For background see S. R. Faruqi's choices . This verse is NOT one of his choices; I thought it was interesting and have added it myself. For more on Ghalib's unpublished verses, see the discussion in 4,8x . I've been including all the Bedil tribute verses, just to show how extensively they've been excised from the divan . For discussion of this choice of Ghalib's, see 8,5x . But this verse isn't quite as anodyne as it may at first seem. The only meaning of that I was familiar with was the 'grandeur, majesty' one (such that people are named Shaukat). When I checked it in Platts and saw that the first meaning was 'one thorn', I was surprised and intrigued; then the much more helpful entry in Steingass made everything clear (see the definitions above). For seems to have a primary meaning of something sharp, piercing, dangerous. Steingass's examples are wonderful: the of a scorpion means its sting-- so that the of a king clearly has at least subtle undertones of danger and threat. (Moral: as Faruqi prescribes, always use dictionaries, even when you don't think you need to.) Ghalib offers his 'heart' to be a red carpet, to be trampled on by an arrogant 'Bedil' (literally, 'heart-less') when and if he would condescend to come. A trampled heart may be a small price to pay for Bedil's arrival-- but it does sound as if that arrival will come at a price. graphics/redcarpet.jpg