Today, my friend Khalid Mir told me rather casually that he had been reading poems by Miroslav Holub. I had heard his name; and when K sent me this poem, I could not resist posting it here. Have read it again and again. For sometimes, I tell myself similar lines – of course in a highly unpoetical fashion. Yesterday, I tweeted this verse from Ghalib: “Meri kismat mei gham gar itna tha. Dil bhee ya rab kai diye hote”. Indeed many different ways to understand the heart and the one below is unique for its gritty imagery as well as playfulness.
Officially the heart
is oblong, muscular,
and filled with longing.
But anyone who has painted the heart knows
that it is also
spiked like a star
and sometimes bedraggled
like a stray dog at night
and sometimes powerful
like an archangel’s drum.
And sometimes cube-shaped
like a draughtsman’s dream
and sometimes gaily round
like a ball in a net.
And sometimes like a thin line
and sometimes like an explosion.
And in it is
only a river,
a weir
and at most one little fish
by no means golden.
More like a grey
jealous
loach.
It certainly isn’t noticeable
at first sight.
Anyone who has painted the heart knows
that first he had to
discard his spectacles,
his mirror,
throw away his fine-point pencil
and carbon paper
and for a long while
walk
outside.
— Miroslav Holub, trans. from Czech by Ewald Osers
* “Miroslav Holub is a scientist by vocation and considers his poetry a pastime…” Read more here
