Tooba Khokhar, Cambridge
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils…
I still remember encountering this poem for the first time, as many of us will have done, in an age its poet deems “apparelled in celestial light, the glory and freshness of a dream”, that is to say, childhood. Nature, the unchanging backdrop to the rituals of life, is where so many of our greatest loves and desires are often played out.
In the Persian tradition too, the lover is symbolised by a nightingale and the beloved a rose. But such an affection is tinged in sadness for the rose’s beauty is as quick to fade as it is to bloom. The nightingale whose sweet melody resounds joyfully in Spring is despondent in Winter. The question that arises then is…
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