Poetry by Atta Shad: Translated from Balochi by Fazal Baloch
Whether morning or eventide,
dawn or twilight—
what remains to be said
of the rainbow and raincloud,
of the scented breeze,
of the beloved earth?
The heart seems withdrawn from all.
The heart, a patient mendicant,
feels and endures each rebuff.
Desire wanders beneath the scorching sun,
a traveler without a destination.
Night falls, (so we’ve heard).
Day breaks, (so they claim).
But who can tell of day and the night?
Both are deemed dead now.
Joy wraps itself in mourning’s cloak.
Love’s springtide
carries the green pulse of bloom.
Yet to slay hope, to shatter a vow,
is a catastrophe enough for any age.
Love and wrath are bound in a single knot.
In the mirror of dreams
the world becomes a marketplace.
And in that marketplace
a shadow falls
over translucent melodies of spring,
over verdant meadows,
over pearl-laden, swaying fields.
Eyes go blind.
Ears turn deaf.
Only wealth gleams,
only riches glitter.
What remains to be said
of the rainbow and raincloud,
of the scented breeze,
of the beloved earth?
In this marketplace
you are for sale.
So am I.
The heart, a patient mendicant
feels and endures each rebuff.
Desire wanders in the scorching sun,
a traveler without a destination.
Atta Shad (1939-1997) is the most revered and cherished modern Balochi poet. He instilled a new spirit in the moribund body of modern Balochi poetry in the early 1950s when the latter was drastically paralysed by the influence of Persian and Urdu poetry. Atta Shad gave a new orientation to modern Balochi poetry by giving a formidable ground to the free verse, which also brought in its wake a chain of new themes and mode of expression hitherto untouched by Balochi poets. Apart from the popular motifs of love and romance, subjugation and suffering, freedom and liberty, life and its absurdities are a few recurrent themes which appear in Shad’s poetry. What sets Shad apart from the rest of Balochi poets is his subtle, metaphoric and symbolic approach while versifying socio-political themes. He seemed more concerned about the aesthetic sense of art than anything else.
Shad’s poetry anthologies include Roch Ger and Shap Sahaar Andem, which were later collected in a single anthology under the title Gulzameen, posthumously published by the Balochi Academy Quetta in 2015. The translated poem is from Gulzameen.
Fazal Baloch is a Balochi writer and translator. He has translated many Balochi poems and short stories into English. His translations have been featured in Pakistani Literature published by Pakistan Academy of Letters and in the form of books and anthologies. Fazal Baloch has the translation rights of Atta Shad from the publisher.
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