The Poet is Eternal; The Man is Ephemeral: Urdu Poet Ahmed Nadeem Qasmi Passes On

[Photo courtesy Urdu Manzil and Syed Saghier Ahmed Jafri]

As we say in Urdu, the man has passed on from the material, ephemeral world. But the poet and his poetry lives on, and helps us live on. Probably one of the most quoted couplets in Urdu about this very matter, one that captures the matter as few have done before, in any cultural and literary tradition, is from Janaab-e-Qasmi himself, who said:

kaun kehtha hai kay mauth aayee tho marjaa'onga
main thoe dharya hoon samandhar main uthar jaa'onga

or

Who says that when death comes, I will die away?
I am a river and into the ocean will I flow away

The Wikipedia article on Qasmi Saahab can be found at:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahmad_Nadeem_Qasimi

and a longer Urdu ke Naam post from your humble correspondent (including links to more pictures and more poetry) about Qasmi Saahab is at:

http://urdu-ke-naam.blogspot.com/2006/07/qasmi-kaun-kehtha-hai-kay-mauth-aayee.html

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