ho ga))e baa-ham-digar josh-e pareshaanii se jam((a
gardish-e jaam-e tamannaa daur-e garduu;N hai mujhe
1) they became, with each other, through the ebullition of perturbation/dispersion, an aggregate
2a) the going-round of the cup of longing is the revolving of the sky/sphere, to me
2b) the revolving of the sky/sphere is the going-round of the cup of longing, to me
pareshaanii : 'Dispersion, scattering, confusion, disorder, derangement, perplexity, bewilderment, perturbation, distraction; distress, embarrassment, trouble, misery'. (Platts p.259)
jam((a : 'A collection, a number together, an assemblage, a congregation, assembly; conjunction; accumulation; aggregate, amount, sum total, whole'. (Platts p.389)
gardish : 'Going round, turning round, revolution; circulation; roll; course; period; turn, change; vicissitude; reversion; — adverse fortune, adversity; — wandering about, vagrancy'. (Platts p.903)
daur : 'Going round, moving in a circle, revolving; revolution (of a body, or of time); circular motion; the going round, or circulating (of wine); the cup handed round; the coming round in turn (of days or times); vicissitude'. (Platts p.533)
garduu;N : 'A wheel; the heavens, the firmament, the celestial globe or sphere; chance, fortune (and her revolving wheel)'. (Platts p.903)
That is, the going-round of the cup of longing has come together with the revolving of the sky/sphere and has begun to deliver the same troubles that the revolving of the heavens delivers. He has expressed this meaning in this way: that the cup of longing, through the ebullition of perturbation, has gone round in such a reversed way that it has come together with the revolving of the sky/sphere.
Through my perturbation, both came to be in one place. The revolving of the sky/sphere used to turn against me in any case. The cup of longing too, through nearness to the revolving of the sky/sphere, has adopted the same style, and it too has avoided me in its going-round.
SETS == SYMMETRY; WORDPLAY
SOUND EFFECTS: {26,7}
For more on Ghalib's unpublished verses, see the discussion in {4,8x}. See also the overview index.
In an elegantly tantalizing way, the first line makes it impossible to know what's happening; under mushairah performance conditions, we're obliged to wait until, after a suitable interval, we're allowed to hear the second line.
When we finally do hear it, we realize that his is consummately a verse of wordplay. The wordplay is in fact of several different kinds:
= pareshaanii as both physical perturbation ('disorder, confusion' of the sky) and mental perturbation ('distraction, distress' of the speaker)
= pareshaanii as 'dispersion, scattering' versus jam((a as 'aggregate, whole'
=words suggesting roundness and turning: gardish , daur , garduu;N (see the definitions above); there's also jaam considered as a hemispherical shape, like an inversion of the dome of the sky
=words with sound effects: jam((a and jaam , also gardish and garduu;N
One additional charm of the verse is the perfect semantic suitability of the 'symmetry' in the second line. The grammar makes it impossible to say whether the cup is being compared to the sky (2a), or vice versa (2b). And what could be more fitting, in a verse that laments the way the two have merged into a single whole?
Asi:
So much ebullition of perturbation occurred, that they both became assembled together. For me, the going-round of the cup of longing is the revolving of the sky/sphere. The idea is that the revolving of the sky/sphere is perturbed, and so is the going-round of the cup of longing.
== Asi, p. 291