((ar.z kiije jauhar-e andeshah kii garmii
kahaa;N
kuchh ;xayaal aayaa thaa va;hshat
kaa kih .sa;hraa jal gayaa
1a) how can the heat/fervor of the temper of thought/anxiety
be conveyed/expressed?
1b) where can the heat/fervor of the temper of thought/anxiety be conveyed/displayed?
1c) as if the heat/fervor of the temper of thought/anxiety can be conveyed/expressed!
2) something of a thought of wildness had just come-- when the desert burned
((ar.z : from an Arabic root meaning 'to show the breadth'. 'Presenting or representing'; also, 'breadth, width' (Platts p.760).
kiije is an archaic form of kiyaa jaa))e ;
GRAMMAR.
jauhar : 'A gem, jewel; a pearl; essence,
matter, substance, constituent, material part (opp. to accident), absolute
or essential property; skill, knowledge, accomplishment, art; excellence,
worth, merit, virtue; secret nature; defects, vices; --the diversified wavy
marks, streaks, or grain of a well-tempered sword;' (Platts p.399)
andeshah : 'Thought, consideration, meditation, reflection; solicitude, anxiety, concern...; doubt, misgiving, suspicion; apprehension, dread, fear'. (Platts p.91)
garmii : 'Heat, warmth; ... fervour, fervency,
ardour; activity ... fieriness, vehemence; passion, rage, anger, excitement;
attachment, warm affection; sexual passion, lust'. (Platts p.905)
va;hshat : 'A desert, solitude, dreary place; --loneliness, solitariness, dreariness; ...wildness, fierceness, ferocity, savageness; ... distraction, madness' (Platts p.1183)
.sa;hraa : 'A desert, waste, wilderness; a jungle, forest; a plain' (Platts p.743)
jalnaa : 'To burn; to be burnt; to be
on fire; to be kindled, be lighted; to be scorched, be singed; to be inflamed,
to be consumed; to be touched, moved, or affected (with pity, &c.); to
feel pain, sorrow, anguish, &c.; to burn or be consumed with love, or
jealousy, or envy, &c.; to take amiss, be offended, be indignant; to get
into a passion, be enraged, to rage'. (Platts p.387)
He says, where might I go to utter the heat of my turbulent themes? I had thought that I could leave the city and utter it in the jungle. The moment a thought of madness occurred, fire burst out in the jungle. Mirza Sahib's goal in this utterance is: seeing the numerousness of those without understanding, it's as if my inner self wants to write melting verse, but cannot do so, and cannot see the fullest possible extent of the high-flyingnesses of its thought. That is, I hesitate to express accomplishment before those without understanding. (15)
It is quite impossible that I would be able to express the heat of my temper of thought. Because I had hardly formed the thought of renouncing the world, when the heart-attraction of the world began to look contemptible. That is, renunciation of the world is no large matter; it's done in the time it takes to form the thought in the heart. (10)
SETS == GENERATORS;
INEXPRESSIBILITY; KAHAN
DESERT: {3,1}
GRANDIOSITY: {5,3}
PROPORTIONALITY: {6,4}
JAUHAR verses: {5,4}; {6,13x}; {16,4};
{16,6x}; {17,4};
{29,2}; {34,2,}
a reference in Ghalib's own commentary; {42,9x};
{56,2}; {57,5};
{73,1}; {113,6};
{120,6}*
The pattern of mutual echoes and affinities among the four words defined above is simply astonishingly rich.
{How / where / as if!}
can be {spread out / presented}
the {heat / fervor / anger / lust} of
the {essence / accomplishment/ well-temperedness}
of {reflection / thought / anxiety}!
At the merest thought of {madness / wildness / desert},
the {desert / wilderness}
became {burned / moved / anguished / envious, jealous / passionate / enraged}
A word like 'convey', which similarly evokes both heat and thought, is a small reminder of the complex, uncapturable wordplay-- and meaning-play-- of the original. Really, you can mix and match until the verse is about either rationality and thought, or irrationality and emotion, or anything in between.
And what sort of 'thought' was it that came to the speaker? Merely kuchh ;xayaal , just a bit of a thought. But it could have been: 1) a first step toward yielding to madness in my own mind; 2) a fearful thought of the danger that madness might overtake me; 3) a desire to express the heat of andeshah somewhere-- say, in the wilderness; 4) a concern about the fate of the wilderness, if anyone ever unleashed the power of andeshah in it. Any or all of these are possible, and so many others besides. This verse is a 'meaning machine' if there ever was one, though it is based partly on complex multivalent individual words, and not just on cleverness with the grammar.
Compare {57,5}, which also uses both ((ar.z and jauhar . And there's {141,6}, which also complains of the limited space available to va;hshat in merely the whole world.
Nazm:
That is, how is it possible for me to manifest the heat of my temperament-- I just had a little thought of wandering in the desert, when the desert caught fire. And this exaggeration is contrary to custom-- that there should be such heat in the temperament that anything that is thought of would burn up. People consider ((ar.z to be a word for the .zil((a of jauhar , although in an affinity with jauhar , ((ar.z has 'movingness' [ta;hriik], not 'stillness' [sukuun]. (6)
== Nazm page 6