Hisabay Umar

Majid Islam Amjad Sahab's ghazal is a precious masterpiece of Urdu poetry, in which he has woven love, philosophy, metaphysics, and the profound truths of life in exceptionally beautiful and simple words. For your audience and readers on the internet, here is a detailed and touching interpretation: Explanation and Understanding of the Ghazal First Couplet The reckoning of life is so little a ledger — when I drew you out and looked, it was all loss. Meaning: The poet places before us the complete accounting of his life, saying that if from my life I subtract "you" — my love, my purpose, or my beloved — nothing remains. When you are removed, only loss persists. Depth: This couplet shows the superiority of emotional and spiritual capital over the material world. A lifetime without the beloved is a pure transaction of loss. Second Couplet In some lamp I am, in some lotus you dwell — somewhere is our beauty, somewhere is yours. Meaning: We two are scattered across the different colors and beauties of the world. If somewhere I exist in the form of light, then somewhere you are in the delicacy and beauty of a lotus flower. Depth: This couplet carries a Sufi hue, where lover and beloved are manifest in every atom of the universe. Every beautiful thing is actually a reflection of that one beauty. Third Couplet What a moment of union it was — in its intoxication, a lifetime of separation seems acceptable to us. Meaning: That one fleeting moment of meeting with the beloved was so enchanting and powerful that in its ecstasy, we gladly accepted a lifetime of separation. Depth: In true love, the quantity of time matters not; rather, the quality of that moment matters. One moment becomes weightier than an entire life. Fourth Couplet Every sound that seems an echo to us — I know not whether we have lived again, or whether this again and again repeats. Meaning: Every sound in the world seems to me like something heard before — an echo. Now I cannot tell whether we have been reborn in this world, or whether the universe itself is repeating itself. Depth: Here the poet questions the cycle of time and the eternity of human existence. This is a profound philosophical conception. Fifth Couplet Whether that truth be revealed within my eyes or in spectacle — every beauty is a gesture toward some beauty. Meaning: Whether that reality is manifest as insight within my eyes or appears in the displays of the external world, every transient beauty in the world is actually a pointer toward that "original and true beauty" — the true Creator or eternal beauty. Depth: This is a classical Sufi couplet, which can be understood in the framework of 'unity of vision' or 'unity of being,' where all beauty in the world is a reflection of God's beauty. Sixth Couplet Strange are the principles of this world's commerce — someone's debt is paid by another. Meaning: The transactions and principles of this world are quite peculiar. Here one commits a sin and another bears the punishment, or one makes a sacrifice and another reaps its fruit. Depth: This is a beautiful reflection of social injustice, the complex system of recompense, or of bearing one another's burden in love. Seventh Couplet Somewhere there is a fragrance — the entire world of existence is but a metaphor for its being. Meaning: In the universe, somewhere there exists that original fragrance — that reality, that Creator — and the entire material world merely stands as a metaphor or symbol to testify to it. Depth: If the world is beautiful, it is because of that "original" which lies behind the veil. The entire universe points to this one singular being. Eighth Couplet I know not when it was, nor where — yet it seems this time we have passed before. Meaning: I cannot recall the time or place, yet often the heart awakens with the sharp feeling that this moment, this state, and this time I have lived through before, exactly as it is now. Depth: In psychology, this is called "déjà vu." Amjad Sahab has cast this complex psychological and metaphysical state into the mold of poetry with remarkable beauty. Ninth Couplet These two shores — they are of the river, we and you! But who is that third shore? Meaning: You and I are like two shores of a river that flow together but cannot meet. But what is this hidden "third shore" between us that binds us together, or toward which we both flow? Depth: This is the closing couplet of the ghazal. This third shore could be 'love' itself, it could be 'time,' or it could be 'the Almighty' who binds two separate beings with an invisible thread.