Over all things…
Where is the melody of contentment?
Where is the flowing peace?
Time and again,
My heart is rudely shaken,
By this tumultuous world!

Over all things…
From father to son,
From brother to brother,
From nations to nations,
Our warring earth is beyond:
Human dimensions!

Over all things…
By the bitterness of this grief,
How much must I suffer, more?
O, my friends, speak not again,
Like me talking about Life:
O, for no more it is the same!

Over all things…
I have wandered off somewhere.
I am lost and alone,
Losing the shores of any hope.
From the bitterness of this truth, too,
How much must I suffer, more?

Over all things…
Tidings that took me to the taverns,
In a land of wisdom and mirth,
Where has their music gone?
What will take me to recall it?
I am standing like an emptied vessel!

Geeta Chhabra

Published in Al Rafed Magazine in September 2011.