*ORPHEUS: A Greek musician who is said to have possessed such mastery of music that he could make the "trees bow" and the "storms calm down" with his tunes and harmonies. He is mentioned more in William Shakespeare's plays especially Richard II.
*RUMI: The first Muslim mystical philosopher, thinker and poet.
*GHALIB: Full name Mirza Asadullah Khan Ghalib, regarded by almost every Urdu poet as the "mentor" of them all. Ghalib lived in British India from 1797 to 1869. He had an extremely struggling life yet he rose above his tribulations and embellished poetry with some rare and unparalleled mystical insights.
*IQBAL: Full name is Dr. Mohammad Iqbal, also known as "Allama Iqbal". Many regard him as the second best Urdu poet after Mirza Asadullah Khan Ghalib. Iqbal too is well known for his mystically wise poems, especially in his books called "Baang-e-Dara"; "Baal-e-Jibreel"' and "Zarb-e-Kaleem". Born in Sialkot during the British Raj in India, it is Iqbal who envisioned a "separate homeland for the downtrodden and persecuted Muslims and minorities of racist and caste-based India. Many philosophers including Dr. Barbara Matcoff of Germany and Professor Anne Marie Schimell, the orientalist and an expert on Iqbal and his poetry, credits him as being more of a philosopher than a poet.
"PUSKIN: Full name is Alexander Pushkin of Russia. Pushkin, like Maxim Gorky and Leo Tolstoy, is well known the world over for his mystically inclined poetry and philosophy.
*KABEER: Full name is Bhagat Kabeer. He was an Indian poet whose poetry is full of mystical discourse and extraordinarily expressed in the most easily understood metaphorical nuances.
*KHAYYAM: Full name is Omar Khayyam, a well known Persian astronomer, mathematician and poet, who was made famous in the West by F.Scott Fitzgerald's translations of his quatrains. The book is known as "THE RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM", Fitzgerald has made a good attempt at translating the quatrains but like all original works, the "Rubaiyat" must be read in Persian, to understood fully....as the verses abound with mystical and metaphysical connotations and similes.
*FAIZ AHMED FAIZ: The most well known Urdu poet admired both by poetry lovers in Pakistan, India and wherever Urdu is read, spoken and understood.
*FARAZ: Full name is Ahmed Faraz. He is also an acclaimed Urdu poet of Pakistan, admired the world over, by lovers of Urdu poetry. Some of his poems are a combination of romanticism and mystical hints.
*MEER TAQI MEER: Regarded by even Mirza Ghalib as a greater "ghazal poet" than he himself. Meer Taqi Meer, of Indian origin, lived and died before Mirza Ghalib. He too was mystical and had to pay a heavy price for his beliefs and poetry.
*MAJAZ: Full name is Majaz Lucknawi. He was a contemporary of Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Sahir Ludhianvi, Ahmed Nadeem Qasmi, Ehsan Danish, Ada Jaffri and Sufi Tabassum. Majaz, like Keats of England, was a brilliant writer and a talented Urdu poet. He, like Keats, Shelley and Emily Bronte, died young....after a long period of unemployment and unrequited love. His poetry is romantic and mystical as well as a true description of the times he lived. He died of consumption -- just like Keats, Emily Bronte and several other poets worldwide.
