Sufi poetry sets young Muslims’ minds in motion - Farrukh Dhondy

Mahmood has serious credentials. He is compiling the Penguin book of Sufi verse (though that may not be its final title on publication) and he is of the opinion that of all Islamic art, architecture being the body, poetry is its soul. He has ancestral pedigree too. His grandfather is the Islamic scholar Bari Miah of the Firangi Mahal in Lucknow, and he numbers several serious Islamic scholars among his relatives.

At the dinner Mahmood finds himself seated next to the mayor on his right and the head of the "Muslim Council", one Abdul Bari, on his left. Ranged before him at the other tables are the stalwarts of the fundamentalist interpretations of the faith, men and women who have worked their way into this assembly as representatives of the Muslim groups of Britain.

The dinner finishes and the time comes for Mahmood to read his poems. He begins in fine and traditional form with a praise of the Almighty, a Hamd, and then a tribute to the Prophet, a Naath.

He then recites from his translations which I reproduce roughly here:

"It was a dark night

The gates to the Ka'aba and temple were locked,

And yet the door to repentance was open

The taverns were alive with light"