Ghazals I

Ghazals I

Ghazal: What have you gained now, burning and burning my heart

What have you gained now, burning and burning my heart?
Why do you make up so many stories, inventing and inventing?

You have brought down the very foundations of the lover's house,
seating rivals beside you every moment, seating and seating them. [TN: *bunyad bithana*, to lay foundations, also means to ruin; *bithana* is to seat.]

Is this some kind of cruelty, or some kind of kindness:
to show favour to rivals, showing and showing it to us?

O idol, never again remove me from your lane;
I have come this far, cruel one, praying and praying to God.

Here I give up my life, writhing and writhing,
while she looks this way, stealing and stealing glances.

"There is no friend who is faithful":
this you say, letting us hear it, letting us hear it again.

My breast was burning, O candle, and on top of that you
set double the fire, shedding and shedding tears.

He took it from my breast with a single glance,
however much we kept the heart hidden and hidden.

At last Jurat has lost his very life,
setting and setting his heart on these heartless ones.

Ghazal: Now love shows me some other spectacle

Now love shows me some other spectacle:
I say one thing, and something else comes out of my mouth.

Just look, friends, at the adviser's foolishness:
I have understood one thing, and he explains something else to me.

What comparison has this cloud with my blood-raining eye?
It rains one thing, and the eye rains something else.

Let me weep; do not make me laugh, companion, for now
one thing pleases you, and something else pleases me.

The messenger has come, and he has lost his wits:
I ask one thing, and he tells me something else.

Like Jurat, my senses are no longer in place:
I say one thing, and something else comes out of my mouth.

Ghazal: Now we can no longer live at that playful one's door

Now we can no longer live at that playful one's door,
whose house we used to think of as our own.

Heedless one, do not settle down to stay in the street of time;
no one lays out his bed in the middle of the road.

Grief-stricken, alas, we have at last left the world itself,
but never lifted our head from the knee of grief.

What can we make of the manner of existence? Like running water,
we see no staying here for even a moment.

If I wring my hands in regret, that playful one laughs,
putting her hand into someone else's hand.

Alas for my fate: the people are no longer near her
who used often to bring up my name in some way.

If you meant to slaughter me, why did you not
pass your dagger across my neck with force?

Why did you go off and leave me half-slaughtered, darling?
Is this the skill you have shown us?

What can we do? If the heart would only listen, Jurat,
we would go nowhere, for one's own home is best of all.

Ghazal: Tell me just this, my friend: am I the fickle one, or you

Tell me just this, my friend: am I the fickle one, or you?
Am I the one who has dealings with everyone, or you?

My short life is forever addressing the bubble:
let us see whether I cross this sea first, or you.

My weakness argues just this in the garden:
let us see, O scent of the rose, whether I am lighter, or you.

If, having made friends, you turned enemy to Jurat,
then who is faithless, playful tyrant: he, or you?

Ghazal: What would we gain from love but dust

What would we gain from love but dust?
Suffering torment is in our fate.

Lost in thought of her, with our head on our knee,
we sit with our eyes shut.

"You need a face to love someone, sir":
what did you say? Say it again. [TN: *munh chahiye*, "one needs a face (for it)", i.e. one must be worthy of it.]

God, the state of her simplicity!
She needs no jewels at all.

Do not stop the tears of the wet eye;
it is better for a fistula to drain.

How can the building of the heart stand?
Collapse is laid in its very foundation.

When she stayed the night at my house as a guest,
with what grace she said in the morning:

"Alas, there is no strength left in my body;
I have sacrificed my stay here." [TN: this couplet and the one before continue her words; the sense of the second line is uncertain.]

Even the heart did not stand by me, Jurat;
what blame can be laid on anyone? It was my lot.

Ghazal: O heart, are we the ones bound by grief for the beloved, or you

O heart, are we the ones bound by grief for the beloved, or you?
Tell me now, are we the ones caught in torment, or you?

We told you not to fall in love; now just tell me this:
is it we who go and weep for hours behind the wall, or you?

Why did you not take your hand off the love of idols?
Is it we who now wring our hands in regret every time, or you?

The same gathering, the same people, the same gossip:
tell me now, is it we who sit there like a sinner, or you?

We told you not to put the cup of love to your lips;
now is it we who are drunk on the wine of sorrow, or you?

What need had you to entangle your life in the wrong place?
Now is it we who deserve taunts and reproach, or you?

The frenzy of love is a bad thing; you have seen it, foolish one:
is it we who are off to the wilderness, leaving house and home, or you?

You lit the fire of love in the breast for nothing;
tell me now, is it I who draw spark-raining sighs, or you?

We told you not to walk along beside anyone;
tell me now, is it we who are disgraced in the marketplace, or you?

If you think about it, Jurat, this is a hard *zamin*; [TN: *zamin*, "ground", the metre, rhyme and refrain of a ghazal.]
let us see whether we compose more couplets in it, or you.

Ghazal: That beloved would never be angry with the messenger

That beloved would never be angry with the messenger,
if our name were not at the head of the letter.

The beauty of the world's beauties comes from your beauty;
if you were not beautiful, no one would be beautiful.

By God, we would not have turned away from Islam
if the love of idols were not so dear to our nature.

