Role of Fate in the Poem "Wedding in the Flood" by Taufiq Rafat

SHUAIB ASGHAR
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH
GOVT. RAZVIA ISLAMIA COLLEGE

HAROONABAD, PAKISTAN

The poem Wedding in the Flood is certainly about wedding ceremony which is always associated with joy and mirth. But the segment of the wedding which the poem deals with is the departure of the bride. This segment is more about the bereft and parting than any mirthful activities. The poem is a chain of expressions of unknown risks and fears. The mother of the bride expresses her fears about the nature and the attitude of the bridegroom. How will she be able to be a part of that stranger house with stranger people and environment? The parting day for her is becoming tediously troublesome.

When parents in a society like Pakistan choose a match for their daughter, they do it with a lot of fears and prayers. They feel worried because the women are not given their due rights in our society and they have very little authority in the daily affairs of life. So they have to be subordinate to their men. The thoughts and worries of the bride are very natural. She is worried about the articles of her dowry which might spoil in the rain. She also thinks about her husband’s nature and disposition. She is actually in total scaring atmosphere. Same are the worries of the bridegroom for her new life partner.

If only her face matches her hands

And she gives me no mother-in-law problems….

Throughout the day the rain continues to fall and because of the rainy season the river is flooding which the marriage party is to cross. During the cross, the boat of the wedding party is caught up in the frowning waves of the river and throws its passengers and luggage on the angry waves. The wedding party including the father of the bridegroom, the bridegroom and the bride downs in the river. The party who set out on a joyful journey in the morning, their journey quite ironically ended in tragic loss of lives and longings.

In Taufiq Rafat’s poems, we find simple people suffering death and destruction. However they do not contribute to the cause of their destruction. They are merely puppet in the hands of fate. In this poem we cannot hold any body responsible and nor can find anybody trying to avert the sudden mortality. We note that fate, in the shape of rain and then the river, is very unkind to the poor villagers. In the day time, the rain keeps on taxing them and in the evening they are faced with howling river.