Rasul Mir

Rasul Mir the romantic poet of Kashmir par excellence has captivated Kashmiri-speaking people for generations with his poetry. He did not write about mysticism as did most of the poets who preceded him in the Valley. Instead he revelled in beauty both in natural and romantic. Several writers have translated his poems into English many of these translations lack the fervour of the original omitting many words and adding others out of context. After a brief introduction and biographical note the author has selected thirty of Rasul Mir’s most popular poems and translated them into English. The original Kashmiri text is written in Roman script with diacritic marks. In these translations the author has endeavoured to capture the mood of the poet as best as he could while paraphrasing the original lines. In the appendix ten poems written by the author himself are given with their English translations.