Amir Khusrau's poetry "In the Bazaar of Love"

As you prepare to chart the waters of a body of translated poetry, be warned: if you are a knower of the tongue in which the poet actually crafted his masterpieces, these waves will seem a tad too still after the heady ebb and flow of the original. But if you haven’t sailed those tides, just go ahead and take the plunge. It’ll be worth your while.In the Bazaar of Love: The selected poetry of Amir Khusrau, translated by Paul Losensky(associate proffessor at Indiana University, Bloomington) and Sunil Sharma (who teaches at Boston University), is a veritable treasure trove of the most beautiful lines composed by the “Parrot of India”, so called because of his fluency and eloquence in Persian, the language of most of his compositions. Indians, however, would be more familiar with his compositions in Hindavi, the tongue of the people of his beloved ‘Hindostan’. Whatever the language, the rhythm and the musical quality of the verse remain unchanged.In fact, the most remarkable aspect of the great Sufi poet is that even if his language were alien to you, you wouldn’t be able to help getting immersed in the jaam (chalice) that his saqi (cupbearer) tempts you with. That beauty, though, is not easily retained in translation. The winding, lilting feel gets rather straightened out, and the complex wordplay that is quintessentially Khusrau loses its coquettish charm.That said, to be able to truly appreciate this book for what it is, you need to wipe your mind clean of the original verse. Translations are meant to allow people a taste of the literary manna that would have been beyond their reach otherwise. And here you will find lines that come significantly close to the original in beauty. For instance, these lines from the piece ‘On Music and Poetry’, which is Khusrau’s explanation of the difference between the poet’s words and the tunes those words are put to: “Poetry is the bride and song her ornament, but/is there any harm if a beautiful bride has none?”In the Persian ghazal, ‘Bi khubi hamchu mahi tabanda bashi’ wherein the last stanza begins thus: “Don’t be cruel. Avoid the shame/ of facing your lovers on Judgement Day” and the splendid lines of ‘Man ashki bidilan-ra khanda mipandashtam ruzi’: “Treat burnt-out Khusrau with contempt/ It’s all fair payback, since he once maligned/ those whom people treat with contempt.”Also present and translated with an obvious effort at maintaining the musical quality (but heart-rendingly lacking the vigour of the original), is the very famous Hindavi piece “Chhap tilak sab chheeni mosay naina milayi ke”.Much better and rhythmically preserved are the two short pieces “Wedding Night” and “Beauty Sleeps on the Bed”. The latter is said to have been uttered by Khusrau on the death of his pir Nizamuddin Auliya: “Beauty sleeps on the bed/ her hair across her face/ Come Khusrau, let’s go home/ night has set over this place.”In fact, Auliya is a prominent figure in the creations of his murid Khusrau. Most of his love-struck verses are actually addressed to the pir, in mystic devotion. The book covers a vast expanse of the works of Khusrau, detailing his life and his inspirations. Lovers of poetry, especially Sufi poetry, would do well to get their hands on this one. True “majnuns” of the art can go dive into the original.