Click here for background and on any passage for word meanings and explanatory discussion. parvin shakir (1952-1994), English literature and linguistics, correspondent, educator, Pakistan Civil Service. Prolific writer bringing new thought and new forthright, feminist style to urdu shaa’eri. The poet might very well be using the violet as a metaphor for herself (and/or other women), who are free spirits but are “urbanized” either in a domestic situation or perhaps by societal constraints. She uses Wordsworth’s poem as an inspiration.
1
vo patthar pe khilte hue Khoobsoorat banafshe¹ ka nanha sa ek phool thi
jis ki saaNsauN² meN jangal ki vahshi³ havaaeN samaaii⁴ hui thiiN 1.violet (flower) 2.used here to mean fragrance 3.wild, untamed 4.held, contained, dissolved
That beautiful, tiny violet, blooming on a rock in whose fragrance was dissolved the untamed air of the jungle …
2
us ke be-saaKhta¹ husn² ko dekh kar
ek musaafir³ baRe pyaar se toR kar, apne ghar le gaya    1.unformed, natural, untouched 2.beauty 3.traveler
… seeing its virgin beauty, a traveler with great love, picked it and took it home
3
aur phir
apne deevan-Khaane¹ meN rakkhe hue kaaNch ke Khoobsoorat se guldaan² meN
us ko aise sajaaya
ke har aane vaale ki pahli nazar us pe paRne lagi
daad³ o tahsiN⁴ ki baarish meN vo bheegta hi raha   1.sitting room, parlour 2.flower vase 3.praise 4.appreciation
… and then, in his sitting room, arranged it in a vase such that everyone who came showered and drenched it in praise and appreciation.
4
koii us se kahe
golden leaf aur eu de cologne ki narm shahri mahak se
banafshe ke nanhe shagufe¹ ka dam ghuT raha hai
vo jangal ki taaza hava ko tarasne laga hai 1.bloom, flower
Someone should tell him (the traveler who picked the violet and brought it home) the tiny bloom of violet is suffocating in the urban fragrances of commercial colognes. It thirsts for the fresh air of the wilds.

She Dwelt Among the Untrodden Ways

William Wordsworth

She dwelt among the untrodden ways
Beside the springs of Dove
A maid whom there was none to praise
And very few to love:

A violet by a mossy stone
Half hidden from the eye
Fair as a star, when only one
Is shining in the sky.

She lived unknown, and few could know
When Lucy ceased to be;
But she is in her grave, and, oh,
The difference to me!

Discussion Copied from Wikipedia

“She Dwelt among the Untrodden Ways” is a three-stanza poem written by the English Romantic poet William Wordsworth in 1798 when he was 28 years old.  The poem is the best known of Wordsworth’s series of five works which comprise his “Lucy” series, and was a favourite amongst early readers. It was composed both as a meditation on his own feelings of loneliness and loss, and as an ode to the beauty and dignity of an idealised woman who lived unnoticed by all others except by the poet himself. The title line implies Lucy lived unknown and remote, both physically and intellectually. The poet’s subject’s isolated sensitivity expresses a characteristic aspect of Romantic expectations of the human, and especially of the poet’s, condition.

According to the literary critic Kenneth Ober, the poem describes the “growth, perfection, and death” of Lucy.  Whether Wordsworth has declared his love for her is left ambivalent, and even whether she had been aware of the poet’s affection is unsaid. However the poet’s feelings remain unrequited, and his final verse reveals that the subject of his affections has died alone. Lucy’s “untrodden ways” are symbolic to the poet of both her physical isolation and the unknown details of her mind and life. In the poem, Wordsworth is concerned not so much with his observation of Lucy, but with his experience when reflecting on her death.