Caged… Memories Have Names, Gulzar Saab’s poetic autobiography whispers stories of love, loss, and longing! With verses that blend the hues of Rumi, Pablo Neruda, and Jibananda Das, the book paints vivid portraits of cherished figures like Birju Maharaj and Pancham, while weaving silken threads of unspoken emotions for his Abbu and Ma. We’ve handpicked some translations from Gulzar Saab’s reflections, a treasure of timeless beauty.
Tagore
With a mould of gurtied on his head, a rustic
Was crossing a vast maidan, both long and wide
Hearing the fragrance of the gur,
A canopy of bees hummed over his head
The sun rose higher and in the growing heat
The gur started to melt.
The simple villager was now astonished,
Drops of gur were running down his face
And he was licking them with his tongue.
I’m a simple villager,
Who has placed the sweet gur of Tagore’s poems
On my head?
Ghalib
‘Is there a man who does not know of Ghalib
A good poet he surely is, but infamous . . . ’
Ghalib describes himself thus.
Such mischief is not seen or heard in any other poet. And
then there was his devilsh ego!
‘Baageecha-e-atphal hai duniya mere aagey
Hota hai shab-va-roz tamasha mere aagey’
The world, a child’s playground, it seems to me
Endlessly, the play of life is enacted before me.
Please believe me when I say I have read the poets of India in every
language; both in the original and in translation. But I have not
found a poet of this temperament in any language besides Urdu.
Ghalib is a synonym for the Urdu language.
Now listen to his desire to vanish without a trace:
Museum Galli Quasim
Entering Galli Quasim
I have stopped at your mansion, Mirza Nausha
Let me call out to you,
First let Umrau go behind the curtains into purdah
Before I step inside.
Cooking vessels, the jug and tray are all removed
The rain used to fall for two hours
The roof would rain for four.
The same seive-like roof is now being repaired . . .
That it took more than a hundred years for this,
Saddens me.
In fact, the smudges of the coal dump in your house had to be erased,
And meanwhile,
Many governments changed, before your house could be reached.
Where you would sit with Kallan on the upper floor, do you
remember?
You would paste the sides of envelopes with gum,
On the boats of your letters Urdu would flow,
Flawless Urdu prose started lapping at untrodden shores . . .
Now a computer will take over the space.
A million letters will be dispatched from there.
They will not be as beautiful as those in your handwriting,
Baba
When the lamp burns out
A slight smoke rises
When the diminished sun sets
Long after sunset
The sky of steel glows with its light
When leaves break away
They float for a distance.
Why then, while you were leaving
Did you not turn and look back even once?
Just held your breath and
Wrapped in soil, you went to sleep.
Pablo . . .!
Often I feel there is truth in what Pablo says,
‘A poem is a bounced cheque.’
The one I wrote it for
Read it, inclined her head slightly and said,
‘It’s good,’ and returned it.
Sometimes, it’s written,
‘Present the cheque again!’
When published in my book, I presented it again.
This time, slightly biting her lip, she smiled, but . . .
By then, we were both in the second half of our lives.
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