Ghalib's Ghazals — Other Translations

Ghazal 5

The joy of the drop is to die in the river
when pain is cureless pain is lost

Our weakness has weakened even our tears
desperate and hoping this water is air

Spring clear after heavy rains it seems the cloud
has wept and died in its grief completely

To understand the wonder of an air that cleans
see how moss on the mirror grows in spring

The rose is budding a desire for its witness
her color and shape are silent but listen

translation by Jim Yagmin

Ghazal 8

It's time for the world to hear Ghalib again
may these words and shadows like doors stay open

Night of the watered face of stars has dawned
ordered and scattered like flowers where beauty sleeps

She is talking and talking who knows my desire
at least already her lips have opened

Why is grief an element of night when everything falls
when open eyes of stars look only to other faces

Tell me how I am happy this ocean from home
when mail from my beloved is already opened

translation by Jim Yagmin

Ghazal 10

I saw the blaze in a friend but avoided flame
I burn only when seeing my own power to see

Don't call me a fire-lover like all of the others
when I fight I cause fires too busy to tend

Many have tested themselves on the neck of wine's vessel
as she walks the waves of wine tremble

We have sold ourselves along with our poems
but not anyone can purchase these things

The illuminating light was not meant for Mount Sinai
good wine should be poured to a glass that can hold it

translation by Jim Yagmin

Ghazal 12

Not the blossom of song not the veil of music
I am the sound of my own breaking

You toy with the length of your dark curls
I am captive to my own dark thoughts

We brag to ourselves that we are different
this weakness has burdened our simple grief

Now you have come and I find myself bowing
this blessing a sadness this prayer a longing

I am a fragment sounding the dawn
you are the walls of my every echo

translation by Jim Yagmin

Ghazal 13

No meetings no leavings
no days nights no years

Who has time to deal with love
no more delight in beauty's witness

Love is every imagined beloved
no more such graceless thinking

Weeping blood is not so easy
I have no strength no stable heart

My loving arms have turned feeble
no balance of elements in this world

translation by Jim Yagmin

Ghazal 14

Wings are like dust for the winds to carry
otherwise feathers would be impatient and strengthless

What basic beauty approaches like this
not even dust on her path only shadows of flowers

Those who are drunk have seen a flower's shadow
else there would be nothing not even dust in the taverns

I have been humbled by these explosions of love
in this room not even dust just desire to construct

Now these words are I know are a simple pastime
not even dust could be gained by writing

translation by Jim Yagmin

Ghazal 19

At every step I am closer only to knowing the distance
as fast as I run the desert runs on

The moon is loneliness and churning flames
a shadow facing the rising smoke

My blisters have bled across the desert
my path is lit like pearls on skin

Because of you the bottle reflects every color
I am the one who has tasted each one

From my eye a fire bleeds what it has seen
the earth and dry leaves of the garden are lit

translation by Jim Yagmin

Ghazal 21

The dew on red petals is not without meaning
the spot on her heart where shame has passed

Dove is a handful of ash the nightingale a prison of color
to these the scar of a burnt heart is nothing

The fire itself could not do what lust for fire has
the heart has suffered waiting and fading

The claim to be love's prisoner is a consequence of constraint
only a hand trapped by stone can promise its faithfulness

Sun of our world illuminate us now
like a shadow a strange time has come upon us

translation by Jim Yagmin