q.
The Trades I Have Failed
So cursed is the fortune I was handed,
that were I to open a shop of coffins in the city,
the people would forsake dying altogether.
that were I to sit down and beg at the city gate,
the passers-by would hold out their bowls to me.
that were I to sell my sorrows as stories in the city,
the mourners would laugh, and the grieving go home consoled.
Crieth Adnan: mock me not for the trades I have failed,
for the one I was born to, ruin,
I have mastered alone.
v.
O Saaqi
What means have I left even to drown my grief, o saaqi,
wine is dearer than blood, and the funeral comes cheap,
o saaqi.
Even after clearing every debt, behold my state,
not a cracked coin in my pocket, yet the dread of death waits not,
o saaqi.
Even medicine is a rich man's indulgence now,
no leisure to prepare for death, and living too exacts a fortune,
o saaqi.
At God's own threshold the bribes run smooth these days,
even a beggar's prayer now sells for the smallest change,
o saaqi.
With what face do I turn toward the Kaaba, O Ghalib,
not the price of a single sip upon me, and off to Hajj I march,
o saaqi!
u.
The Horizon Is Made of Distance
There is a thing I have learned of walking, and I set it down, though I am not certain it is a comfort.
I asked of the road how far it ran, and the road gave me no answer, for a road knoweth nothing of its end; it knoweth only that it is walked. So I asked instead of the far line where the earth and the heaven are wedded, that men call the horizon, and I said: there, there is the place I go. And I went toward it. And in all my going it did not come one span the nearer.
For a long while I took this for my failing. I thought my pace too slow, or my heart too divided, or the way too crooked beneath my feet. I quickened, and it did not help. I wept, and it did not help. And then there came upon me the plain and terrible thing, which is this: that the horizon is not a place at all, but a distance; and a distance cannot be crossed unto, for the crossing of it doth but unfold a further distance, even and the same. It is made of the very farness I would abolish. Should I arrive, it would not be there; it would have withdrawn, and stand as far beyond me as before, and be still itself.
Here I might have sat down in the dust and cursed the road, and some have done so, and I do not judge them. But another knowledge came behind the first, treading soft. It was this: that were I ever to arrive, the going would be finished, and I with it. The horizon that will not be reached is the same horizon that keeps me walking; and the walking, I begin to think, was the whole of what was given me. To be denied the end is to be granted the road. I had asked for the wrong mercy.
So now I go as one who hath arrived, and hath not arrived, and hath made his peace with the and. I do not look to close the gap; I look to keep faith with it. And when at times an eagle wheeleth above my head, circling, I do not take it for a sign that I am near. I take it for a companion, that hath understood the same thing, and hath chosen, as I have, to go on.
t.
Again
Long hath it been since I have made
my confidant a guest again;
long, since the wine set all the gathering
bright as flame again.
I gather up my heart once more,
its fragments strewn and slain;
long hath it been since I have smiled at
that feast of wounds again.
Again the breath begins to catch
with all its wary pain;
for years my collar hath been torn,
unrent, made whole, in vain again.
Again my heart goes circling round
the street of blame and stain,
the idol-temple of my pride
left desolate and plain again.
Again I long to break the seal
and read her hand again,
to lay my soul before the charm
that title-line doth feign again.
My soul still searcheth for that ease,
that leisure to remain,
through night and day but sit and hold
her image in the brain again.
Crieth Adnan: provoke me not,
for now, from weeping's strain,
I sit with all a tempest poised,
a gathered flood of rain again.
s.
It Would Have Been
What manner of friendship is this,
that my friends themselves have turned to preach?
one healer I had wished for,
or one sharer of my grief, serene, it would have been.
This grief lays waste the soul; yet where to flee,
when in the breast the heart is caught?
were love's own grief not here,
the grief of bread and toil, I ween, it would have been.
To whom shall I complain? the night of grief
is such a curse, so black, so vast;
what harm was death to me,
if once, a single closing scene, it would have been.
