Stranger In Babylon - Iv Poem by Sadiqullah Khan

He throws a coin of whatever value
And says these words ‘The Goddess of Mylitta
Prosper thee'. The coin once thrown is sacred.
In the lap of the girl, in Aphrodite temple
Seated there for the first and only encounter
To consort and rejects no one.
Many of the wealthier, too proud to mix with strangers,
Followed by attendants, drive in covered carriages
To the precinct, and others wear, wreaths of strings
Above their head. There is always a great crowd.
The tall and pretty get it sooner, and other
May wait for four years. And wedding is a bidding,
To the highest goes, and of course the wealthiest,
The lame of limbs, or the uglier sort, to the poor -
Who like everywhere else, and today are not comely.
Euphrates flows through its middle, walled with moat,
Burnt brick fence the river and houses made
Three or four stories high. The boats which come down
Are leather and circular and taken back folded
By donkeys, after their hulls of willow have been sold.
Of the customs they wear linen tunic reaching the feet,
In three piece, turbans, carry sticks with curved heads
Ornamented into apple, rose or eagle.
Anoint themselves with perfumes and bury their dead
In honey with lamentations like those of Egyptians.
When a man is ill, they lay him in the public square
And the passers-by come up to him and tells as he knows.
Before Cyrus and of the Assyrian Kings, there were queens.
Princess Nitocris, who made water channels and walls,
By a remarkable deception, she her tomb built
On one of the gateways above heads and this inscription
Cut upon it. ‘If there be one among my successors
On the throne of Babylon, who is in want of treasure,
Let him open my tomb, and take as much as he chooses -
Not, unless he be truly in want, for it will not be for his good'
Darius opened the tomb, for he wanted to use the passage way,
Of a massive structure and moreover a dead body lay
Over his head, while passing through. Accordingly,
He opened the tomb, and instead of money, found only
The dead body and a writing which said. -
‘Had thou not been insatiate of pelf, and careless how thou gottest it,
Thou wouldst not have broken open the sepulture of the dead.'

-Adapted from Herodotus (484 - 425 BC) , Histories, Book I.

Babylon was one of the glories of the ancient world, its walls and mythic hanging gardens listed among the Seven Wonders.
Founded about 4,000 years ago, the ancient city was the capital of 10 dynasties in Mesopotamia, considered one of the earliest cradles of civilization and the birthplace of writing and literature.


Sadiqullah Khan
Peshawar
July 12,2014.