FWP:
SETS == IZAFAT
MIRROR: {8,3}
VOWS: {20,2}
What kind of a scar or brand is it that would be difficult to erase? According to the commentators, it's a scar left on the person who receives the 'taunt of false-promising'-- namely, the beloved. But the i.zaafat grammar also opens the possibility that it's a mark or scar left on the person who gives the 'taunt of false-promising'-- namely, the lover.
What if the scar or mark is left on the beloved? The lover does undoubtedly tease or taunt the beloved about her false-promising and her radical indifference to vows and pledges (see for example {20,2} and {20,3}). It's even conceivable, though barely so, that the beloved might possibly feel guilty, but her 'guilt' is usually presented in an ambiguous or cynical style (see {46,1}). As a rule, she receives the lover's barbs with either irritation or (much more painfully for the lover) complete indifference. Thus I have trouble accepting Faruqi's second interpretation, which he actually prefers, and which attributes to the beloved an awesome and entirely implausible concern with the strictest sincerity and purity, even to the degree of experiencing perpetual grief over totally false taunts-- more grief, Faruqi claims, over false taunts than over true ones. Is this the beloved that we know so well from the rest of the classical ghazal world? Not hardly!
It seems to me much more possible that the present verse is another, all too familiar case of indifference on the beloved's part-- the lover goes nattering on about blame and reproach, and the beloved entirely ignores him. After all, we have no evidence that she actually has any such scar; we only know the lover is muttering ominously about it. On this reading, the mirror as a 'whirlpool of reproach' is just part of what he's muttering about; and the other meanings of var:tah also become relevant (see the definition above). But probably she's not even listening.
What if the scar or mark is left on the lover? Here the scar would represent the dark stain of guilt he incurred in the eyes of the beloved, when he accused her (whether rightly or wrongly) of false-promising. (See {177,1} for his casuistical reflections on how touchy she is, and how desperate he is to placate her.) On this reading, the mirror as a 'whirlpool of reproach' is just another evidence of her ill-temper and quickness to blame: she'll feel anger even at her own mirror. (See {64,4} for another example of her irrational suspiciousness and hostility.) Why will she blame the mirror? The verse gives us no way to know; nor do we really have hints enough for useful speculation. (Though there's always the idea of her basic 'ungazeability', as in {214,7}.) If we consider her wrath against the mirror to be probably petty or even groundless, we realize afresh how dire are the prospects of the hapless lover who was rash enough to actually 'taunt' her.
But as Nazm says, the verse is not well-framed, its complexity is obscure rather than enticing; whatever meaning(s) Ghalib had in mind are 'not expressed in a good way'.
Note for meter fans: In the first line kyuu;Nkar
, meaning 'how, in what way', has been shortened for metrical reasons into
kyuu;Nkih ; this latter form looks just like the normal
word for 'because', though it isn't the same of course. As Josh observes,
such shortening of this particular word is no longer accepted. On the ambiguities of kyuu;Nkar , see {125,1}.
Nazm:
No telling with what water the stain of false-promising will be removed. Now, to you, even/also the mirror is a whirlpool/maze of reproach/blame, for in the mirror you adorn yourself so as to show yourself to the Others, which is precisely false-promising. In this verse instead of kih , there ought to have appeared to ; and [as the verse stands] even the meaning is not expressed in a good way. (233)
== Nazm page 232; Nazm page 233