شمع اور شاعر
تو اگر خود دار ہے، منت کش ساقی نہ ہوعین دریا میں حباب آسا نگوں پیمانہ کر
English translation
If you are self-respecting be not obliged to the cup-bearer; in the ocean’s midst turn the goblet up side down like the bubble (Simile for the up-side down, i.e. empty wine-cup).
Translated by Dr M.A.K. Khalil
About this couplet
This is couplet 56 of 86 in “شمع اور شاعر” (The Candle And The Poet) in the section Poems of Period - 1908-30, from Allama Muhammad Iqbal's Urdu book Bang-e-Dara (بانگِ درا), published in 1924.
Read it in the poem۵۶ / ۸۶