For a few days now, I have been reading and re-reading quite a bit of poetry. I enjoyed a book of ghazals and nazms, that I have leafed through innumerable times in last fifteen years or so. I browsed through some of my favorite poetry sites. Many of these poems are extremely wonderful, and some of their lines are so powerful that they make you pause and think for a long while.
Incidentally, that is one thing I admire greatly about urdu poetry, specially ghazals. They have a rhythm (which makes them so amenable to be adapted to music), and they touch on a wide variety of topics. Ashaar of a single ghazal may present different shades of life, and different philosophical aspects.
I believe many people would have heard or read this sher:
Zaahid, sharaab piine de maszid mei.n baith kar
Ya woh jagah bata de, jaha.n khuda nahii.n hai
(The author of this is 'Daag', I think, but am not sure).
Recently, my brother shared with me the reply (which I had never heard of earlier):
Zaahil, sharaab pii le tu maszid mei.n baith kar
Gar dil mei.n khuda nahii.n hai, to kahii.n nahii.n hai
I was overwhelmed.
I want to share another nazm that made a very great impact on me.
Tajmahal - the epitome of beauty, one of the great wonders of the world, and an eternal monument of love.
Or is it? Is there a unanimous agreement on what the Taj represents ? I am afraid not. This is what Sahir Ludhianvi said:
ye chamanazaar ye jamunaa kaa kinaaraa ye mahal
ye munaqqash dar-o-diivaar, ye maharaab ye taaq
ik shahanashaah ne daulat kaa sahaaraa le kar
ham Gariibo.n kii muhabbat kaa u.Daayaa hai mazaak
mere mahabuub kahii.n aur milaa kar mujhase!
Read the complete poem : Taaj Mahal
In the last few days, I have read quite a lot of news headlines and quite few articles on the increasing acts of violence, specifically in our country. Violence, compounded by corruption - the sorry state of affairs really saddens me.
My lament:
Jahaa.n mei.n yeh kaisaa toofaan aayaa
Yeh kaisaa junoo.n aadmii par chaayaa
Mahavir, Buddh, Nanak ke hamvatan
Gandhi ki beTe, aman bechte hai.n
Incidentally, that is one thing I admire greatly about urdu poetry, specially ghazals. They have a rhythm (which makes them so amenable to be adapted to music), and they touch on a wide variety of topics. Ashaar of a single ghazal may present different shades of life, and different philosophical aspects.
I believe many people would have heard or read this sher:
Zaahid, sharaab piine de maszid mei.n baith kar
Ya woh jagah bata de, jaha.n khuda nahii.n hai
(The author of this is 'Daag', I think, but am not sure).
Recently, my brother shared with me the reply (which I had never heard of earlier):
Zaahil, sharaab pii le tu maszid mei.n baith kar
Gar dil mei.n khuda nahii.n hai, to kahii.n nahii.n hai
I was overwhelmed.
I want to share another nazm that made a very great impact on me.
Tajmahal - the epitome of beauty, one of the great wonders of the world, and an eternal monument of love.
Or is it? Is there a unanimous agreement on what the Taj represents ? I am afraid not. This is what Sahir Ludhianvi said:
ye chamanazaar ye jamunaa kaa kinaaraa ye mahal
ye munaqqash dar-o-diivaar, ye maharaab ye taaq
ik shahanashaah ne daulat kaa sahaaraa le kar
ham Gariibo.n kii muhabbat kaa u.Daayaa hai mazaak
mere mahabuub kahii.n aur milaa kar mujhase!
Read the complete poem : Taaj Mahal
In the last few days, I have read quite a lot of news headlines and quite few articles on the increasing acts of violence, specifically in our country. Violence, compounded by corruption - the sorry state of affairs really saddens me.
My lament:
Jahaa.n mei.n yeh kaisaa toofaan aayaa
Yeh kaisaa junoo.n aadmii par chaayaa
Mahavir, Buddh, Nanak ke hamvatan
Gandhi ki beTe, aman bechte hai.n
11 comments:
'Dil main khuda nahin to kahin nahin', Aha!
I like Sahir's 'Taaj mahal'!Whatever of his work that I have come across, I have liked. I think this nazm was written in reply to an old Hindi movie ghazal: ' Ek shahenshah ne banwake hansi taaj-mahal', though I am not so sure!
"Zaahil, sharaab pii le tu maszid mei.n baith kar
Gar dil mei.n khuda nahii.n hai, to kahii.n nahii.n hai..."
Wonderful, just wonderful !!! Whoever has written it, kudos to him/her.
As you rightly said, Sahir has raised another p.o.v. to Tajmahal.
For lack of time, I am not able to pursue this hobby of mine. Thanks for sharing & keeping me in touch with all these shayari. You gave me a link, I am still to click on that. :((
Yeah, Lazy might be right for that Tajmahal.
@LeziB, Cuckoo: Yes, these lines are simply wonderful - Dil mei.n khuda nahii.n to kahii.n nahii.n hai!
I have come across another reply to the first sher, in a humrous vein. I quote it here, meaning no offence to the lord:
Zaahil sharaab na pii maszid mein baith kar
Botal ek hi hai, kahii.n khuda na maa.ng le
I believe what LeziB has mentioned is right. The other poem was written by Shakeel Badayuni. Here is a link to that one too:
http://www.cs.wisc.edu/%7Enavin/india/songs/isongs/5/555_gif.html
Take a look Cuckoo, you will love them both. Even if they have just opposite points of view!
Me, not much into Hindi poetry but this sure is beautiful...
@Ash: Thanks for dropping by. I am glad you liked it :-))
@Alok: Wah wah wah! Kya baat hai !! Lagta hai aapko bhi shayar kar diya meri post ne! :-)
All i want to say is thanx a lot, first or the b'day wishes n second for the beautiful verses i jst read. thanx for the poetry...
some firewalls restrict access to URLs with an underscore in them. thats why i was not able to access from work...
nice post here on ghazals...my knowledge of urdu is limited, but the ones here dint trouble me much...
btw, did u listen to this ghazal "patta patta buta buta..."?
i was in a hariharan concert other day and he sang it so beautifully...
@Deepti: You are most welcome. And nothing but the best of the best wishes for you :-)
@Sriram: Thanks for clarifying the mystery. I have heard of this problem before.
I am glad you liked the ghazals. I keep posting on poetry. And in the earlier ones I added an english translation too, to help the people who are not so conversant with hindi/urdu - but I gave it a miss this time as I felt I could not do justice to the masters' poetry.
I have read the ghazal you mention, but have not heard it. My interest in ghazals is more from the perspective of poetry, so I enjoy reading more than listening :-))
Coming here so late....and in your 50th post Ash beat me by some minutes....life is not fair...lol...!
I think I have the book by Daag...will check out and confirm....
I love that sher...
hey how about you give lil bit post on differences between....
Nazm
Sher
Ghazal
Rubain...( is that valid...)
That would be pretty informative...!
@BTR: Please do confirm :-) It is indeed a lovely sher. Let us attribute it to the rightful owner ;-)
Regarding info on different forms of poetry, that is indeed a very good idea. But I think that I am not qualified enough to do it - people much more knowledgeable than me have done it before. But if you are interested, I can pass you some links.
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