same ghazal. The words of one, perhaps, who reaches (intermediate) manzils easily, who does not really care for the manzil , and who, whatsmore, wants to keep travelling, if possible.

It's been a while... From now on I'll try and post something at least once a week. As a beginning, here's an excerpt from a story I have entered in the Deccan Herald short story contest:


The Son

...A genius in the family is difficult to suffer. When you realize that a small change in the probabilities of nature, and that genius could have been yours. Or at least, yours too... To watch your own father, who in the right order of things, should have retired into quietude, even as you ascended the golden throne of youth; to watch that father still going strong, more youthful than you, a twinkle in his eye, his white whiskers bristly, his shoulders square, his back erect, head high, his missing tooth shining like a black pearl amongst white ones. To watch the ceaseless ascendancy of such a father, while you yourself slide down into the slimy pits of oblivion. The envy for such a father is no sin. It’s a service to the Gods for playing the fool in their cruel joke...