This poem by modernist Balochi poet, Munir Momen, has been translated into English by Fazal Baloch.
In the void of our separation
A day can break
A night can sleep
A city can rest
A dream can bloom
But this solitude, which is a sleeping soldier,
Would vanquish like the sadness over a snuffed-out lamp
Far from the threshold of our hope
Someone’s imagination gives birth to fireflies
Where wind plays with pearls
And moon is a drop of honey
But in a farther premonition
The entire world is a dead street
Neither you exist nor I
Neither a day nor a night
Neither any memory of the moon nor a dead firefly
Not even an encounter in the darkness
Not even a lament over a broken promise
In the void of our separation
There was a bird that flew away
In the void of our separation
There was a needle
That got lost.
Fazal Baloch teaches Urdu at Atta Shad Degree College, Turbat. He is the first regular translator of Balochi literature into English.
