===
1437,
4
===

 

{1437,4}

sair-e ḳhayāl junūñ kā kariye ṣarf kareñ tā ham par sab
patthar āp galī-kūchoñ meñ ḍher kiye haiñ lā lā ham

1) take a look/'stroll' through the thought of madness-- so that they would expend all on us,
2) we ourself have heaped up stones in the streets and alleys, {having 'brought and brought' them / oh 'Lala'}

 

Notes:

sair karnā : ' To take the air, to stroll, ramble, perambulate; to take amusement, to enjoy sights, to view or contemplate a beautiful landscape; to make an excursion, &c.; to read, peruse'. (Platts p.711)

 

ḳhayāl : 'Thought, opinion, surmise, suspicion, conception, idea, notion, fancy, imagination, conceit. whim, chimera; consideration; regard, deference; apprehension; care, concern; —an imaginary form, apparition, vision, spectre, phantom, shadow, delusion'. (Platts p.497)

 

lālā : 'Sir, master; a school-master; a grandee ...; a respectful term of address to a father, or a father-in-law; (for lallā or lalā , q.v.) dear boy, darling; —(in Persian) the chief (or an upper) servant (intrusted with the education of his master's sons); a major domo; —a slave'. (Platts p.946)

S. R. Faruqi:

sair kariye = please look
āp = ourself

The theme of this verse is new, and in it the use of lā lā is devastating. For lālā means 'boy' and 'servant'. Since it's boys who do the task of throwing stones, the word lālā is exceedingly appropriate-- or rather, its use on this occasion ranks as a miracle.

The theme of boys' throwing stones, Sayyid Husain Khalis has versified well [in Persian]:

'The madman goes on his way, and the boys on theirs.
Oh people! In this city of yours, are there no stones?'

In our time Bani gave to Mir's theme quite a different twist, and composed a remarkably 'tumult-arousing' verse:

lo sāre shahr ke patthar sameṭ lāʾe haiñ
kahāñ hai ham ko shab-o-roz tolne-vālā

[there-- we have collected and brought the stones from the whole city
where is there anyone, night and day, to heft them upon us?]

For the meaning of lālā as 'servant', see the 'Masnavi' of Maulana-e Rum (second daftar):

'Fortitude is like a sword-bridge, with paradise on the far side.
With every beautiful one is an ugly servant [lālā].
As long as you flee from the ugly servant, there will be no union.
Because between the ugly servant and the beloved there's no distance.'

If we look attentively, then Maulana's theme is a kind of commentary or addendum on Mir's verse. To be stoned is equal to that ugly servant who is with the beloved. If you flee from being stoned, then there will be no union (that is, the reality of passion will not be revealed).

Jur'at has well used the word lālā with the meaning of the beloved:

us but se yih pūchhūñgā dikhā sīnah-e pur-dāġh
lāle kī bahār aisī kahīñ dekhī hai lālā

[I will ask that idol, having shown my breast full of wounds,
'have you ever anywhere seen such a flourishing of tulips, Lala?']

Mir has versified his own theme a second time in the fifth divan [{1611,4}]:

ḍhūñḍte tā it̤fāl phireñ nah un ke junūñ kī ẓiyāfat meñ
bhar rakkhī haiñ shahr kī galyāñ patthar ham ne lā lā kar

[so that the children wouldn't wander around searching, in their entertainment of madness
we have 'brought and brought' and collected, in the streets of the city, stones]

There are also several meanings for ham par sab : (1) so that all the stones would be expended on us; (2) so that all the people would expend those stones on us; (3) so that all the boys would expend those stones on us.

FWP:

SETS == DOUBLE ACTIVATION
MOTIFS == MADNESS
NAMES
TERMS == TUMULT-AROUSING

SRF doesn't even bother to point out the primary meaning of lā lā as short for lā lā kar 'having brought and brought'. That's because he considers it so obvious that he counts on us to recognize it at once, as we surely do. And of course he makes sure of our understanding by citing {1611,4}, in which the verbal use is paramount.

Thus he can devote his energies to showing us the other senses of lālā , which we might or might not know. And the doubly activated word- and meaning-play is indeed irresistible. Compare also the strikingly similar use of the title 'Baba' in the next verse, {1437,5}.

It's also piquant that we are invited to 'contemplate' or 'take a stroll'-- such a different form of progress than that of a madman who is either laboriously collecting stones, or else being pursued by stone-throwing urchins. And our stroll is to be through junūñ kā ḳhayāl , the 'thought' of 'madness'. And what exactly is this? The way madness thinks? A kind of thought, perhaps in an observer's head, which is about madness? A thought that is itself madness? The speaker seems to be lucidly, or even perhaps wittily, calling our attention to his own madness.

 

 
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