Shelley's "Ode To The West Wind" -- Urdu Renditions - Part I
Afzal A. Khan
In my time, I have been fond of many diverse subjects, one of them
being English Literature. And, one of my favourite English poets
has been Shelley. Born in 1792, he died in 1822, at the relatively
young age of 29. A few years before his death, circumstances had
forced him to move from England to Italy, where he lived with his
wife in different cities. On 8th July 1822, Shelly drowned in a
sudden sea storm. His remains were interred in Rome.
Regarded as one of the finest lyric poets of his age, he belonged
to an era known in English Poetry as the Romantic Age. His coll-
eagues and close friends in that period were Keats, Byron and Leigh
Hunt etc. He remained an uncompromising revolutionary and idealist
all his life and inspired several generations of English poets and
philosophers. Amongst his major works are long, visionary poems
like "The Revolt of Islam", "Queen Mab" and "Adonais" etc. But in
the popular mind, he is better known for his (comparatively)
shorter poems like "To A Skylark" and "Ode To The West Wind".
Perhaps the latter has a special significance today, when we read
about much of England and Europe lying frozen under snow and major
snowstorms sweeping through most of the East Coast and Midwest
areas of the US. Some two months back, our worthy friend Naseer
Saheb too had written about Fall settling in, heralding the coming
of winter.
This is not the place (nor is it my intention) to offer a detailed
analysis of the poem. Suffice it to say that Shelly refers to the
West Wind as an elemental force of nature, affecting our internal
and external environment. But he ends up with a message of hope
and rejuvenation : "If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind ?"
For those, who might like to read the poem for themselves, here is
the text :
ODE TO THE WEST WIND
O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being,
Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead
Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,
Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,
Pestilence-stricken multitudes: 0 thou,
Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed
The wing�d seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each like a corpse within its grave,until
Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow
Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth, and fill
(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)
With living hues and odours plain and hill:
Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;
Destroyer and Preserver; hear, O hear!
II
Thou on whose stream, 'mid the steep sky's commotion,
Loose clouds like Earth's decaying leaves are shed,
Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean,
Angels of rain and lightning: there are spread
On the blue surface of thine airy surge,
Like the bright hair uplifted from the head
Of some fierce Maenad, even from the dim verge
Of the horizon to the zenith's height,
The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge
Of the dying year, to which this closing night
Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre
Vaulted with all thy congregated might
Of vapours, from whose solid atmosphere
Black rain, and fire, and hail will burst: O hear!
III
Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams
The blue Mediterranean, where he lay,
Lulled by the coil of his crystalline streams,
Beside a pumice isle in Baiae's bay,
And saw in sleep old palaces and towers
Quivering within the wave's intenser day,
All overgrown with azure moss and flowers
So sweet, the sense faints picturing them! Thou
For whose path the Atlantic's level powers
Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below
The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear
The sapless foliage of the ocean, know
Thy voice, and suddenly grow grey with fear,
And tremble and despoil themselves: O hear!
IV
If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear;
If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee;
A wave to pant beneath thy power, and share
The impulse of thy strength, only less free
Than thou, O Uncontrollable! If even
I were as in my boyhood, and could be
The comrade of thy wanderings over Heaven,
As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speed
Scarce seemed a vision; I would ne'er have striven
As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need.
Oh! lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud!
I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!
A heavy weight of hours has chained and bowed
One too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud.
V
Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is:
What if my leaves are falling like its own!
The tumult of thy mighty harmonies
Will take from both a deep, autumnal tone,
Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce,
My spirit! Be thou me, impetuous one!
Drive my dead thoughts over the universe
Like withered leaves to quicken a new birth!
And, by the incantation of this verse,
Scatter, as from an unextinguished hearth
Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!
Be through my lips to unawakened Earth
The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,
If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?
In its turn, the poem has inspired Urdu poets too to compose their
versions.
Tomorrow, InshaAllah, I shall continue the thread by posting a
couple of Urdu renditions......
Afzal
Vijay
> Tomorrow, InshaAllah, I shall continue the thread by posting a
> couple of Urdu renditions......
>
> Afzal
Thanks! Look forward to the Urdu renditions.
Best regards,
Vijay