God Is My Most Dearly Beloved! Poem by Kazi Nazrul Islam

God is my most dearly beloved.
He is never far from me,
always He holds me in His embrace.
He is the handsomest and the most beautiful,
my supreme Lord.
Sometimes I call him my master
and lie at His feet in deep humility.
At other times I lose myself in His love
and shower my tear-washed kisses on Him.
The kisses I bestow on Him
fly toward an unknown destination,
and then returning from the seven heavens
they gather again in my breast.
It is according to His wishes
that I speak of myself as His eternal slave,
and yet, though a slave, how I joke
and laugh with Him!
I know not the nature of His beauty,
I only feel His enchanting touch.
Oh, how can I dream of seeing Him
with these two eyes of mine!
But can't a blind wife feel
the loving touch of her husband
and be thrilled?
I know that I shall see my Master
when the veil of darkness will lift
from my eyes.
How can I say if I am frightened
of Him or not?
The limits of His creation are beyond
the reach of my knowledge.
I am afraid of Him during the day,
but at night all tear deserts me.
And then in those dark mysterious hours
what things we say to each other!
Some or that I understand,
some I don't,
only tears flood my eyes.
Forgetting all speech I long to hold Him
tight in my embrace.
I know not where one could find
such a love as this.
Why, does the skylark know
whence comes the rain water to quench
his thirst?
No loving couple has ever tasted
such a love as this!
Only the truly beloved of God knows it.
Sometimes I play with Him,
but sometimes I see Him going away
from me leaving me behind,
and then my sorrow knows no bounds.
Hurt and pained, I destroy the peasant bower
I built.

Tears well up in my eyes,
the pang of separation overwhelms me,
and my days and nights grow dull, lifelessness
and heavy.
And then I suddenly discover with a start
that the friend of my days
and the lover of my nights
lies, quietly smiling, deeply entrenched
in my tear-drenched breast.
With my eyes swimming in tears I cry;
'You are so noble, so great,
and yet you come to me!
What if the learned theologians
slander You?
You are ever holy and sacred,.
You are my most dearly beloved.
Why should you Jove one so
and invite all these vile attacks? '
You quietly smile and say.
'One who is touched by the magic of my love
is changed in a moment
and turned into pure gold.
All his past is wiped out
and he becomes a new man.
And yet his detractors slander him
and grow green with envy! '

'Does he lament and pine away and weep? '
ask the learned theologians.

My love replies,
'I have seen tears in his eyes,
I have heard his tear-soaked message
in the darkness of the night
The sorrows of his beloved
have brought a storm in his sky,'
I wonder and say;
'You are so kind, so beautiful;
why, then, is there
such a barren desert
in the hearts of men? '

My Lord answers,
'They do not want to make friends
with me.

They avoid me.
they turn their backs on me.
and that brings on them all their sufferings.
Like a beggar I stand all the time
at their door.
I plead not to be shut out
but to be taken in,
and yet they turn a deaf ear
to my entreaties.
They think that I am cruel,
and thought I provide them with shelter
it is they who shut me out.
They look upon me as a stranger,
they fear me,
and in turn they themselves grow
timid and cowardly.
I gladly take him into my arms
whoever wants to befriend me.
Who is a better friend of man than me'?
AIl the sins, curses and black stains
dropp off from one who is touched by my love.
and then he is no longer judged by me.
All creatures can be my beloved
if they only want me,
and then they can find their fulfillment.'

I look about me and see His love
in the moonlight that falls on this earth.
I see His love wrapped about the length and breadth
of the sprawling blue sky.
It is His love that makes me so an anxious
to make Him my own.
It is His love that makes me love
this world of ours with such great affection.
Eternally beautiful. eternally full of grace,
He begs us all the time to make ourselves
as beautiful as He.
But on this beautiful creation of His
falls the shadow of the evil.
That raises all the problems and Shuts Him off
from our vision.
We strive and work for our own petty gains
and like fools, run away from tile task
allotted to us by Him in His infinite wisdom.
We are like ignorant children,
and so He wants us to act
according to His instructions.
All His directives He has clearly laid down
in His Holy Book,
but we pay no heed to them.
Drunk with pride we go our way
and blunder and languish and wither away.
Those who do not follow the path shown by Him
exchange nectar for poison
and then complain for ever.
No one who begged His kindness
ever came back with empty hands.
disappointed and rejected,

Only those who never sought His assistance
went on blaming Him as unkind and cruel.
Whose loving kindness is behind the blossoming
of all the smiling flowers, all the sprouting
corns and foodgrains of this earth?

Whose warm affection flows down
from the rainy clouds and along the swelling
streams of rivers and seas'?
From whom does this life spring
and gain its power, fame and prestige?
This knowledge still eludes those fools
and malcontents,

In His name I say.
Please listen to me, all of you who
as yet do not believe.
Take Him to your bosom as your friend
and you will see that all your wants
have vanished.
It is through His infinite mercy
that I love Him.
I would like to say only this and leave;
'One who has got Him through His love
has nothing else to seek for him
in this wide wide universe.
But I have said enough.
Go now and love Him,
and come back to me again.
and tell me what you have lost
and what you have gained.

[Original: Allah porom prioytomo mor; Translation: Kabir Chowdhury]