Verse 14x1821aakare ko))ii
G3
1
whatever there is, is absorbed in the mischievousness of the eyebrow of the beloved
2
having 'put the eyes on the niche-shelf', let someone always look
taaq par rakhnaa>> : '(-), To lay on the shelf; to put or set aside; to neglect, abandon; to refuse; to disobey'.
| References | |
|---|---|
| Arshi, Imtiyaz Ali | Ghazal# 169 |
| Raza, Kalidas Gupta | 347 |
| Nuskhah-e-Hamidiyah | 255-257 |
| Asi, Abdul Bari | 262-263 |
| Gyan Chand | 383-384 |
| Hamid Ali Khan | Open Image |
He became 'absorbed in the beloved's eyebrow' and his eyes were 'put in the niche' because because the eyebrows are a niche. The point is that everyone has become a spectator of the beauty of her eyebrow, and the lover ought to burst his eyes: 158,6 .
== Zamin, p. 381
In the world every person and every thing is lost in beholding the beauty of the eyebrow of the beloved. Now we should remove the eyes from the direction of every thing in the world, and keep looking only at the eyebrow of the beloved. The simile of eyebrow is [habitually] given as 'niche'. Thus it is in the poet's mind, 'having put the eyes in the niche [] of the eyebrow of the beloved, let's always look'. Since this verse is in [divine] 'Reality' [], by 'putting the eyes on the niche-shelf [] and looking' is meant that one ought to look with the eye of revelation behind the appearance of things and see the sight of the True Beloved.
== Gyan Chand, p. 384
For background see S. R. Faruqi's choices . For more on Ghalib's unpublished verses, see the discussion in 4,8x .
On the nature of a or 'niche', see 10,1 , which provides illustrations. Putting things in a niche usually serves to preserve and/or display them; but there's also the 'niche of forgetfulness' in {10,1} itself and in 111,2 . In the case of the present verse, the relevant idiom given by Platts is , 'to put on [the shelf of] a niche'; see the definition above. Gyan Chand unselfconsciously uses ; I've seen this latter form of the idiom elsewhere as well. In any case, Ghalib has made the idiom work with paradoxicalness and panache.
As Gyan Chand notes, the shape of the eyebrow suggests the curving arch that overhangs the shelf of a niche. If a lover wants to pay close, consistent attention to the beloved's eyebrow, deciding to place his eyes on a niche-shelf and aim them at her face would seem to be a fine tactic: it would guarantee that they wouldn't move around in their sockets or be accidentally jostled. And in addition, the eyes would be sheltered by the arch of the niche, the way the beloved's own eyes are sheltered by her irresistible eyebrows.
Or, idiomatically, a lover might 'put aside, neglect, abandon, disobey' his eyes (see the definition above)-- and having done this, might then 'always look at' [] the beloved's eyebrow. What are we to make of this paradoxical suggestion? Surely it pushes us back toward the at the beginning of the first line. If indeed 'whatever is/exists' is in any case absorbed in contemplating the beloved's eyebrow, what need for eyes? Perhaps one (mystically) 'sees' better without eyes. The eyes in their rolling around, in the frivolity and fickleness of their attention, might well prove to be only a distraction. Shove them aside, and let the empty eye-sockets 'look', let the face look, let the lover's whole soul and body look.
There seems to be a form of what I call 'grotesquerie' here (pulling out the eyeballs and sticking them on a shelf?!), yet it doesn't seem to be truly activated in the verse itself. It's only latent within the idiom, and if we choose a literal meaning from the tangle of possibilities, it's our own choice and not necessarily Ghalib's (though he certainly set up all the possibilities).
Note for grammar fans: On , see 215,1 .
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