Why would she take it from my breast and give it back to me,
if this wretched heart were not so full of faults?

God has brought this idol to us, or else
we would have no way of living at all.

If my heart had been with me today, alas!
I would not have been abashed at that playful one's coming.

Beauty and love are bound up together, each needing the other;
we would not be the seekers if she were not the one sought.

Had Jurat not given his head on the road of love,
he would not be the crown of the company of lovers.

Ghazal: Without her, seeing our side empty, we are so dumbfounded

Without her, seeing our side empty, we are so dumbfounded
that we cannot turn over, like a figure in a carpet.

If some piece of fire comes to mind at the time of sleep,
why should we not take these flowers on the quilt for live coals? [TN: *atish ka parkala*, "a piece of fire", a fiery, spirited beauty.]

If you have now resolved to abuse us, darling,
then, pressing lip to lip, we will simply swallow your abuse.

When that green-coloured tyrant is not at our side,
how are we to get through this black night, curse it? [TN: *sabza-rang*, "green-coloured", a dusky complexion.]

Our eyes have met hers, as she makes plain by her look;
what do we care for anyone? We are carefree.

When that silver-bodied one is not with us on a moonlit stroll,
look: what is the moon to us but a brass platter?

Every face that is beyond the imagination of Mani and Bihzad, [TN: Mani and Bihzad, the legendary and the great Persian painters.]
we draw as a picture of the mind, without a brush.

If we compose one well-measured couplet in praise of the beloved's beauty,
we count it the choice of all the verses on beauty. [TN: *jamali*, "of beauty", may also allude to a poet named Jamali; translated by the plain sense.]

When we recite the elegy of the heart in the corner of loneliness,
we ourselves are the answerer and we ourselves the questioner.

She, steeped in perfume and drunk on wine, busy walking among the roses,
and we, watching her this way, alone in the garden.

The rose of hope may perhaps bloom for us too;
it would be no wonder if we found fruit. [TN: the last words of this line, *pate sahali*, are unclear in the source; translated by the likeliest sense.]

Since the states of love now always overcome us, Jurat,
we speak verses of rapture in the manner of lovers. [TN: *hali*, "of (mystical) state", is marked in the source like a pen name; it is not the later poet Hali.]

Ghazal: In the words of Soz, Jurat, what shall we say of our thought

In the words of Soz, Jurat, what shall we say of our thought? [TN: Soz, the Delhi poet Mir Soz, an elder contemporary.]
Our verse is a cup of the wine of Unity.

But it intoxicates each one according to what he is:
the womanly in a womanly way, the manly in a manly way.

Ghazal: Why should the nightingale in the cage not listen to talk of the garden

Why should the nightingale in the cage not listen to talk of the garden?
To one who has strayed from home, talk of home is sweet.

Do not ask now about the state of your love-sick one;
talk has begun now of his grave and shroud.

In the season of spring, with a hundred tongues, it is silent:
what had the bud heard from someone's mouth? [TN: the closed bud is likened to a small mouth; its many petals are "tongues".]

What shall I say of pleasure and delight, friends?
Ask grief-stricken me about sorrow and pain.

Adviser, what can I tell you of how it was torn?
Ask the hand of madness about my shirt.

He was the wise man of the age, but he went mad,
the one who heard the tale of my madness.

Give your head on the road of love, but do not turn your face away;
this word of the Mountain-digger is a line cut in stone. [TN: the Mountain-digger is Farhad; "a line on stone" means something fixed and unalterable.]

Even the gathering of the garden in spring is put to shame by it;
what need is there to ask, my friend, about your company?

Friends, what can I tell you of how the moth burnt?
Ask the tongue of the candle about its devotion. [TN: the "tongue" of the candle is its flame.]

Perhaps it is she who is spoken of on every road, so I
listen with the ear of the heart to every man and woman's talk.

That thing is not in us by which that friend might be won,
though, as it is, we have a word in every art.

Jurat, with the coming of autumn nothing remained in the garden;
only the talk of rose and jasmine remained on the tongue.

Ghazal: Without you, what can we say of the sickness that has taken hold of us, friend

Without you, what can we say of the sickness that has taken hold of us, friend?
It is a sickness whose very name one fears to speak.

Everyone says, seeing my heart set on you, friend:
"Alas, what a sickness has taken hold of him in his youth!"

This is the rank of us madmen in the wilderness of frenzy:
that the moment we set foot there, every thorn comes and clings to our feet.

How could one not call her the queen of the land of beauty?
Wherever she goes and sits, a court gathers there.

What value can I have among those who would buy her,
in whose lane a market is held day and night?

Which day has passed over me, O sword of separation,
when you did not strike a fresh wound on my heart every time?

Now that the whim has taken her to go home,
you too, blood-raining eye, start your shower of weeping.

Since you keep drinking my heart's blood without a break,
tell me, grief of love: why, did you find it so tasty?

The quickness of madness's hand is such today, enough!
not a single thread is left holding in my collar.

Recite one more ghazal in this *zamin*, Jurat;
now you have begun to compose couplets in fine style.

Ghazal: Without seeing her, how can sorrow and torment pass

Without seeing her, how can sorrow and torment pass?
Let her come in a dream: but how can sleep come?

