Aik Alif by Bulleh Shah

The first post of 'The Translation Series' is the translation of a Punjabi poem known as 'Aik Alif' by my favourite Sufi poet, Bulleh Shah. He was a great Sufi poet of Punjab as well as a saint, a humanist and a philosopher.

I hope this translation helps you grasp the message the poet is trying to convey.

Parh parh ilm te faazil hoya

You read so many books to know it all

Te kaday apnay aap nu parhya ee na

Yet fail to ever read your heart at all

Bhaj bhaj warna ay mandir maseeti

You rush to holy shrines to play a part,

Te kaday mann apnay wich warya ee na

Would you dare enter the shrine of your heart 

 Larna ay roz shaitaan de naal

You are quick to attack the evil one

Te kadi nafs apnay naal larya ee na

Yet pride is a battle you have not won

Bulleh Shah asmaani ud-deya pharonda ay

You grab for a star you can control

Te jera ghar betha unoon pharya ee na

Yet fail to grasp the light in your soul.

Bas kareen o yaar Ilm-oun bas kareen o yaar

Let the race end, my friend,stop trying to be the one who knows

Ik Alif teray darkaar

For ‘God is One’ you need to know.

Bas kareen o yaar Allah Sayyaan Allah Sayyaan 

End the race, my friend. God is All we need! God is All!

Main jaanaa Jogi de naal

Follow the wandering dervish!

Jo naa jaane haq ki taaqat rab na devey us ko himat 

If you deny the power of all that’s true, God will not grant strength to you

Hum mnn ke darya mein doobey

We are lost in this river of self

Kaisi nayya? Kya manjhdhaar?

No boat or streams are of any help

Bas kareen o yaar

End the race, my friend

Ilm-oun bas kareen o yaar

Stop trying to know it all, my friend

Allah Sayyaan Allah Sayyaan

God is All we need! God is All!


 This has also been performed at Coke Studio by the very famous Saeein Zahoor and Noori, you can listen to it here.

Thank you for stopping by :)

The Translation Series

For quite sometime now I've been wanting to do a translation series because of a number of reasons. Mainly because I've wanted the world to find beauty in the literature of every language and somehow Asian languages have forever been neglected and also because I've been doing translations for friends for quite sometime now and its about time I start doing this officially. So by initiating this series I'll be translating my favourite pieces of Punjabi and Urdu literature and sometimes, very rarely you might even find Persian ones. It's a pretty hard job to translate such classical and bombastic Punjabi and Urdu pieces into English and make sure that they have the same impact even after translation but I promise to try and give my best. I hope this turns out to be the way I've planned it.  

Thank you for stopping by. :)