02_03

{2,3x}

fa.zaa-e ;xandah-e gul tang-o-;zauq-e ((aish be-parvaa
faraa;Gat-gaah-e aa;Gosh-e vidaa((-e dil pasand aayaa

1) the expanse of the rose's smile/laugh-- tight/narrow; and the relish/taste of/for luxuriousness-- careless
2) the leisure-place of the 'embrace of leave-taking' of the heart was pleasing

Notes:

fa.zaa : 'Width, spaciousness, openness, extensiveness (of ground, &c.); an open area, a court, a yard; a spacious tract, a wide expanse of land, a plain'. (Platts p.782)

((aish : 'A life of pleasure and enjoyment, pleasure, delight, luxury; gratification of the appetites, sensuality'. (Platts p.767)

be-parvaa : 'Heedless, careless, unconcerned, without reflection, thoughtless; fearless, intrepid; at ease, independent'. (Platts p.204)

faraa;Gat : 'Freedom (from business, &c.), cessation (from work, &c.), finishing and ceasing (from), disengagedness, leisure, rest, repose; freedom from care or anxiety, ease, convenience, comfort, tranquillity, happiness; easy circumstances, competency, affluence, abundance'. (Platts p.777)

*Platts Dictionary Online*

Asi:

The expanse of the smile/laugh of the rose is narrow, and the relish/taste of/for luxuriousness is careless; thus the effect of all this was that the situation of the embrace of leave-taking of the heart was pleasing to us. And there can also be the meaning that the expanse of the smile/laugh of the rose is narrow, and the relish for luxuriousness takes no care at all about this.

== Asi, p. 50

Zamin:

He says that the field of the rose's smile/laugh is very narrow; that is, the interval of blooming is very small, and the relish of/for luxuriousness (the desire for life, or the longing for joy-spreading) is careless; thus the interval of leisure obtained in the leave-taking embrace of the heart was pleasing to us.

Or this: that the condition of the bud (the shape of which in its tightness is like that of the heart, and which when it becomes a rose does not remain heart-like) was pleasing.

In short, having seen the impermance of the rose, the heart arose [and departed] from the garden of existence.... The bud's blossoming becomes an embrace of leave-taking and is the leisure-place of either the poet or the bud.

== Zamin, p. 26

Gyan Chand:

To us the expanse of the smile/laugh of the rose felt very much shrunken. Thus we didn't turn our attention toward it. Our relish/taste for luxuriousness is careless. That is, we don't have merely a taste/relish for luxuriousness-- when the heart took leave of our breast then a privacy-chamber came to be there, and that pleased us. After giving leave [to depart] to the heart, there comes to be leisure and entire freedom from worry, because all the complications are due to only/emphatically the heart; thus heart-lessness agrees with us.

== Gyan Chand, p. 63

FWP:

SETS

For background see S. R. Faruqi's choices. This verse is NOT one of his choices; I thought it was interesting and have added it myself. For more on Ghalib's unpublished verses, see the discussion in {4,8x}.

For more on the 'embrace of leave-taking', see {57,6}.

The bud is 'narrow', tight, compressed, thus (metaphorically) depressed; when the bud opens into a rose, it becomes wide like a smile/laugh, and thus (metaphorically) cheerful. But in this verse the speaker finds the brief interval of the rose's smile/laugh (before its petals wither and drop away) too 'narrow' to accommodate his careless, heedless desires. Rather than settle for that narrow little expanse of time, he has a wilder and more rakish plan.

Thus when the lover has given to the (bud-shaped, bud-like, 'narrow') heart an embrace of leave-taking, the result seems to be a faraa;Gat-gaah , a place for leisure, rest, enjoyment. Perhaps this is a metaphorical space in which the last, irrevocably final embraces are exchanged (and the rash lover, left without a heart, carelessly embraces his own doom). Or might this be literally the empty space left in the lover's breast, where the heart used to dwell?