When she sat me near her, my heart writhed all the more;
O God, how will this restlessness ever go now?

Since she has been travelling, the heart is restless in my breast;
how can we sit in our house, ruined as we are?

Cupbearer, separation from the beloved is the gatekeeper of my throat;
how then can a drop of wine go down my throat here?

She, for whose grief we grieve, does not know of us;
O Lord, how then can there be patience and strength in this pain?

There, the demand at every moment is "Meet only now and then";
we are at a loss how we are to answer it.

Your years are few, your little face is so lovely;
how then could shyness and modesty be acceptable?

What astonishes me is this: if such chastity remains,
how will the season of youth be spent in pleasure?

Now recite a ghazal in your own style, Jurat;
let us see how its couplets will be the choicest.

Ghazal: When she came, after a hundred longings, this was our state from love's shyness

When she came, after a hundred longings, this was our state from love's shyness:
there were thousands of longings in the heart, and to raise the eyes was impossible.

Last night when someone stayed away from us, who can tell what happened?
Was it the night of separation, or some calamity, at whose very sight came union? [TN: the sense of the second line is uncertain; perhaps that the night was so terrible it was "union" with death.]

Until the beloved's face came into sight, we kept lamenting in our pain,
so that grief itself grieved over our sorrow and grief.

Who could rival her? Moon and Venus all claimed equality,
but at dawn, seeing her tyranny, the face of the sun was like a speck of dust.

Seeing the night of union in a dream, I fell into sore torment:
there were a thousand worries over the answer; strange was the question she asked me.

From the surge of my tears every land and sea in the world has had its share;
had this wet eye not rained today, God forbid, there would have been famine.

If, the moment they appear, they begin at once to subside,
then someone should ask the bubble: what was it that puffed up its cheeks? [TN: the bubble's puffed cheeks are its pride, which bursts at once.]

If I too have entered the ranks of the slain, why are you vexed for nothing?
Sir, the slope of the water of your sword ran toward my throat.

When you ate betel and gave it, my afflicted heart was honoured, red-faced;
it took for a load on the stomach what was the juice from your mouth. [TN: the second line is obscure in the source and translated literally.]

The sick man who lay with his life on his lips: there is no other news of him now,
but everyone says this much: he was a man of very good nature.

When the cage was taken far from the garden, I became more a captive of longing;
this cruelty that has happened this year was the same calamity last year.

The sky does not want us and her to be in one place now:
by chance she came here at night, she whom it was impossible to invite.

Then the colours of the hoop of the sky appeared to me plainly:
now it was black, now yellow, now green, now red.

No one has valued you yet, Jurat, though you have spoken marvellous verse;
when we are gone, everyone will say: he was a great master.

Ghazal: That drinker of wine now wishes to pass into the garden

That drinker of wine now wishes to pass into the garden;
quickly, O messenger breeze, bring this to the ear of the rose.

I do not know where we are going, like the intoxication of wine,
wherever we pass these days in a daze.

When she saw me in the gathering, she said in a temper:
"My slipper is to pass through such a gathering!" [TN: i.e. "I would not set foot in such company."]

To this day we hang our heads in the lane of disgrace,
since we passed by that door last night, with a hundred troubles.

We are lovers of a veiled one who, if she ever
passes before us, passes with her face hidden.

This tavern of existence lasts only a few days here;
do not pass your life in heedlessness, you who have no sense or wit.

The heart has been caught like this in coquetry, airs and grace,
as one who has forgotten his road passes among highwaymen.

If we travel together, this is the longing: to pass for miles
in one carriage, held in her embrace.

No one values poetry any longer, Jurat;
pass your time silently in the corner of solitude.

Ghazal: We sit near her, but we cannot raise our eyes

We sit near her, but we cannot raise our eyes;
our heart is set on her, but we cannot lay a hand on her yet.

Seeing those lips from afar, we bite our own lips;
regard for good manners still holds: we cannot move our lips.

We gaze with longing at that stature and that cheek, and, alas,
we cannot press her tightly to our breast.

My heart rolls at those feet as she walks,
but at night we cannot press them, even by stealth. [TN: pressing the feet (massaging them) is a service to a beloved or elder.]

At night we stand pressed against that door like thieves,
but the goods we want we cannot steal.

How we are charmed by her ways! And yet
for fear we cannot even move our neck.

We keep looking at the mirror of her knee,
but by no means can we bring our knee against it.

Is it that we do not know the rules of love?
But we cannot teach them to her, without more or less.

We silently watch her flaming colour,
but alas, we cannot put out our own heart's fire.

What a pity that she speaks only if she speaks of herself;
how can we call her? We cannot call her.

Though we live in the same house, Jurat, our
fortune is so asleep that we cannot have her sleep beside us.

Ghazal: When, smitten with frenzy, we fix our minds on her image

When, smitten with frenzy, we fix our minds on her image,
then what gestures we make, all by ourselves!

My grief-worn soul, without her, says to my restless heart:
"You go on slowly; we are coming behind you."

Several times today she looked at us with an angry eye;
at last, O fortune, we have become worthy of punishment.

The heart did not heed us, and we did not heed the adviser;
he wore himself out telling us, and we wore ourselves out telling it.

