Allama Muhammad Iqbal- The Painful Wail

Consumed with grief I am, I get relief in no way
O circumambient waters of the Ganges drown me

Our land foments excessive mutual enmity
What unity! Our closeness harbors separation

Enmity instead of sincerity is outrageous
Enmity among the same barn’s grains is outrageous

If the brotherly breeze has not entered in a garden
No pleasure can be derived from songs in that garden

Though I exceedingly love the real closeness
I am upset by the mixing of waves and the shore

The miraculous poet is like the grain from the barn
The grain has no existence if there is no barn

How can beauty unveil itself if no one is anxious for sight
Lighting of the candle is meaningless if there is no assembly

Why does the taste for speech not change to silence
Why does this brilliance not appear out from my mirror

Alas! My tongue poured its speech down
When war’s fire had burnt the garden down