saudaa-e ((ishq se dam-e sard-e kashiidah huu;N
shaam-e ;xayaal-e :zulf se .sub;h-e damiidah huu;N
1) from the madness of passion, I am a drawn-out cold sigh
2) from the evening of the thought of curls, I am the opened-out dawn
dam-e sard : 'A cold sigh, a sigh of despair'. (Platts p.525)
kashiidah : 'Drawn, pulled, stretched, lengthened, prolonged, long, extended; contracted, pulled in; borne, endured, suffered, experienced; disturbed (in mind)'. (Platts p.838)
damiidah : 'Blown, blossomed, shot forth, opened out, expanded, vegetated (a plant); blowing, blossoming; sprouting; broken forth (as the dawn of day)'. (Platts p.527)
That is, the madness of passion has embodied a cold sigh. Now there's nothing in me except for cold breaths. And the evening of the thought of the curls-- that is, the thought of the curls-- has made my condition like that of an opened-out dawn, of which the elements are amazement-strickenness, agitation/anxiety, collar-tearing, liver-tearing, a pallid complexion, a dust-smeared face, etc.
.sub;h damiidan = for the dawn to break. In the madness of passion, I've become an embodied cold sigh-- that is, with every breath I heave a cold sigh. I am the dawn that breaks after a night of imagining the curls-- that is, I imagined the curls, and after that my heart blossomed out. In both lines, opposition [ta.zaad] has been used: saudaa and sard ; then shaam and .sub;h . Then, shaam-e ;xayaal-e zulf is an extremely artificial construction; as far as ;xayaal-e shaam-e zulf goes, it can work.
SETS
CURLS: {14,6}
MADNESS: {14,3}
NIGHT/DAY: {1,2}
For more on Ghalib's unpublished verses, see the discussion in {4,8x}. See also the overview index.
As Asi notes, 'the poets give for the breaking of dawn the simile of a single cold sigh'. For with dawn there often comes a brief, cool, light breeze. So if the speaker considers himself to 'be', through the madness of passion, such a cold sigh, the dawn that would accompany it must be a special one. It is a dawn that follows a particularly dark night-- the 'evening of the thought of curls'. The beloved's black curls are ramifying, entangling, endless. And what blossoms out from them is a dawn that has for its dawn breeze a 'cold sigh', a 'sigh of despair'. It's a verse of sheer mood.
Asi:
Because of the madness of passion, I am a single drawn-out cold sigh. So to speak, I am the dawn that has risen from the evening of the thought of the curls of the beloved. Since the poets give for the breaking of dawn the simile of a single cold sigh, he has said that 'since from the madness of passion I am heaving a cold sigh, therefore I too seem to be a dawn'.
== Asi, p. 172