Wali Deccani

Wali of the Deccan is called in the book the first to write an Urdu diwan and the Father of Urdu poetry; born at Aurungabad, he wrote in the latter half of the seventeenth century, held a just balance between Sunnis and Shiahs, and did not flatter any ruler in his verses.

The one piece given here is drawn from Hindustani Lyrics (London: The Sufi Publishing Society, 1919), in the English verse of Inayat Khan and Jessie Duncan Westbrook. It is a free rendering, not a literal translation, and the original Urdu poem is untitled; it is named here by its first line.