FWP:
SETS == MAGAR
BONDAGE: {1,5}
CURLS: {14,6}
TESTING: {4,4}
The wonderfully complex use of taab -- enhanced of course by betaabii -- makes this a verse of what might be called word-exploration. The first line urges a helpless, captive heart to lie still and not struggle, for what's the use of struggle? We wait for the second line to give us a plausible interpretive context: will the exhortation to the captive continue, or will some other relevant information about his condition be provided to explain the exhortation? Then, as so often, the second line provides us with a host of possibilities, and no way to choose among them. The captive should lie still, since struggle is fruitless--
=but then, it's not surprising if the heart suffers-- it's undergoing a test of its power of endurance [taab] in bondage amidst the beloved's twisting, coiling curls.
=but then, it's not surprising if the heart suffers-- it's undergoing a test consisting of torture by the heat/pain [taab] of the beloved's twisting curls.
=perhaps, the lover explains to his heart, it's the the furious radiance [taab] of her curls that is undergoing a test, as she once again checks out its potency by using it on us.
Moreover, all the important words are mutually tangled in
coils of wordplay. We have a heart that is vaa-bastah
-- literally 'bound' like a captive, or else 'dependent' like a slave. We
have tresses that are pur-shikan -- either 'full of
twists', or 'city-overthrowing' like conquerors who sweep all before them (see the definitions above).
We have betaabii , the lack of taab
or endurance-- an agitation that would cause one to writhe and twist. And
through it all, we have taab with all its
meanings: heat, radiance, endurance, twisting, curl.
Nazm:
Perhaps you want to again taste the relish of the coils [phande] of tresses, since you're writhing? Enough-- just keep on lying there, tied up. May it not be that from your writhing the coils would be drawn even tighter! (231)
== Nazm page 231