When she looks in the mirror, how she smiles,
thinking: "Truly, we are a darling Doomsday."

What pleasure of talk did we find in her gathering?
We sat silent at one side like a picture on the wall.

Hundreds of admirers of yours have sprung up;
it is true, sir: of what account are poor we here now?

Grief for some moon-faced one has made us so weak
that we often see stars bursting before our eyes.

Raise your eyes and see: is anyone looking here?
Just let us be sacrificed, let us be your offering.

What can we do, alas, and to whom can we speak of our unrest?
At your hands, darling, we find rest nowhere now.

In our restlessness we see no rest in any one place;
like a firework flower we wander, simply cast about. [TN: *gul-e bazi*, a spinning firework.]

What fear have we for our life? Our very name is Jurat;
why then should we not be sent down into the field of love? [TN: *jur'at* means courage.]

Ghazal: I held back the breath in my body for a long time

I held back the breath in my body for a long time;
come, sir, who has kept you surrounded?

When we went there, she came here: well done!
Fortune has played a fine trick on us.

He alone crossed the road of love
who set his foot on it boldly.

The sky has made everyone helpless, but on one,
the deer of the heart, it has set grief as a lion.

When we went and sat in the beloved's lane,
we never turned our step back out of it.

After a long time she saw it and said:
"Who has put this heap of dust here?"

Thank you, pain of love: you have always
kept us sated with life.

How flustered she was yesterday, when we
surrounded her for a moment on the road!

God grant it be well: Jurat
has turned his step back in love.

Ghazal: Draw your sharp sword, sir

Draw your sharp sword, sir;
fulfil the longings of the heart, sir. [TN: the refrain *nikalo sahib*, "take out, sir", changes sense with each couplet: draw, fulfil, put out, turn out.]

Why do you set foot outside the house?
Do not draw out my soul, sir.

If you are vexed at being looked at, then
put out my astonished eye, sir.

This is the wick that keeps my heart's wound open;
do not draw out the arrowhead, sir.

Let me stay in the house; do not, without cause,
lay a false charge on me and turn me out, sir.

Do not admit strangers to your private hours;
they are bad people: turn them out, sir.

Your mind is somewhere else, like mine;
put that thought out of your heart, sir.

Do not let abuse come out of your mouth
against anyone, every moment, without cause, sir.

Alas, this needless grievance: get it out
of your heart somehow, sir.

Do not keep sitting in the open market;
show some dignity now, sir.

For the sake of brisk trade, do not
set up your shop in the middle of the road, sir.

Jurat longs for union completely;
here, fulfil this longing, sir.

Ghazal: When I said, "Self-willed idol, come this way,"

When I said, "Self-willed idol, come this way,"
she began to say: "Get along, you disreputable one, go that way!"

Since morning your lover's state has been very bad;
it looks as if he will die by evening.

Adviser, do not stop me weeping, for if the lover
does not do this work, what work is he to do?

If you are coming in this cloudy weather, rose-faced cupbearer,
then bring the cup filled with rose-coloured wine.

Here there is no fear for life: yes, draw your sword;
it was the rival who took fright at the sight of the blade.

When I said, "Give me just one kiss, at least,"
she said: "Hold your tongue, why, really!"

Though I spread my eyes and heart on the road, Jurat,
it is not possible that that heart's-ease will set foot on them.

Ghazal: The pull of love shows us a strange sight

The pull of love shows us a strange sight:
someone is drawing us along toward himself.

In the gathering we stand gazing at her face, and that playful one
neither has anyone get up, nor has us sit.

What cruelty, alas, that our way on the road of love
is this: what pleases no one else pleases us.

In this rising there is a fall, for, like a child's height,
the sky makes us grow only to shorten our life.

Now that we have shut our eyes, by God,
what cannot be seen is seen by us.

So that we may know the pleasure of being put out too,
the sky, alas, makes us burn like a lamp. [TN: *thanda hona*, to grow cold, also means a lamp going out, and death.]

How fine that she weeps only in order to laugh:
for her own heart's pleasure she makes us fret.

If we meet her and sleep a moment, then, to give us pain,
ill fortune shows us a dream of separation.

We are that captive bird, whom whoever
wishes to make an offering of his own wings sets free.

No one now brings messages of that playful tyrant's two-facedness,
to make us laugh, or to make us weep.

Struck dumb, alas, we go and sit in thought of her,
when someone in the gathering of beauties calls us near.

How lost in the sight we are! In Jurat's words,
someone is drawing us along toward himself.

Ghazal: The one we seek has gone and sat down somewhere

The one we seek has gone and sat down somewhere;
having made us sit waiting, she has gone and sat down somewhere.

I had written so much of the state of my lost heart
that the messenger lost my letter and sat down somewhere.

How can we raise our eyes to look, when for no reason
that beloved glared at us and went and sat down somewhere?

As the sun is hidden from evening on, so on the night of union
she hid her face in that way and sat down somewhere.

Because I keep to my house, it is spoken of from house to house:
"The crown of the band of lovers has gone and sat down somewhere."

I took her not coming to mean that that playful one,
thinking my sitting there improper, had sat down somewhere.

What can we say of our way of life? Without her it is now
as if some holy madman had gone and sat down somewhere. [TN: a *majzub* is one lost in divine rapture.]

