Daughter + Mother = Carrie + Debbie & "Black Day"

“Black Day”

‘Is the sun out?’

I’m asking every passerby,

This is my only question for today,

I wonder what’s so haunting in my inquiry.

That every passerby,

With swift pace,

Walks away from me.

Or, again, turns around and returns to the street,

Where the most famous morgue is located.

I tune my inner soulfulness and rub my outer eyes,

Not a single ray of light is visible to me.

Maybe I’m suffering from the sunflower’s ailment,

Or my enraptured self is telling the truth

That the sun was murdered!

Parveen Shakir (24 November 1952 - 26 December 1994)

Translated from the Urdu by M.S. Alverston, 02/24/11.