کسی نے یہ بقراط سے جا کے پوچھا
مرض تیرے نزدیک مہلک ہیں کیا کیا
kisii ne ye buqraat se jaa ke puuchhaa
maraz tere nazdiik muhlik haiñ kyaa kyaa
Someone went and asked Hippocrates:
'In your view, which diseases are deadly?'
Poetic forms
Level 1: Foundations of Urdu Poetics · about 10 minutes
| Form | Shape | Example in this course |
|---|---|---|
| Ghazal | independent shers, one radif and qafia | Ghalib, Mir, Dagh |
| Nazm | a titled poem on one theme, any stanza | Iqbal: Tarana-e-Hind, Bachche ki Dua |
| Rubai | four lines, special rubai metres, lines 1, 2, 4 rhyme | (Anees, Josh, Firaq) |
| Qata | a thought continued over two or more shers | |
| Marsiya | elegy, usually in six-line stanzas | (Anees, Dabeer) |
| Musaddas | six-line stanzas: four rhyming lines + a rhymed couplet | Hali's Musaddas |
| Masnavi | narrative in couplets, each rhyming within itself | (Mir Hasan's Sihr-ul-Bayan) |
سارے جہاں سے اچھا ہندوستاں ہمارا
ہم بلبلیں ہیں اس کی یہ گلستاں ہمارا
saare jahaañ se achchhaa hindostaañ hamaaraa
ham bulbuleñ haiñ is kii ye gulsitaañ hamaaraa
Better than all the world is our Hindustan;
we are its nightingales, and it is our garden.
Practice
Who wrote it?: 6 questions, built fresh each time from the couplets.