Even the silhouette of a cage
is a prison.
I am turning into the shadow
of my clothes.
My hands remain in others.
The mud, now forlorn.
Why did the river fall
on its own into the sea?
How lonely it is to choose.
I am in pieces
severed from the ones who die
& I wake up in flames
resounding in stone,
drowned in dirt.
What tree will take root here?
The name of my sorrows is a child.
My hands hold broken toys
& my eyes behold humans.
Many bodies demand from me eyes.
Where do I begin?
The life of the skies is briefer than mine.
To fly does not require landing.
Whose voices are the hands?
(Bear with me my lies).
When you free the forest’s birds,
the flame tastes the lamp.
On the roof of being,
I hang my clothes to dry.
My eyes remain fixed
in the distance.
I dress myself in sorrows,
clad in the lick of flames.
Should I tell you
the name of my shade?
To you, I bequeath
the moons of every night.
Translator’s note
These translations are from Aankhein, which remains in circulation without a known literary estate or publisher actively enforcing copyright. While many renditions of her work exist in print, I was drawn to create versions that reflect the surrealism and fragmentation in her poetry through the use of breath and space, in keeping with the aesthetics of contemporary English-language poetry.
Sara Shagufta (1954–1984) was a Pakistani poet who wrote experimental, confessional, and political verse in Urdu and Punjabi. Born in the Punjabi city of Gujranwala, she spent most of her life in Karachi. Her posthumously published collection, Aankhein, cemented her reputation as one of the most original and overlooked voices in Urdu poetry.
Aiman Tahir Khan is a writer and editor from Lahore, Pakistan. She was selected as the inaugural Pakistan Youth Poet Laureate in English. Her work appears in Nimrod, Porter House Review, and Muzzle Magazine, among others. She currently serves as Associate Poetry Editor at Sontag Mag, mentors young Pakistani poets through Lakeer Magazine, and reads works in translation for The Adroit Journal.