THE TRAGEDY OF SELF-MADE PEOPLE

Those who tempers optimistic,

bright and buoyant,

what unusual fates they have.

Cleansing life’s path

of thorns strewn,

assembling each straw

to build a nest,

trapping fragrance,

adorning gardens,

their life is spent.

Their life consumed,

they gift the flowers.

give all away.

Not that, the

drudgery of

the unending toil

goes unrewarded,

blood-money

for longings that die

goes unpaid.

All pleasures that life

enfolds, come their way;

with one and all

they are endowed,

but late always,

ever delayed.

Rewarded they are

for the slog, the grind

but bit by bit,

like borrowed money

returned in parts;

the actual writing

fading into the hidden rear.

In teeming spring,

their flowers all

are the last to bloom;

the sun in their courtyards

appears late.

Translated from Urdu by Yasmeen Hameed