In the beginning of love this was how Jurat looked:
at last he grew abashed and went and sat down somewhere.

Ghazal: The road that led to meeting her, we came to know

The road that led to meeting her, we came to know;
O Khizr of imagination, we are your sacrifice. [TN: Khizr, the guide of lost travellers; here imagination is the guide.]

The composure of your beauty was made plain to all
in whatever gathering we went, in our distracted state. [TN: a pun on *jam'iyat* (composure; also a gathering) and *pareshan* (distracted; also dishevelled).]

The moment I shut my eyes, thinking of that house,
thank God, we went there without being beholden to the doorkeeper.

Yesterday she was telling this to one in the know:
"When we went as a guest to Jurat's house last night,

who knows what spell the wretch cast on us!
We gave in to what was not to be given in to."

Ghazal: When we weep, writhing with the pain of the heart

When we weep, writhing with the pain of the heart,
how she laughs, bursting into laughter!

This is all we saw: that we were made to get up and go,
the moment we raised our eyes to look this way a little.

Tell us, sir, with what eyes are we to watch this:
your looking at someone else while we look on?

Now they will not even let us stand, those who
used to take pleasure in seating us beside them.

That heart, too, has left my side, which
I used to hold to my breast and weep.

You are going, O life that is passing:
into what misfortune have you thrown us?

A letter came from there by which we understood
our own fate well, once we had it read out.

She has not yet stepped out of her house, and already
a whole world has gone, its home and goods plundered.

Alas, the sky put some fear into her at our union;
it made the thing, and then it spoiled it.

Since love has lessened there these days,
we find nothing when we go to her.

Yet from the strength of our longing, every time,
we are put to shame, reaching out our hand.

No word comes out of her mouth:
what has someone come and told her about Jurat?

Ghazal: Such a surge of weeping is seen at the moment of the beloved's leaving

Such a surge of weeping is seen at the moment of the beloved's leaving,
as when the surging cloud is seen raining without a break.

Though the colours of the world's garden be seen in thousands,
where is rest for the heart, so long as the beloved is not seen?

When we pass through the lane of imagination,
wherever we look, the beloved's face is seen.

Whose envy of the rose-garden has wounded me, that on
every pore of my body a thousand wound-roses are seen?

If she tears up my letter unread and puts it in a chink of the wall,
why should my breast not be seen split, like a pen? [TN: the reed pen is split at its nib.]

Alas, if one cannot exchange words with that playful one,
what else is there for things to depend on?

Alas, where one has not even the power to move one's lips,
how should one have the face to hope for kisses and embraces there?

Alas, we with our kindled hearts are there like sparks in a stone,
where not even the passing of the messenger breeze is seen.

Those to whom the sky gives a high head, it does not give rest;
look how moon and sun, night and day, are seen ever turning.

When the hours pass every day counting toward the promise,
why should not every day seem to us a Day of Reckoning? [TN: *roz-e shumar*, the Day of Counting, i.e. Judgement Day.]

When I see the flaming little bird on her bodice,
why should it not seem as restless as a quicksilver bird? [TN: the "little bird" is an embroidered or jewelled ornament on the *mahram* (bodice).]

Let there be a garden by the riverbank, blooming in a hundred colours,
where on every path a thousand delights are seen;

on all four sides let the birds of the garden be singing,
let marvellous flowers and fruit be seen on bough after bough;

on this side let the waves of the river show their playful gaits,
and on that side let the spring breeze be seen dancing;

let thick black clouds have gathered round from every side,
let there be the flash of lightning, and falling drizzle seen;

on one side let the peacocks cry out on the parapets,
on the other let a line of herons be seen against the cloud;

let the cup go round as the eyes of beauties roll,
let a sitar be seen in the hand of a merry minstrel;

lip to lip and breast to breast, let her be with us whom we love:
then the spring of life's garden will be seen by us. [TN: these seven couplets form one continuous description.]

Now recite some love ghazal of many layers, Jurat,
so that friends may see fresh meaning too, my friend.

Ghazal: My heart will turn to blood and come out of my weeping eye

My heart will turn to blood and come out of my weeping eye;
if this weeping goes on, a deluge will come any day now.

The moment news comes, the tyrant asks: "Sit down a moment;
I will tell you the whole truth when my wits come back."

There is now no throwing of dust, no bewilderment, no nakedness;
if madness comes, it will come bringing all its gear.

I will read the letter afterwards, messenger; for God's sake,
first say this: will she come here, somehow?

Do not go, O soul, from this body for just one more night;
I hear that tomorrow she will come to my house as a guest.

No one's worth is known while he lives;
you are killing me, but afterwards you will be sorry.

Jurat has set off, indeed, into the lane of that bloodthirsty idol,
but look: he will come back from there spangled with blood. [TN: *afshan*, the gold or silver spangle sprinkled on the hair or a page.]

Ghazal: Wherever there is talk of pain

Wherever there is talk of pain,
our verse too will be well known.

In the world, O rose, there can be few
so proud as you of a two-day beauty.

If the stones of separation keep falling like this,
one day the glass of the heart will be smashed.

Yesterday, seeing me throwing dust about, she said:
"I suppose this is the custom of lovers."

