On Seeing A Cat In The Lap Of Someone

Introduction
In this poem also ‘Allamah Iqbal uses a common object like a cat in somebody’s lap for explaining a mystic truth. This mystic truth is the universality of the Love of God in everything in the universe. This concept is contained in the first verses of Surahs 59 , 61, 62 and 64 of the Holy Qur‘an, according to which everything in the universe is so intoxicated with the Love of God that either it spontaneously declares His praises and Glory or is about to do so.

Translation
Who has taught you this glancing with shyness?
Who has taught you the riddle of Love’s initiation?

Love comes out of each grace of yours
Wit is dripping from the blue eyes of yours

You see him sometimes, you shy away sometimes
Rise up sometimes, lie down and sleep sometimes

Is your eye bewildered like the mirror?
Are you recognized by the glow of knowledge?

You strike him with wrists, this is a strange playfulness!
Is it aversion or anger? Or a way of Love it is?

You will be removed from the lap if you will be naughty
You will be beaten if the flower on the breast will fall

What are you longing for? What are you seeking?
Ah! Are you also in Love with the same thing?

The feeling for Beauty is not special to Man
Like the heart it is present in everything

In the flask of time Love is like the pure wine
Love is the sun’s spirit, and the blood in moon’s veins

Its pain is concealed in every speck’s core
This is the light which is reflected in everything