DIWALI 1

You can decorate my courtyard,

                        With as many lamps as you please.

But you cannot illuminate

             The deep gloom of my soul with their bliss.

From these tiny lamps,

                              You wish to brighten my mind,

How innocent of you; you insist

                                The fireflies to lighten a world.

 Mercifully, you wish me to bathe

                                 In the lights for a brief period,

Smile heartily coming out of the grave

                                        Of sorrow for that period.

I do not wish to smile temporarily

                   While I know that sorrow is my fortune,

  No fleeing from my permanent ally            

                          As I do not trust in fleeting relations.

There is a moon in the heaven

                                        That can cure my affliction,

But she forgot the path of my sky

                              Once she dipped into the horizon.

The full moon night, the moonbeams,

                                  Will certainly come for others,

But the new moon had decided

                                            To reign over my sector.

Whatsoever she had given me

                                Even if it is tears, it is my heaven,

And I do not wish to come

                              Out of the spell of her adoration.