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būd nabūd ṡabāt rakhe to yih bhī ik bābat hai mīr
is ṣafḥe meñ ḥarf-e ġhalat̤ haiñ kāshke ham ko miṭāʾo tum
1) if {the world of possibility / 'existence nonexistence'} would maintain stability, then even/also this is a single/particular/excellent/unique matter/account, Mir
2) in this page, we are an erroneous letter-- if only you would erase us!
ṡabāt : 'Continuance, subsistency, durability, permanence, stability, endurance; constancy, firmness, steadiness, steadfastness, fixedness; resolution, determination; soundness, validity'. (Platts p.368)
bābat : 'Account, head, item (of account), article, business, affair, matter'. (Platts p.117)
ḥarf : 'Changing, altering; inverting, turning (as a coat); —extremity, verge, border, margin, brink, brow, side, edge; ridge or ledge (of a mountain); summit of a mountain; —nib (of a writing-reed) obliquely cut; a crooked pen; writing obliquely; —a letter of the alphabet'. (Platts p.476)
FWP:
SETS == BHI; EK; [POETRY]
MOTIFS == WRITING
NAMES
TERMS == PARADOXI love SRF's idea that the speaker could be the verse itself, talking to Mir. It can't be taken very far in terms of evidence, but it certainly can't be discounted either.
That first line opens up so many possibilities! SRF has analyzed būd nah būd , but what really calls out to my mind is ik bābat . The word means an 'account' or something like an item in a ledger (which opens up excellent lines of wordplay with the 'erroneous letter'); more generally, it means 'business, affair, matter' (see the definition above). In this latter broad sense it has striking affinities to the protean bāt . In fact, SRF explicitly equates it with bāt .
If we accept the equation, then perhaps we're entitled to read into it some of the same idiomatic uses that we can establish for bāt . And in any case, we can certainly make use of the well-established idiomatic powers of ek . Here are some of the possible readings. If this 'world of possibility' would maintain stability, then:
= ... 'this is nothing much' ( ik bābat as something small, minor)-- Who cares whether this petty, dubious world of possibility would hold together?
= ... 'this doesn't make any difference' ( ik bābat as the same one thing)-- It's all the same, it's all one, whether the world of possibility holds together or not.
= ... 'this would be an extraordinary, unexpected thing' ( ik bābat as something unique)-- This world of possibility is so petty, so doomed, that it would be remarkable if it could even sustain itself for very long.
= ... 'this too is something that should be taken into account' ( ik bābat as some matter or affair)-- If the world of possibility is going to last for a bit, then 'this' too is one more thing that should be considered:
='this' meaning the world's unexpected stability.
='this' meaning the speaker's status as an erroneous letter.
Then, if these possibilities aren't enough, consider the bhī . It can mean 'this too' (along with other things); it can mean 'even this' (this which is in an extreme class of its own). And finally it can be the specially idiomatic form that is just a phrase intensifier (as in yih bhī koʾī bāt hai?! )-- 'What! What kind of thing is this?! Is this any way for things to be?!')
All these possibilities are swept up at the beginning of the second line with 'on this page', and the only real assertion made in the line is that 'on this page we are an erroneous letter', so that the desirable, desired thing is for the speaker to be removed. But perhaps he is out of place on this page because it's such a flimsy, shoddy, disintegrating page? Perhaps his place might be on some mystically accessible page of fine parchment and excellent calligraphy? Perhaps if he were erased from this page, he might be able to move on to someplace better where he would really feel at home?
Compare Ghalib's take on his own out-of-place existence:
G{113,7}.