Hareef-e-matlab-e-mushkil nahin fusoon-e-niyaaz

A spell of prayer is no match for an arduous quest; O Lord, accept my plea: may Khizr's age be blessed.

Don't be the existence-phantom's desert-wanderer, lest Your inner world of thought still holds its peaks and crests.

Union's great spectacle is here, but who is so possessed Of strength to give the waiting-mirror its last test?

Each lover-particle is a sun-worshipper, a guest Of light; though dust, its need for that proud blaze is not suppressed.

Ask not, O Ghalib, of my passion-tavern, unexpressed, Where the great bowl of heaven is a dustpan, laid to rest.

Behold creation's artifice, a grand deceitful test: The gaze, a reflection-seller; thought, a mirror-smith at best.

So wonder-striking is the Hunter's radiant form, I've guessed, That from my mind's own page the thought of flight is dispossessed.

My heart, from thought's assault, now quakes like a wave's own crest; The glass so frail, the wine with crystal-dissolving zest.

To think that Asad could abandon faith is a fool's jest, Like trying to draw Flight's image with a feather from its nest.

O Vision's-Aftermath, you are disgrace's shame, a thing unblessed; A mischief-walking gaze, with doors to both worlds manifest.