[Tavern-Talk] Seemab's Day of fortune

[tavern]

Seemab's Day of Fortune

2008 has proven to be a year of celebrations not just in Baba Town East 
(that is, Meherabad-Meherazad) but at Baba centres elsewhere. For fifty 
years earlier Avatar Meher Baba conducted a series of sahavases ­- or 
strictly speaking, by His own description, one extended sahavas ­- that 
bridged from East to West and carried Him around the globe on His final 
world tour.

The first of these sahavases transpired at Meherabad between 15th and 26th 
February. Three months later He flew to America, where in May He poured out 
His love to His lovers in the Meher Center in Myrtle Beach; then on to 
Australia in June, where He inaugurated Avatar's Abode. These original 
programs of Baba's were commemorated this year (2008) at all three of these 
places. At Meherabad this past February the public remembrance of Baba's 
final sahavas at this sacred site drew many hundreds of His lovers from all 
over India; and at Avatar's Abode pilgrims from around the world took part 
in a seven-day commemoration and celebration of the founding of one of the 
world's great Baba centres.

The particular moment in all of this that I want to dilate upon here ­- the 
incident that prompts this present "Tavern Talk" ­- happened at the outset 
of Meher Baba's Meherabad sahavas with the Hindi and Marathi groups. On 
16th February 1958, among many other activities, singers from the Baba 
groups entertained their Beloved with bhajans and qawaalis. During the 
afternoon session one particular singer rendered a ghazal by the celebrated 
Urdu poet Seemab. Midway, while the song was still in progress, Baba 
stopped the performance. For several moments silence prevailed among the 
many hundreds assembled there. Then Baba informed His lovers that He had 
just bestowed on Seemab that ultimate Gift of gifts ­- Liberation from the 
round of births and deaths. The great poet's offering from an earlier life 
had borne its Fruit through the nazar and grace of the Avatar of the age.

Who was this lucky man, Seemab Akbarabadi? We know this much: he was a poet 
of the modern era, born in Agra in 1880 and passing away in Karachi in 1951 
(on 31st January, as it happens). My internet source describes him as the 
disciple of Daag Dehlvi (1831–1905), one of the great Urdu poets of his 
day. The word “disciple” here obviously signifies a poetic rather than a 
spiritual lineage. About Seemab's spiritual backgrounds and associations 
specifically, I have no information. We do know this, however: at a later 
date, after the 1958 sahavas, Baba said that Seemab had composed and 
dedicated his poem to his own Sadguru.

Naturally the story of Seemab and his liberation by the grace of the Avatar 
will generate interest in the ghazal he wrote, since who ever heard of 
another poem that created an effect like this one did? I close this “Tavern 
Talk,” then, with a reproduction of the ghazal, first in a romanized 
transliteration from the Urdu and then in an English translation. The Urdu 
transliteration has been taken from a past issue of the Glow (November, 
1973, p. 16). Since I do not myself read Urdu, the translation was carried 
out by Gopi Krishna (a Baba lover from Hyderabad) and me, with help from 
Meherwan Jessawala and others from Meherabad-Meherazad. We drew to a 
certain extent on Adi K. Irani's translation that appears in the 
aforementioned Glow issue. I cannot altogether vouch for the accuracy 
either of the Urdu text or the translation ­- perhaps some scholar and 
expert in Urdu can improve upon it; but it will give a rough idea. As 
perhaps you can see even from this crude English rendering, Seemab's dense 
lines are ambiguous and idiomatic, in the manner of great Urdu poetry; 
their profound spiritual ideas are expressed in a symbolic language 
susceptible to many interpretations.

Ward Parks
for Tavern Talk
9th October 2008


                                     Seemab's Urdu Text

Ab kyaa bataauun main tere milne se kyaa milaa?
Irfaan-e-gam huaa mujhe dil kaa pataa milaa.

Jab duur tak na koii faqir aashnaa milaa,
Tere niyaaz-mand tere dar se jaa milaa.

Manzil milii muraad milii muddua milaa;
Sab kuchh mujhe milaa jo teraa naqsh-e-paa milaa.

Khud been-o-khud shanaas milaa khudnuma milaa.
Insan ke bhes me mujhe aksar khuda milaa.

Sar jasha-e-jamal ki hairaniyan na puuch.
Har zarre ke hijab me ek aashnaa milaa.

Paaya tujhe huduud-e taayun se mawara
Manzil se kuch nikal ke tera raasta milaa.

Kyun ye khuda ke dhuundane waale hain na muraad?
Guzaraa jo main huduud-e-khudi se khuda milaa.

Ye ek hi to niyaamat insaan nawaz thi.
Dil mujhko mil gaya to khudai ko kya milaa.

Yaa zakhm-e-dil ko phenkde nazaron se cheel kar,
Yaa aitaraaf kar ke nishaan-e-vafaa milaa.

Seemab ko shaguftaa na dekhaa tamaam umr;
Kambakht jab milaa hamen gam aashnaa milaa.


                        An English Translation

What can I say, what did I achieve when I met you?
I got the knowledge of pain; I found address of my heart.

When across a long distance I could find no friendly guide,
Your humble supplicant at last arrived at your doorstep.

I reached the destination and gained what I desired; I attained my object.
Indeed, I got everything the moment I discovered your footprint.

A Self-seer and a Self-knower I met; I met the Self-revealer.
In the guise of a man I found verily God.

Do not ask about the distressing bewilderments in the celebrations of beauty.
Hidden behind the veil of every particle I uncovered a dear one.

I found you superior to the limits of what I could conceive;
By going beyond the high station is revealed the way to you.

Why are these seekers of God disappointed?
Having crossed the boundary of self, God is met.

This is the only gift that man was favored with;
When I found my own heart, what other godly thing was there to receive?

Either tear away and cast out from your sight the heart's wounds,
Or else agree that you have found in me the mark of faithfulness.

Throughout his entire life Seemab never appeared to be happy;
Whenever I met that wretched fool, I found a companion of sorrow.
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