1374_01

{1374,1}

kyā ham bayāñ kisū se kareñ apne hāñ kī t̤arḥ
kī ʿishq ne ḳharābī se is ḳhāndāñ kī t̤arḥ

1) how would we express to anyone the style/manner of our place?!
2) passion has made the foundation of this household from/with desolation/difficulty

Notes:

t̤arḥ : 'Throwing; ejection; laying (a foundation); fixing (a position, &c.); foundation (of a building, &c.); position, establishment, location; plan, design; form, description, sort, kind; manner, mode'. (Platts p.752)

ḳharābī : 'Ruin, destruction, desolation; badness, corruption, depravity; noxiousness, ill, evil, mischief, perdition; misery, trouble, affliction; difficulty, perplexity'. (Platts p.488)

*Platts Dictionary Online*

S. R. Faruqi:

t̤arḥ = style
t̤arḥ karna = to lay a foundation

In all three verses the word t̤arḥ has been used in a very creative and distinctive style. The opening-verse is a good example of an 'implicative' [kināyātī] style of expression. In the first line he has mentioned only 'of our place'; in the second line, by saying 'this household' he has expressed the individuality of his place, and in this way he has established his own individuality as well.

Then, ḳharābī se t̤arḥ karnā is fine in the meaning that the material that was used in the foundation of this household is ḳharābī -- that is, destruction, ruin, and desolation. And the second meaning is also fine: that passion has laid the foundation of this household with ḳharābī -- that is, with great difficulty. That is, Passion was not willing that this household should be established, with great difficulty it consented to this establishment. In both cases, only/emphatically Passion is declared to be the founder of our household.

FWP:

SETS == INEXPRESSIBILITY; SE
MOTIFS == HOME; PERSONIFICATIONS
NAMES
TERMS == IMPLICATION; REFRAIN

It's really the versatility of that little se that energizes the verse. For ḳharābī se can be read in two ways:

='from desolation'-- that is, 'desolation' was the construction material used by Passion

='with desolation'-- that is, 'desolation' was the style or method used by Passion

Then of course 'desolation' is just a place-holder; ḳharābī itself has a wide range of meanings (see the definition above).

Note for meter fans: In the refrain, the official last syllable is the long syllable t̤ar , while the final ḥ is what I call a 'cheat syllable' that is ignored in the scansion. The word can be scanned either as t̤arḥ , long-short, which is used in the present ghazal and reflects the official Arabic pronunciation; or as t̤araḥ , short-long, the scansion (and pronunciation) that is far more common; see for example t̤araḥ-dārī in {1374,9}.