The expression chuumte hii gaal kaa;Taa ['at the moment of kissing, he bit the cheek'] appears as a saying in fiiroz ul-lu;Gaat (Lahore 1967), but it isn't present in farhang-e aa.sifiyah or Platts. The Firoz has given the meaning that's easiest to guess ('right in the beginning, to cause harm'). The form that Mir has used must have been common in that time, because Mir in his hajv-e palaas raay ( kulliyaat , vol. 2, p. 413, Ram Nara'in La'l) has used these very words (this hajv doesn't appear in Asi): tum to kaa;To ho pahle chuume gaal . The word chuumaa too nowadays is not in use; in place of it chumah is used. In both aa.sifiyah and Platts chumah doesn't appear, but chuumaa does.
Yaganah has, in the 'ground' of Ghalib, using Mir's style [andaaz], brought out a fine verse:
pahle hii chuume gaal kaa;T liyaa
ibtidaa yih to intihaa kyaa hai
[right at the start she kissed, then cut the throat,
if this is the beginning, then what is the end?]
Since Yaganah too has used exactly the form of the saying that's found in Mir's verse, but that's not in the dictionaries, it's possible that Yaganah might have seen this form of it in Mir's verse. It's also possible that this saying itself may have been shaped by Mir himself. Because if this had been a regular and well-known saying, then it would certainly have been in Platts, or the aa.sifiyah , etc.
This verse is an example of how excellently Mir uses a saying [kahaavat]. Yaganah too has used it well, but without that Mirian quality. By placing the idiom mu;Nh lagaanaa in the first line, Mir has created an affinity with 'kiss'. It's an extremely common idiom, and is correct with regard to the dictionaries too. Then,if the meaning of chuumte hii gaal kaa;Taa ('to cause harm right in the beginning') would be kept in mind, then the meaningfulness increases further, because the cutting of the throat is not itself the causing of harm; rather, the beloved's kissing him, or her extending a hand to touch him, does harm to his innocence.
Then, in Yaganah's verse there's only sarcasm, while in Mir's verse there's also playfulness and rakishness. At the beloved's cutting of the throat there's no kind of embarrassment, but rather a kind of bondage/acceptance [;Dha;Taa))ii]. Among 'love', 'kiss', and 'cheek' there's also a 'commonality'. Compare
Abd ul-Rashid has given for chuumte hii gaal kaa;Taa various forms-- for example, pahle chume gaal kaa;Taa and pahle hii chuume me;N gaal kaa;Taa , etc., that are included in several dictionaries.From this it can be known that it is indeed a saying, but it has no one fixed form; that is, various forms are traditional, and Mir too has used two different forms. In the words of a proverbial saying, so much complexity is astonishing.
