Bikut Kahani: A Tale of Love and Longing

بکٹ کہانی: بارہ ماسہ کا المیہ عشق

Abstract

Bikut Kahani by Muhammad Afzal is a remarkable work in the tradition of Barahmasa poetry, in which the progression of months and seasons serves as a symbolic backdrop for the exploration of love, longing, and separation. Through the voice of a female speaker who addresses her companions (sakhis), the poem portrays the intensity of desire and the anguish of separation from her beloved. Each month from the rains of Sawan to the frosty nights of Aghan and the blossoming of Phagun is depicted not merely as a change in nature, but as an intensification of emotional states. Hunger and sleep vanish, the heart burns with the fire of longing, and natural phenomena like rain, cold, or blossoming flowers deepen the sense of absence rather than bring solace. The poem exemplifies how seasonal cycles become metaphors for the constancy of human passion and suffering, creating a lyrical fusion of nature and emotion. Bikut Kahani thus stands as both a cultural artifact of medieval Indian literary traditions and a timeless expression of love, melancholy and the universality of human emotion.