Verse 31853aamke


G14

1
we will write a letter, although there might/would be no petition/purpose/result
2
we are, after all, a lover of your name

t>> : 'Writing, character, handwriting... a letter, epistle'.
tlab>> : 'A question, demand, request, petition; proposition; wish, desire; object, intention, aim, purpose, pursuit, motive'.

References
Arshi, Imtiyaz Ali Ghazal# 231
Raza, Kalidas Gupta 445
Hamid Ali Khan Open Image

Bekhud Mohani points out the double meaning in the first line: , which is most easily read as 'there would be no purpose/goal' (in writing the letter), can also mean ma:tlab nah nikle , a 'purpose/goal would not be achieved' (by writing the letter)-- that is, it would be fruitless. In good mushairah -verse style, the first line is thus piquant but uninterpretable, until we're allowed, after the usual delay, to hear the second line-- which itself can't be understood until the last possible moment, when we hear the simple, forceful . Another enjoyable subtlety, as Mehr Afshan Farooqi points out (Dec. 2005), is the double meaning of as both letter in the sense of 'epistle' or written message, and letter in the sense of 'character' (by which Platts, in the definition above, means 'letter of the alphabet') or 'handwriting'. So the speaker might be proposing merely to write the 'letters' of the beloved's adorable name, perhaps over and over, as lovers have been known to do-- an activity that of course goes even more elegantly with the second line. In the second line is a textbook case of the beauties of . It balances the sentence so gracefully, colloquially, and untranslatably, that there's no way I can do it justice; 'after all' is much more cumbersome and limited. Imagine taking it out, and just think how much plainer and cruder the feeling of the words would become. The second line also directly addresses the beloved, so it's even possible that the beloved is actually-- rather than merely imaginatively-- present. On this reading, there's of course no rational point in writing her a letter-- only a romantic, emotional one. For a similar example of the lover's pleasure in merely mentioning the beloved, see 53,11 . graphics/letters.jpg