Grief has brought me close to death;
God knows on what day this will be far off.

He alone will understand the wound of my heart
on whose own heart there is a running sore.

The cupbearer will give us the measure only
when the cup of life is full.

If grief keeps stinging like this every moment,
the heart will become a hornet's nest.

If this weeping is what you want, Jurat,
you will be left without sight.

Ghazal: Beauty, my love, is not going to last

Beauty, my love, is not going to last;
then this favour will not last either.

O surge of madness, I have made an offering of my collar;
now this hem is not going to last either.

Do not lift the veil from your face all at once;
my wits are not going to last.

You have gone, and this life in this body
is not going to stay in any way.

Why do you weep for the rose, nightingale?
This garden is not going to last.

I am a guest of a breath or two; even now
when you come, the guest will not be here.

The wine is finished, and the rose in the garden,
your sacrifice, will not last.

If you are to come, come even now; or else, sir,
even this arrangement will not last.

Since you asked for my heart, then here
it will not stay another moment.

Take what you left in trust at such a time,
for later you will not remember it.

Do not be alarmed at the grief of separation, Jurat;
you are not going to stay so bewildered.

Ghazal: You bring us into the snare, but your heart is caught somewhere else

You bring us into the snare, but your heart is caught somewhere else;
you have us recite couplets, but the theme is woven somewhere else.

Just meet our eyes this way; why, sir, what is all this talk?
You take pleasure in talking with us, but your heart's delight is somewhere else.

It is true, when we tell you something of our heart's state,
you listen with your ear turned to us, but your mind is fixed somewhere else.

Look what cunning, how one has us wrapped up!
That artful idol takes the heart, and has given her own somewhere else.

If I break in and speak to her, she says with a look:
"Do not tease me, sir; my mind at this moment is somewhere else."

You tell us in words that you will meet us; we know,
but in your heart you have promised your comings and goings somewhere else.

When you see us and say, "Come, sit down, let us talk,"
all this talk is for show: your fondness lies somewhere else.

Now you seem to me rather like one who shares my pain;
perhaps, darling, you have found someone like yourself somewhere else.

You sit beside me, but from your fidgeting it shows
that your mind is set on slipping away somewhere else.

To my face you tell me, "Sit; do not go home just yet";
but I know where the message has gone, somewhere else.

You talk to me fondly; may I be an infidel if I lie:
you take my heart, sir, but, God be praised, it is somewhere else.

A pity, darling, that you remember a stranger while he is here!
What is there in someone else that is not in Jurat?

Ghazal: Now she has given up coming out of the house even as far as the door

Now she has given up coming out of the house even as far as the door,
or her coming at night, always in disguise.

Companions, is this weeping, or is it a deluge, alas?
Look how a river comes surging out of the eye.

When I resolve to go to that playful one,
the sword of her eyebrow says: "Come carefully."

What else do we gain from going into that lane,
but to come back home again, rolled in the dust?

First of all, when does the restless heart come back from there?
And if it does come, it comes making a fuss at a hundred places.

Companions, you are going to plead for me, but
do not go there and come back having made more trouble.

We have drowned so deep in the sea of love that now, while we live,
it is hard for us to come leaping up to the surface.

Someone take me to the killer's lane at the moment of death;
this is the knot we must go there and come back having untied.

It is not without reason that, out of the garden,
she comes before me crushing a rose in her hands.

Though someone in the gathering of beauties should coax us a thousand ways,
we must slip away even from there and come to you.

My life is leaving my body: quickly, out of kindness,
come two or four steps from your house at such a time.

What shall I tell you, Jurat, of her flair in dress?
Whenever she rises and goes, she comes back in a different guise.

Ghazal: This is the way I keep making my pain known

This is the way I keep making my pain known:
I keep reciting couplets to her that fit my state.

We have only one place to live, and it is this house, alas;
yet the heart lives apart, and I live apart.

Whose talk can I listen to, alas, O bird of the garden?
I am always lost in the noise of my own laments.

At least there is this much effect in the tale of my pain:
every day I make one or two people weep.

Though my head be cut off for weeping in the gathering of beauties,
like the candle I keep the tears flowing from my eyes. [TN: a candle's wick is trimmed ("its head cut") when it gutters and "weeps" wax.]

If there is any effect at all in my sighs and laments,
then one day I will bring that playful one here.

What shall I say of beauty and love? Do not ask;
these days I am out of temper even with my own life.

Ever since my heart was given, alas, Jurat,
I have borne how many calamities every day!

Ghazal: I am chasing after a life that has gone, O Lord

I am chasing after a life that has gone, O Lord;
every moment I am beside myself, O Lord.

How could I please the taste of men of letters?
I am a theme already used, O Lord.

How can I show my temper, alas?
I am like a broken sword, O Lord. [TN: *jauhar* means both the watered pattern of a blade and a person's worth.]

What can I say of how little time I have, alas?
I am a sigh that has leapt from the breast, O Lord.

I am so burnt by the burning of grief, O Lord,
that hell, seeing me, turns to water from shame.

See what comes of it: there, she is coy and proud,
and I am in this broken state, O Lord.

