Without your knowledge
Without you even thinking about it,
I have been following you for decades!
You are no more the exquisite beauty
You used to be !
Age and exhaustion has also taken
Their toll on me.
In order to bring an end
To this game of trailing one another
I had come to this spot several times.
From where either you had overtaken me
Or I had overtaken you !
Now there is metalled road
In that remote locality.
They have also put up, an iron fencing,
To prevent people
From slipping into the gorge.
Defying the midday sun and the wind
Was it you that day,
Who came looking for me ?
The accident that happened that day
Did the hills across describe in detail to you ?
Since widening of the narrow inclined
Crimson tract into a big road;
Your shadow is not to be seen.
Source : HUMMING A PIECE OF SOLITUDE
Poems of ROUSAN ARA BEGUM
Translated by SYED AHMED SHAH
