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THREE GREAT SUFI POETS OF KASHMIR Lalla Ded, Nund Rishi, Ghani Kashmiri Selected Poems Translation & Introduction Paul Smith Lalla Ded is the famous female poet/saint from Kashmir who lived at exactly the same time as Hafiz of Shiraz (1320-1392). Her vakhs (poems/sayings) are sung even today in Kashmir. She was married at a young age but the marriage was a failure and she walked out at the age of twenty-four. She became a disciple of Siddha Srikanth. It must have taken a lot of courage on her part to walk out of a marriage and to walk around unclothed as she did. She was treated with contempt by some and much reverence by others, seeing her as a saint and eventually as God-realized. Her two hundred vakhs are some of the oldest examples of Kashmiri written. She was a bridge between Hindu mysticism and Sufism. Nund Rishi ('Rishi' meaning Kashmiri Sufi) or Shaikh Nur ud-din, as he was afterwards named, was born at Kaimuh, a village two miles to the west of Bijbihara in Kashmir in 1377. He used his poetry as tool to spread the knowledge of the absolute and criticized the mullas and other pseudo-scholars and gave expression to the lives of the common people. He also composed many poems on the pitfalls of the spiritual path and on the love of the devotee for God. His poetry is called Shruks that are poems in the rhyme structure of A-B, A-B. The Rishi order is a Sufi tradition of religious harmony and it was founded by among others Nund Rishi. He was popular as a Sufi Perfect Master in Kashmir in his lifetime and still is. Ghani Kasmiri (1610-1668) is Kashmir's greatest Sufi poet of the Persian language. His teacher & spiritual master was another great Sufi & poet Mushin Fani. Ghani was visited in Kashmir by Sa'ib, Kalim & Qudsi, along with Ghani some of the most influential poets of the new style of Indian Persian poetry (Sabk-e-Hindi). Ghani led a simple life often in seclusion and never wrote for royalty or the rich. He exposed corruption and sang of truth, love and bea