Ghazal: O love, do not send the heart toward the black tress

O love, do not send the heart toward the black tress;
do not send a traveller among highwaymen at nightfall.

Look, I will become a garland on my rivals' necks;
do not send garlands of flowers, playful one with a body like a rose. [TN: *har* means both a garland and defeat.]

Let us at least look our fill at the face of the rose, heartless one;
alas, fowler, do not send us into the snare just yet.

When she sends me wine, the rivals say:
"He will go astray; enough, do not send him another cup."

If I send the messenger to her a second time, he says:
"I have had enough; I will not take the reward; do not send me."

Now that we have reached the beloved's lane, just let us stay;
do not send us anywhere else from here while we live, O turning of the days.

Why, every moment, do you put the hookah to your lips and send it?
Put lip to lip as well; do not send a kiss by message.

By God, I have found you alone after a long time;
today at least, self-willed idol, do not send me off on some errand.

Give me sometimes a kiss of the eyes and life-giving lips, my life;
do not send us, as our only gift, a kiss by message.

Abuse, darling, is the language of love;
when do I say: do not write and send me abuse?

But this is the fear: that the letter may be intercepted somewhere;
do not write my name at the head of the letter and send it.

Jurat, now that she is angry with you, how can I bring her round?
You yourself will begin to blame me then; do not send me.

Ghazal: I will not go away from here like the smoke of a fire

I will not go away from here like the smoke of a fire;
like the candle, I will burn away in the beloved's gathering itself.

If I look at her even from afar, she says with her look:
"Come, I will crush your eyes under my soles this minute."

My restless heart says: "Take me there, or else
I will break the doors of the breast and get out."

I am the sun on the mountaintop; I am sure that that moon
will come out on the roof only when I have set.

If no one takes me there today either, then enough:
there is no tomorrow for me; I will go out of my life itself. [TN: a pun on *kal* (tomorrow) and *kal jana*, to be finished.]

When I rise from there, her gliding foot says:
"When you set foot on the ground, I will slip."

By God, this is the word the beauty of idols speaks to all:
"I am that will-o'-the-wisp that will cheat you all."

Coming to me after years, she began to say this night:
"There are many obstacles to staying here; I am going."

The killer's blade says: "You, bound by your straps, [TN: the opening words *dawali bando* are unclear in the source; translated by the likeliest sense.]
I will take effect on you all like a spell." [TN: *muth chalana*, to work a magic spell on someone.]

Though her temper has so changed that she tells me:
"Look, if you come I will leave the house,"

yet how could I keep away? My state is all changed:
if I do not go like this, I will go in disguise.

Jurat, compose more verses that stir up madness now, so that I
may take this ghazal and go with it to the tomb of Sauda. [TN: Mirza Rafi Sauda (d. 1781), the great Delhi master; *sauda* also means madness.]

Ghazal: Just look at the relish of her glaring at me

Just look at the relish of her glaring at me!
The relish of the whole world is in her looks.

With what relish, cruel one, your stealing of hearts is plain!
How can I steal the relish of your stealing glances?

If someone asks of the pleasure of union, I swallow it,
speaking only between my lips of the relish of lips meeting.

What a state your drinker of love is in:
telling the pain of his heart, the relish of weeping and making others weep!

With my hand on my heart I take a strange pleasure in the pain,
remembering in separation the relish of reaching out my hand.

The pleasure in silence is not in speech;
where is there relish, like losing oneself, in coming to oneself?

I am a sacrifice even to her quarrelling, for one sees
in the very midst of displeasure a strange relish in the meeting of eyes.

What has your sick one to do with sleep and food? He has
no pleasure in sleep, and no relish in eating.

When I remember it I go, God knows where:
the relish of her calling me with fond glances.

What shall I say of the night of union, when I take her ills upon myself:
what relish I take in sitting her on my knee!

I am no longer in myself; ask the heart
about the relish, after that, of pressing her to my breast.

If it is at the door of that veiled one, in a loud voice,
then there is relish in having Jurat recite a couplet.

Ghazal: Last night, as long as that heart's beloved was not at my side

Last night, as long as that heart's beloved was not at my side,
the heart had no dealings with me, nor I with the heart.

On what day was this sinner not circling that lane?
Alas, the longing: there was no chink in the wall.

Yesterday your sick one could find no rest on his bed;
today there was only the bed, and the sick one was not there.

Thanks, O wind of extinction: like a burnt tree, I
was indeed in the garden, but not worthy of the garden.

There is no room to set down a sesame seed, with her beauty so increased; [TN: *til* means both a sesame seed and a mole on the face.]
when I saw her last night, there was not a single mole on her cheek.

What was the matter last night? Tell me, let me be your sacrifice;
that sighing of yours was not free of secrets.

Setting my heart on the point of a spear, she said, laughing:
"We saw Mansur; he was not on the gallows." [TN: Mansur al-Hallaj, the Sufi executed for crying "I am the Truth".]

The scene yesterday in the contest between the wet eye and the cloud:
never was weeping kept up without a break like that.

We were slaughtered the moment we came before the killer,
although there was no weapon in her hand.

After my death everyone wept over my bier,
but that one tyrant alone had no tears in her eyes.

Yet why did she hide her face when people said:
"He had no visible sickness that should kill him"?

