qadr-e sang-e sar-e rah rakhtaa huu;N
sa;xt arzaa;N hai giraanii merii
1) I possess the worth of a stone beside the road
2) my heaviness/expensiveness is harshly/severely abundant/cheap
The way in a stone on the road there is 'heaviness' but also extreme 'abundance/cheapness', in that they receive the kicks of travelers, the same is the situation of my 'heavy/expensive' worth. (205)
I'm a possessor of honor and worth, but extremely low/base, like the stone lying in the roadway, that constantly receives kicks from travelers. He laments his worthiness, and complains against the movement of time. (363)
SETS == WORDPLAY
The first line is piquant, but we can't tell where the verse is going-- why do I possess the (negligible) 'worth' of a stone in the road? Surely I am more valuable than that, at least in my own eyes? It almost sounds like a riddle.
The second line, in classic mushairah performance style, withholds the answer to the riddle until the last possible moment. Not until we hear giraanii can we make the connections. Then we are rewarded with a delightfully elegant show of wordplay: stones beside the road are both 'heavy' [giraa;N] and 'abundant' [arzaa;N]; while I, in a beautifully engineered paradox, am both 'expensive' [giraa;N] and 'cheap' [arzaa;N].
And on another reading, my problem may be that my very worthiness, my 'heaviness' in value [giraanii], is all too 'abundant'. I pride myself on my (poetic?) worth-- but so do all too many others.
The final touch of wordplay is sa;xt , which can refer to either physical hardness or unyieldingness-- exactly the qualities of a stone-- or a sort of moral harshness or severity, as in {167,2}. In this latter sense it imparts a tone of melancholy, bitterness, or lament about the stone-like 'cheapness' and 'abundance' of the speaker's worth.
For more verses full of 'stone' wordplay, see {62,5}.
Hali:
giraanii means heaviness, and also expensiveness. He says that my worth is like that of the stone that would lie beside the road, and everyone, coming and going, steps on it in passing. That is, I am indeed of 'heavy' worth, but like that stone I am worthless; thus, how cheap is my heaviness/expensiveness! (160)