1589_06

{1589,6}

kal hī josh-o-ḳharosh hamāre daryā ke se talāt̤um the
dekh tire āshob zamāñ ke kar baiṭhe haiñ kinārā āj

1) only/emphatically yesterday our tumult and ebullience were like the buffeting/dashing of the sea
2) having seen your disturbance/affliction of the world/age, we have determinedly withdrawn, today

Notes:

āshob : 'Tumult, clamour; storm, tempest; terror; misfortune'. (Platts p.58)

āshob : 'Terror, dread, fear; grief, affliction, misfortune; confusion, discord, disturbance, tumult, riot, sedition'. (Steingass p.67)

kinārah karnā : 'To keep or hold (oneself) aloof (from), to avoid, shun; to abstain (from), refrain (from); to retire, withdraw'. (Platts p.850)

kar baiṭhnā : 'To have done with, to rest or cease from; to do effectually or thoroughly; to do deliberately, or composedly, or unconcernedly'. (Platts p.828)

*Platts Dictionary Online*

S. R. Faruqi:

Your āshob-e zamāñ -- that is, the destruction of your era, your age; āshob of course means 'difficulty, disaster', but it's also used to mean 'typhoon'. In this way in the whole verse there's the glory of wordplay [murāʿāt ul-naz̤īr]. With josh-o-ḳharosh , daryā , talāt̤um , āshob , kinārah -- all these are also creating an arrangement with a single meaning.

The verse seems to be addressed to the beloved, but it's also possible that the addressee can be the Lord. In this latter case, the verse becomes radically mischievous, or rather bitter. We tried very hard to fulfill the duties of His viceroy on earth, but the Lord's Lordship became so tempestuous that we considered it better to separate ourself.

FWP:

SETS == IDIOMS
MOTIFS
NAMES
TERMS == WORDPLAY

This ghazal is the first of a set of two about which SRF makes special claims for an over-all 'musical' effect; see {1589,1} for his discussion.

This is the first verse in this ghazal that I really like, and it appeals to me not just for the array of wordplay that SRF points out, but for the brilliance and wit of its ending. Take a look at the definitions above: kinārah karnā means 'to avoid, to withdraw' and kar baiṭhnā means 'to do something determinedly'. So kinārah kar baiṭhnā means 'resolutely to withdraw'-- but kinārah baiṭhnā means 'to sit on the shore'-- which is a perfect way both to recover from one's own tumultuous wave-like behavior, and to escape from the stormy disturbances created by the beloved. The way two separate idiomatic expressions are cleverly combined (with a single kar serving both), and then are used to suggest a third form of (entirely appropriate) activity-- ah, there's the Ustad-ship of an Ustad!