Ghazal 37, Verse 5x

{37,5x}

saraapaa yak-aa))iinah-daar-e shikastan
iraadah huu;N yak-((aalam-afsurdagaa;N kaa

1) entirely one-mirror-possessing of {breakingness/brokenness}
2) I am the desire/will/intention of those with/of a worldful of dejection

Notes:

shikastan : 'To break (trans. and intrans.); to defeat (an enemy); to turn away the face; to be rough and severe; to torture; to disturb; to be disturbed, agitated, angry; to eat, chew; to be broken, split, opened; to be covered with shame; to fold, to bend, to curl; to restrain; to suppress, to keep back (as tears, &c.)'. (Steingass p.753)

 

iraadah : 'Desire, inclination, will; intention, purpose, resolve, determination; aim, object, end, end in view; plan, design; meaning, purport'. (Platts p.37)

 

afsurdah : 'Frozen, frigid, benumbed; withered, faded; dispirited, dejected, low-spirited, melancholy'. (Platts p.62)

Gyan Chand:

Those people who are entirely dejected-- their power of desire/will becomes very weak. If they form a desire/intention to do some task, then because of dejection and despair, after some time they abandon that desire/intention. I too am the image of just this kind of mental defeat and sorrow. In another place he has said, [the second line of] {71,1}. (98)

FWP:

SETS == A,B
MIRROR: {8,3}

Raza p. 123; Raza p. 124. S. R. Faruqi's choices. Ghalib originally composed a ghazal of six verses, from which he chose the first two for publication in his divan. In the original six-verse ghazal, this verse was the fifth one.

On this ghazal as a kind of unlabeled verse-sequence, see {37,1}. On the macaronic structure of this ghazal, with its Persian first lines and Urdu second lines, see {37,2}.

On the idiomatic possibilities of yak expressions, see {11,1}.

The Persian infinitive shikastan can mean either 'to break' or 'to be broken'. Thus if I am 'entirely a mirror' of this state, what I reflect might be either 'brokenness' or 'breakingness'. And a mirror sometimes reflects reality, while it also sometimes metaphorically reveals an inner vision.

The second line declares that what I am is an iraadah -- a desire, intention, resolve. And this iraadah is one formed by 'those of a world-ful of dejection'. This may mean, as Gyan Chand maintains, that I am a very weak, futile desire or intention, since I 'mirror' or reflect the 'brokenness' characteristic of people who are despairing and dejected.

Yet it's also possible that the desire or intention that I 'mirror' is that of 'breakingness', since it's one formed by people radically disaffected with the world. Perhaps they cherish a dream of destroying the world, or themselves, or their connection with the world. Even if they're too melancholy to even try to achieve this intention, it's just the sort of longing that the state of the desperate lover ('I') might well embody or reflect.

Gyan Chand is right to suggest for comparison {71,1}; but consider also {214,8}.