Bacha aur Shama

What is this wonder, child with a moth's desire, That makes you gaze upon the candle's fire?

Why do you stir, though seated here on my knee? Is your desire to embrace the light you see?

Your tiny heart is filled with wonder deep, A recognition from a slumbering sleep.

The candle is a flame, but you are pure light; Ah! It's unveiled, while you are veiled from sight.

Why Nature's hand has made the flame unveiled, While you in this dark lantern of clay are veiled.

Your light is hidden by the veil of knowing, On seeing eyes, a dust that stops its glowing.

This thing we call our life is but a haze, A dream, a trance, a stupor for our days.

For Nature's court is Beauty's boundless sea; Each drop a storm, if only eyes could see.

In mountains' awesome silence, Beauty lies, In spreading sun, and in the night's dark guise.

In morning's sky, a mirror clear and bright, In evening's dark, and twilight's rosy light.

In fading ruins of some ancient age, And in a child's first words upon life's stage.

In all the blended songs the garden sings, And in the nests built by small, feathered things.

In mountain springs, in rivers flowing free, In towns, in wastes, for all the world to see.

But still the soul for some lost treasure yearns, Else why like a caravan's bell in this waste mourns?

Amidst this pageant of all Beauty's grace, It lives like a fish outside its native place.