In death I turned to scandal:
why not drowned where river-currents ran?
no bier had risen then, no tomb,
no grave beneath the green, it would have been.
Crieth Adnan: these mysteries of the Path,
this discourse thou dost spin;
we'd take thee for a saint,
hadst thou not loved the wine's red sheen, it would have been.
r.
The Fault of Thy Gaze
This soft, this dim, this drunken haze:
the fault of Thy gaze;
I never sought these reeling ways:
the fault of Thy gaze.
I knew not wine, nor how the cup
its slow undoing lays;
Thy love hath poured me all my days:
the fault of Thy gaze.
The jar is drunk, the goblet drunk,
the dawn, the dusk, the moon;
all being reels and softly sways:
the fault of Thy gaze.
I see Thy sly coquetry, Saqi,
in the cup's dim phase;
the eye doth pour, the wine's a phrase:
the fault of Thy gaze.
No prayer I know, no fast, no rite;
yet when Thy face displays,
I bow, and there a Ka'ba raise:
the fault of Thy gaze.
I laid the blade, the heart, the head,
and begged Thee not for grace,
but "whom shall next Thy wounding graze?":
the fault of Thy gaze.
Crieth Adnan: "I am no more,
I fall into the blaze;
I am the wine, the drunk, the daze:
the fault of Thy gaze."
q.
Tonight
Turn not away Thy gaze tonight,
hold me close tonight.
The hours of parting stretch so long,
without Thy light tonight.
Thine eyes have stolen all my peace,
I lose the fight tonight.
Like burning flame I waste away,
no sleep in sight tonight.
Crieth Adnan: "O Beloved, come,
and make all right tonight."
p.
Countenance
Thou art the mirror wherein all forms fade,
the light that burneth in the deepest shade.
Mine every breath a plea to Thee I weep,
whether I wake or sink in endless sleep.
I know not if this soul be mine or Thine;
I see Thy face, and call the wound divine.
o.
Azizati
May you be rain,
that wakes the parched river.
May you be tree,
that shades the lone river.
May you be moon,
that lulls the dreaming river.
n.
The Hidden Offering
Why can I not tear open this deafening mind,
and lay the full weight of my torment before Thee?
Yet Thou dost depart with mocking laughter upon Thy lips;
turning not once to behold the vessel Thou hast broken,
leaving a fondness, to burn in silence.
No eyes shall ever witness this agony;
it remaineth within the dark center of my spirit.
If this love were a living flower,
I would rip it from the very root of my life
and scatter it beneath Thy feet.
Though Thou mightest leave it to wither in neglect,
abandoned to rot upon the cold ground,
yet even in its death, all doubt would vanish from Thy heart,
and Thou wouldst know at last how deeply I have bled.
m.
The Far Shore
Uncrossed, the water stretches wide;
I say, O Beloved,
What if the vessel never part?
What if the journey be unmade?
Yet remaineth the quiet scar,
the stone, the tide, the waiting shade.
I say, O Beloved,
should the fragile hull of hope
sink down into the silent deep,
yet shall mine eyes pursue thy course,
and watch the voyage thou dost keep.
Is not the lap of present hours enough?
Must all the measure of my day
be spent in weeping for the bank
that lieth ever far away?
Nay; what is lacking in this place,
I fill with fullness of the soul,
for where desire taketh root,
there grows the tree that makes it whole.
l.
Give a statistician fifty variables, and he shall weep for multicollinearity; give a machine learner fifty thousand, and he shall call it feature selection.
k.
Resign
Blue heaven, brown breeze,
Broken stars do sing,
Trees do whisper, waters do murmur,
Vines spreadeth canopies too.
Sleepless sighs, forest path,
Yearning dreams do gaze,
Winds do rustle, moonbeams do glimmer,
Wild lilies weaveth garland too.
Crieth Adnan: "Dearest, heed Thou me,
Lone dreads do burn for thee!
Thy love, ahh, nectar divine,
Wherein my soul I resign."
j.
In Statistics, one seeketh the p-value to prove significance; in Machine Learning, one keepeth changing the random seed until the metric looketh favorable.
i.