Compose, my talent, another ghazal: this is a reply to Naziri; [TN: Naziri of Nishapur (d. 1612), the Persian poet; a "reply" (*jawab*) is a ghazal written in another poet's *zamin*.]
this *rekhta* that I recited was not worth showing. [TN: *rekhta*, the old name for Urdu verse.]

Ghazal: Last night, what grief did I not have

Last night, what grief did I not have!
There was no thought of sleep at all.

Who knows what has happened to us today?
Even yesterday the heart was not so faint.

Everyone said, seeing how I wore away my life:
"Even Farhad was not in such a state."

As long as we did not love you,
your beauty was not like this.

Now that the heart is given, why should we not come?
Had you told us before, it would not have been impossible.

Look, your eyebrow slipped away so,
as if there had been no crescent in the sky.

She did not stay a moment when she came to me;
it was a kind of show, it was not union.

Last night, seeing the one whom Laila envies,
I was struck dumb; there was no life left in me.

Hearing the whole tale of Qais, she said:
"He too was not perfect in love." [TN: Qais is Majnun, the lover of Laila.]

When did you weep so much blood, Jurat?
Your hem was not red until now.

Ghazal: Everyone has gone, leaving your threshold

Everyone has gone, leaving your threshold;
foul-tongued one, give up that tongue of yours now.

Do not turn us out, my friend; into your lane
we have come and sat down, leaving both worlds.

In time of hardship, alas, even the soul
goes, leaving the feeble body.

When does true company come of the crooked? Look out:
the arrow at last flew off, leaving the bow.

At the hands of the gardener's cruelty, alas,
we have gone at last, leaving the nest.

When she turned back from the garden, the birds of the garden
went along with her, leaving the rose-garden.

From weakness, like a footprint,
we stayed behind helplessly, leaving the caravan.

Companion, tell the whole tale of love;
do not leave the story for tomorrow or the day after.

This is my state, now that that killer
has risen and gone, leaving the guest of a few breaths,

just as one passes a dagger across the throat
and lets the half-dead bird go.

Have mercy on Jurat's youth;
enough, grief of love, leave this young man alone.

Ghazal: Everyone, seeing her in the road, on the earth, says

Everyone, seeing her in the road, on the earth, says:
"By what road has this moon come down onto the earth?"

The tale of your sick one is long indeed, but
the story will now be cut short in a moment, on the earth.

You have climbed so high on her roof that, enough, at last
your love will have you brought down and leave you on the earth.

This is that restless heart which, like a writhing lightning,
is seen now in the sky, now on the earth.

Thinking of something, I simply begin to tremble, Jurat,
when, alas, my foot falls heavily on the earth.

Ghazal: Listen to her words: this is what they call increasing love

Listen to her words: this is what they call increasing love:
coming last night in a dream, she said, "This is what they call coming."

We set foot in the frightful valley of love:
this is what they call taking a thousand calamities on your head.

She cut short what we said and backed up the rival:
this is what they call lessening, this is what they call increasing.

When we were sulking, you said halfheartedly, "Come, make it up":
look this way, sir, is this what they call coaxing?

Because of my restless heart they tremble day and night:
this is what they call the doors and walls of the house writhing.

She whose friend I am at heart takes me for an enemy;
what else shall I say? This is what they call the world turned upside down.

Seeing her picture and mine together, she said:
"This is what they call a fairy-face, this is what they call a madman."

That fairy-face has made the whole world smitten with her:
this is what they call driving a whole world mad and showing it off.

This pearl-scattering eye: His Honour the Heart is graciously appearing;
this is what they call coming out of the house to the door of fortune.

When someone in the garden saw the rose-bud opening,
he said: "Come here; this is what they call taking pleasure."

That playful one smiled and said to me: "Hey, you,
look this way: this is what they call smiling with grace."

Recite another ghazal in this *zamin*, Jurat, such that, hearing it,
lovers will say: "This is what they call the speech of love."

Ghazal: The truth is, these days we have formed an attachment in the wrong place

The truth is, these days we have formed an attachment in the wrong place;
every moment we keep thinking: what have we done?

Whichever way she rose and went, I, as though bewildered,
kept looking that way for so long, even after she had gone.

When that playful one and I exchanged greetings,
Patience and Strength said: "There, we have paid our respects." [TN: i.e. they took their leave.]

She was strolling among the roses, and I, alas, in my restlessness,
kept running everywhere in the garden like flowing water.

As long as people kept talking to me about her,
I kept thinking something to myself, and my heart kept pounding.

Perhaps she has heard me telling the pain of my heart,
or else why does she make me repeat it, saying, "Very well"?

Why should I not look every moment at the sky with longing?
It gave her to others, and gave us the one she loved. [TN: the second line is compressed in the source; translated by the likeliest sense.]

Even when our hearts met, our meetings were in such a place
that while we went on writhing here, she went on writhing there.

Her lips were once joined to my lips,
and all my life I kept passing my tongue over my own lips.

Since she is famous throughout the world, for her sake
with how many people this mad heart has quarrelled!

What can I say of the heart's burning? As long as I lived,
something like a live coal kept glowing at my side.

Everyone who saw Jurat in the game of love said:
"This dear fellow has always gambled with his life."