"To die, to sleep -
To sleep, perchance to dream - ay, there's the rub,
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause; " ... Hamlet: III i ll 63-7.
The gray-haired hotelier sits in his cane-chair,
rocks it to and fro, to and fro.
In the distance, he sees clouds shape themselves
into quaint lane-ways, stone walls and flat houses
trapped in the landscape of childhood
and a flat ledge juts out, of Cumulus,
then whiter still, shinier, rests a man, blind
and resting, footsore and weary:
Hafiz Doliwaley writes itself in the sky
and the weather turns around, its green branches
blown in the wind, the Neem Tree spread wide,
its blossoms for the blind mendicant, lost in his dreams.
He is alone with little to sustain but crumbs and khana;
a sad man, a wise man, a fool, a happy one,
a majzoob; his blind eyes pierce the future,
and his chant resounds: Kan ban jay-ega;
monosyllables ejaculate and tumble
from dry lips of dry times . . .
yes, the aged hotelier recalls this
scaling down, oh, six decades of old Delhi
sighting again this man of hard prophecies
but the eyes of Haji, the hotelier, grow moist;
he visits, again, the grave near Bahadar
lit with candles, colored wraps, joss sticks
for it is Thursday's pilgrimage for the boy
now sixty years young to the day
of the teasing, taunting thrown forward
to an old Doliwala in dust, near death and sleeping:
"You are old, old, majzoob! You cannot run,
not with me, nor for India, nor Allah."
The majzoob runs through dust into dust.
The hotelier rocks in his cane-chair;
watches storms fly over the brown lake.
Clouds, distantly, show him Hafiz ... the Neem tree
now leafless, fruitless ... and the blind one,
Hafiz, rises from shrouds and beckons.
Haji, the hotelier, wakes, starts and trembles:
It is not a dream . . . even, as he rocks to and fro:
Kan ban jay-ega, that timeless chant.
Silver trophy winner
Adding your comment:
I had to read again and still get lost.. 
