Of treats—and grounds—and sealing love

All my life my sister has been to me a provider of treats. I cannot recount to you (or myself for that matter) the number of gifts I have had from her. From the elaborately concocted fictions about the universe from my earliest memories, through the songs, ideas, poems, concepts, interests, loves, laughs, philosophies, news, and nuggets she litters my life with, to the You Tube videos I almost invariably watch downloaded on her laptop, my mental life is strung with gifts from her.

Very often, I've believed as many as six impossible things she's told me before breakfast. Or fallen in love a couple of times. Yesterday it was with something which I watched with toothbrush in my mouth and mist in my eyes, which Sheetal also shares with you, so enjoy!

That sequence of events is beautiful for so many reasons – Sahir, Madan Mohan, Meena Kumari and Sunil Dutt are not the least of them. Oh! But the idea of it! In the ghazal world there isn’t a more intimate act than to work in another's zameen. It is always an extension of love. It is like wearing your lover’s T-shirt. And the audacity and the longing in writing in the meter and rhyme structure of an unknown lover is just too delicious.

The sweetness of the episode was impossible to resist. So this, dedicated in gratitude to my sister.

Ek tere noor ki hasrat ne jagaya hai jinhe

Dil ke nairang tilismaat kise pesh karoon

Apne jazbaat-o-khayaalat-o-khalwat se saje

Bazm-e-dil ke ye da’waat kise pesh karoon

Justuju ne tho duboya hai humee mein humko

Doobke ubhre jo ilmaat kise pesh karoon

Teri furqat mein ris-ris ke jutaaya hai jise

Woh nihaan abr-e-barsaat kise pesh karoon

Har koi aab-talab phirta hai zoya ya’an par

Phir umadta behr-e-zulmaat kise pesh karoon

Keeping with Urdu

My next was going to be an acerbic rant on the Ghazal in English. But that was before, in the very process of composing it, I succumbed too. The Ghazal is such a therapeutic form of verse that I realise that it must enormously tempt poets of temperament. The real poets of talent of course find no crutches in either language or form – but we don’t speak of those just here.

Since I am still embarrassed by my English attempt, I will give you instead a good old-fashioned recent one in Urdu. At least it will have the advantage of being quite incomprehensible to a majority of the people who will glance at it, while affording me the satisfaction of giving it a life beyond the bytes of a Word document.

Ye baad-e-tabaah sab raah barbaad kar jo chale

Shukr! Zahmat-e-intikhaab se aazaad kar jo chale

Abd-e-misr sa gumaan hota aaj kal humse

Dil-e-sang-e-giraan ko seene pe laad kar jo chale

Keysh se khuda tak ka faasla tai hoga kaise?

Pairon mein zanjeer-e-khudi saad kar jo chale

Gila tho nahi hai koi woh jo chale so chale

Zahan-o-dil ko roshan-o-aabbad kar jo chale

Koi gul na khila ab ke mausam-e-bahaar mein

Chale tho tamaam chaman nashaad kar jo chale

Ab kuch zabt ka tamasha bhi dekhajaye Zoya

Zor-e- vaheshat mein tarq-e-fasaad kar jo chale

Dawaat-e-dil

Dawaat-e-dil mein dubo kar kalam nikala hai

Zamzam-e-dard se do boondh nam nikala hai

Tangi-e-dil ka kya ho ilm humko jab hamne

Dasht-e-dil se shaala-e- dharam nikaala hai

Jigar baaki ho tho beshaq shouq farmaayen

Humne tho dil hi se shouq-e-sanam nikaala hai

Kyon jeeta hai teri zulf ke sar hote tak?

Ghata ne ek hi jhonke se dum nikaala hai

Samajh ke Khuda ka khudii se bair humne

Sajde se saayaa-e-sharam nikaala hai

Hairat hai zabt-e-umeed ka ke zoya tumne

Dasht-e-khaar mein phir rista kadam nikala hai