They Came Only To Speak Of You

The morning paper brought unhappy news. “Famous poet Ahmed Faraz passes away”, it said.

What is it that attracts so many people to Faraz’s poetry? His poems are loved for their sheer lyrical beauty. A perplexed romanticism which cries out for empathy in hard times.

Faraz was a deep romantic who wrote “ranjish hi sahi, dil hi dukhane ke liye aa” (let there be antipathy between us, but come, come (back) to break my heart). Sentimental, without being maudlin, it was his poesy as much as his brooding good looks that would draw dozens, nay hundreds of fans to his doorstep. His success as a poet can be measured by the fact that his female fans in particular would accord him the adulation normally reserved on the Sub-continent for cricketers and film actors!

At the same time, his poems bear a kind of stoic optimism as seen in his nazm “Khwaab Marte Nahin”:

ख्वाब मरते नहीं

ख्वाब दिल हैं न आँखें हैं ना साँसें के जो

रेजा-रेजा हुए तो बिखर जायेंगे

जिस्म की मौत से ये भी मर जायेंगे

ख्वाब मरते नहीं

ख्वाब तो रौशनी हैं, नवा हैं, हवा हैं

जो काले पहाडों से रुकते नहीं

ज़ुल्म के दोज़खों से भी फूकते नहीं

रौशनी और नवा और हवा के आलम

मक़्तलोन में पहुँच कर भी झुकते नहीं

ख्वाब तो हर्फ़ हैं

ख्वाब तो नूर हैं

ख्वाब तो सुकरात हैं

ख्वाब तो मंसूर हैं

Khvaab marate nahin

Khvaab dil hain na aankhen na saansen ke jo

rezaa-rezaa hue to bikhar jaayenge

jism kii maut se ye bhi mar jaayenge

Khwaab marate nahiin

Khvaab to raushani hain, navaa hain, havaa hain

jo kaale pahaadon se rukate nahin 

zulm ke dozakhok.n se bhi phukate nahin

raushani aur navaa aur havaa ke aalam 

maqtalon men pahunch kar bhii jhukate nahin

Khvaab to harf hain

Khvaab to noor hain

Khvaab to Suqraat hain

Khvaab Mansoor hain

Dreams do not die.

Dreams are not hearts, nor eyes nor breath
Which once shattered, will scatter (or)
Die with the death of the body.

Dreams do not die.
Dreams are light, life, wind,
Which cannot be stopped by mountains black,
Which do not burn in the hells of cruelty,
Like light and life and wind, they
Do not bow down even in graveyards.

Dreams are letters,
Dreams are illumination,
Dreams are Socrates!

Dreams are Mansoor!

This poem comes from a man who, upholding the best traditions of Faiz, consistently spoke out against the tyranny of military dictatorship in his country. Like Faiz, he too was to pay a heavy price for his outspoken opposition to prevailing ideas. He was sent to jail, and even exiled from his beloved homeland. Forever a proponent of freedom and equality, his poem “Mahasra” (The Siege) is a scathing indictment of Pakistan’s military rule. Faraz has travelled beyond petty concerns of minor poets of whether his words would get published. His far greater concern was to ensure that the voice he had raised against repression not be stilled.

In the words of Siegfried Sassoon, in the days to come, his name shall be as music that ascends.

Requiescat in pacem, Ahmed Faraz.