chalne deta nahin jab paaon ka chhaala ham ko
ham to Suqraat hain ham zahr se zinda honge
maarna hai to do amrit ka pyaala ham ko
“We walk on our heads for the sake of the household's needs — even on the days the blister on our foot will not let us walk at all. We are Socrates: poison is the very thing that will keep us alive. If you truly mean to kill us, then hand us a cup of nectar.”
चलने देता नहीं जब पाँव का छाला हम को
हम तो सुक़रात हैं हम ज़हर से ज़िंदा होंगे
मारना है तो दो अमृत का प्याला हम को
The verse in Devanagari — it carries the authenticity of the original, and every Hindi reader can read it.
The two couplets move from the body to the spirit. The first is the unglamorous heroism of providing — a man who keeps moving for his family even when his own feet have given out. The second answers any threat with a magnificent inversion: like Socrates, who drank the hemlock and became immortal in the drinking, the speaker says poison is what keeps him alive — so to kill him you would have to do the opposite and hand him nectar. Defeat is made impossible by simply redefining what kills.
Some of the bravest work is the daily, invisible kind — moving for the people who depend on you when you would rather stop. And the thing meant to break you can be the very thing that keeps you standing, if you decide that it is.
The heart of this site stays with Iqbal: explore his couplets → Or browse the whole Other Voices shelf →