;xaak-e fur.sat bar sar-e ;zauq-e fanaa ay inti:zaar
hai ;Gubaar-e shiishah-e saa((at ram-e aahuu mujhe
1) the dust of the interval/occasion/leisure-- on the head of the relish of death/oblivion, oh Waiting!
2a) the dust/sand of the hour-glass is the flight/panic of a deer, to me
2b) the flight/panic of a deer is the dust/sand of an hour-glass, to me
;xaak : 'Dust, earth; ashes'. (Platts p.484)
fur.sat : 'A time, opportunity, occasion; freedom (from), leisure; convenience; relief, recovery; respite, reprieve; rest, ease'. (Platts p.779)
;xaak ;Daalnaa : '(- par ), To throw dust (on); to bury, to conceal (an affair, or anything disgraceful); --to heap curses (on), to execrate'. (Platts p.485)
;zauq : 'Taste, enjoyment, delight, joy, pleasure, voluptuousness'. (Platts p.578)
fanaa : 'Mortality, frailty, corruption, decay, perdition, destruction, death'. (Platts p.784
;Gubaar : 'Dust; clouds of dust; a dust-storm;... impurity, foulness; (met.) vexation, soreness, ill-feeling, rancour, spite; affliction, grief; perplexity'. (Platts p.769)
shiishah-saa((at : 'An hour-glass'. (Platts p.740)
ram : 'Terror, scare; flight, elopement; concealment'. (Platts p.598)
SETS == A,B; EXCLAMATION; GENERATORS; IZAFAT
S. R. Faruqi's choices. Ghalib originally composed a ghazal of twelve verses, from which he chose three for publication in his divan. In the original twelve-verse ghazal, this verse was the third one.
Strikingly, the first line contains no verb. Because of the generally extravagant and emotive associations of 'dust on the head', it's tempting to supply a subjunctive ('may dust be on the head!'); but a present is also possible ('dust is on the head'). Either way, the effect feels exclamatory and dramatic.
But what exactly does it mean to put 'dust on the head' of someone or something? In its literal meaning, it describes a widespread traditional ritual of mourning (to express the extremity of their grief, mourners tear their clothing, beat their breasts, fling dust or ashes on their heads, etc.). Then idiomatically it can also mean 'to heap curses on, to execrate' or 'to bury, to conceal' (see the definition of ;xaak ;Daalnaa above).
These varied meanings are augmented by the complex possibilities of both fur.sat and ;zauq (see the definitions above). And as if so many permutations weren't enough, both words are enmeshed in even more ambiguous i.zaafat phrases. We're offered the radical abstractness of the 'dust of leisure' [;xaak-e fur.sat] ('the dust that is leisure'? 'the dust that belongs to leisure'? 'the dust that results from leisure'?). Similar use is then made of the 'relish of oblivion' [;zauq-e fanaa] ('the relish for seeking oblivion'? 'the relish that is oblivion'? 'the relish that results from oblivion'?).
Having no choice, we must wait impatiently (and of course, under mushairah performance conditions, must wait as long as possible) for the second line to bring what we hope will be clarification.
As so often, the second line starts completely afresh in its imagery. It's also what I call 'transitive'-- since it claims 'A is B', it equally claims that 'B is A', so that in a radically abstract verse like this we can't tell whether the line is really talking about an hour-glass (through the metaphor of the flight/panic of a deer) or about the flight/panic of a deer (through the metaphor of an hour-glass).
In either case, it seems safe to say that the verse is about the brevity of life and imminence of death-- but how much beyond that very unhelpful level can we really go? Just to take the two most extreme cases, perhaps the verse expresses a radical eagerness and 'relish' for death, so that it curses, or grieves over, 'Waiting', and heaps scorn on the foolish 'interval' of one's lifetime, which misbehaves and runs madly along like the panic/flight of a deer. Or perhaps the verse expresses fear and horror at death (as for example does {7,2}), so that it curses any possible 'relish' for death by heaping on its head the pathetically scanty 'dust' of the interval of the lifetime; thus during the condemned person's agony of waiting, the hour-glass seems to move with the madly fast rush of a panicky deer.
Compare {229,4}, another 'dust on the head' verse. And for another intriguing use of ram-e aahuu , see {172,5x}.
Gyan Chand:
On the portion of ground of the age/world, I am waiting for the relish of death/oblivion. In the hour-glass, sand is passing from one chamber to the other for me with as much speed as dust that would be flung up by a fleeing deer. The swift passing of the sand is a sign of the swift passing of time-- that is, the lifetime. I am about to attain oblivion, the lifetime is swiftly becoming finished. (347)