If it be written in Python, lo, it is Machine Learning; if in R, it is Statistics; but if it be set forth in PowerPoint, ye shall proclaim it Artificial Intelligence.
h.
Seek not the True Model, for it is written: all models lie, yet some lie productively.
g.
Verily, if thou but squinteth with sufficient zeal, behold: all things become Gaussian.
f.
O Dearest
In secret, O Dearest,
leavest something within mine smile,
in flower's scent,
in flute's lone song,
in wind's chanting murmurs.
In guilt, O Dearest,
takest something from the ever deeper layer of pain,
that tear of mine which blendeth with mirth,
that word unspoken in silent eye's reign.
e.
I of Me
O Dearest,
This day, cuckoo singeth sweet,
This night, with moon I shall meet.
Words, soft do murmur, heart doth quiver,
Body doth shiver, mind like a river.
Breeze, bloweth gentle, feet moveth not,
Words, fail upon the lips, thoughts held in a knot.
Petals, rain upon, smiles floweth murmuring,
Moon yet laugheth, swaying with the sea,
and therein fadeth,
the I of Me.
d.
Sail Furled
Such doubts have anxieties bestowed,
love of the beloved, forgone;
Such gifts of daily-dooms,
idle thoughts of sleep, no more.
Keep yet the sail furled;
the wind's face is but torn,
Perhaps in some path, rest awaits,
which came and then, gone.
c.
Stand Before Mine Eyes
Mine Beloved, for once
stand before Mine eyes.
May Thy gaze touch my heart.
Beyond all that exists, stand,
Stand where this abandoned heart
awaits sleeplessly for Thee.
b.
This Too Shall Pass
This too shall pass, shall pass,
shall pass,
Mine beloved, this too shall pass.
The pain thou hold, nurture warily,
the grief thou started to love
in the dark—
shall leave you, it shall.
O dearest, this too shall pass.
The altar thou hast built of agony,
the sacred bleed thou clingest to,
burn away, burn away,
for even the altar must crumble to dust,
and the worship of thine own ruin shall pass.
O dearest, this too shall pass.
The sight of thee guarding thy wound—
O dearest, my soul crushes high,
crushes under the weight of thy silence.
Yet, mine... passes not, passes not,
it bleeds over thine,
until thine passes first from thee,
O dearest, when will it pass?
Mine beloved, let me, let me
come close and whisper to thee,
"thou must let the shadow flee..."
for I know, I know
thy quiet grief,
and all the sorrow thou hast nursed to be,
yet, it must pass from thee, it must for you—
and I to be free.
a.
Of Him That Is Without
Of late there is come upon me a knowledge, and it may be that I am of them that are without.
I have dwelt upon this earth of God for years. I have beheld great kindness. I have beheld the hardness of men's hearts. I have beheld, above all, injustice that no mind can compass. I have seen the gentle ground down, and the cruel lifted up, and the ledger, seek it how I might, was never brought to even.
I cannot, with all the sincerity that is in me, bring my heart to say, that the Divine, who framed this world about me, with a might beyond the utmost reach of mine imagining and my reason, is a Kind one, or that He is kind altogether. Yet have I read many pages, dry, and yet not without savour, of them that would prove Him kind, in doctrine, in wisdom, in verse, in lamentation... and herein is the thing wherewith I can make no peace: that I understand them. The argument prevaileth upon the page, and dieth in the breast. If the Divine, in His exceeding providence, be Kind, be it so; these things are beyond my poor and broken being. I can have dealings with Him only in mine own reality, that is narrow, and is broken. And in that reality, Kind I cannot call Him.
And this I must confess, that it was not this end I sought. I came, if aught, in hope to be persuaded.
It may be that this maketh me of them that are without. Or it may be that to refuse to name cruelty as kindness is no forsaking of Him, but a stranger faithfulness, that holdeth Him to His own word. I can no longer tell the one from the other. Be it so. Yet this at the least I have kept: that I have not lied unto mine own soul.