Ghazal 198, Verse 1

Nazm:

That is, the way avarice for one's own wealth is the extreme of avarice and deprivation, so the same is true of the extreme of envy/jealousy: when we feel a longing for union, we ourself become jealous of ourself. (222)

Bekhud Dihlavi:

He says, in passion for her, we've come to feel envy/jealousy even over ourself. Thus we've accepted the sacrifice of our life, but we've given up longing for her. That is, if we long, then she will come or will call us there, and in both those situations my eyes will see her, and we'll feel envious; our hands will touch her hands, we'll burn with envy; our feel will fall on the earth of her street; we'll be jealous. Thus we've left off longing for her. (288)

Bekhud Mohani:

We have so much envy/jealousy that not to speak of the Rival, it doesn't even please us that we ourself would long for her. Although we're dying, we don't long to meet with her, (390)

FWP:

INDEPENDENCE: {9,1}

Bekhud Dihlavi labels this not a ghazal but a verse-set, but he seems to be alone among the commentators in taking that view.

The commentators unite to provide one reading, which is basically that of {153,1}; thus in its intensely paradoxical way this reading makes perfect Ghalibian sense. But notice that {153,1} also makes heavy use of wordplay: without the clever triple use of dekhnaa , its enjoyableness would be much diminished.

The same clever use of wordplay energizes the present verse as well, in a subtle but thus all the more amusing way. If we don't approve of envy, including our own, then we're speaking in what might almost pass as a Ghalibian mainstream: this verse is part of the set that I call 'independence' verses (for more on these verses, see {9,1}). And notice what the result of our rejection of envy is: in the second line, we repudiate all interest in something that belongs to somebody else: we reject, literally, 'her longing' [un kii tamannaa]. (For more on the complexities of rashk , see {53,4}.) Since we radically disapprove of all envy, why should we envy or covet something that's so clearly hers-- her very own longing?

This ambiguity around which the wordplay turns is a little harder to convey in English, since 'her longing' would normally mean 'the longing felt by her'. In Urdu, un kii tamannaa can mean either 'the longing felt by her' or, perhaps even more commonly, 'the longing felt for her' (by somebody else). A closer case in English would be something like the ambiguity of 'his memory is unreliable' (in his own mind) versus 'his memory lingers on' (in the minds of others).

In short, I'm suggesting a parallel with {197,2} and so many other Ghalibian verses, in which the overt meaning and the wordplay interact in complex and doubly enjoyable ways.