MIRZÿ GHÿLIB

Introductions
This elegy is a tribute to the genius of Mirz« Asad Allah Kh«n Gh«lib. See Appendix I, No. 31 for his biography. The poem also provides a glimpse of ‘All«mah Iqb«l’s feelings of love for Delhi as an emblem of the glory of the Muslim civilization in the Indian sub-continent, which reached its zenith during the reign of Sh«hjah«n (1592-1666, reigned 1627-58), the famous Mughal Emperor of India and the builder of the T«j Mahal. The love and pride of ‘All«mah Iqb«l for the period of the glory of Muslims and Islam during the rise of the Islamic civilization, and his pathos at the decay of this civilization appear throughout his works, including B«ng-i-Dar«.

Translation
Through you the secret was revealed to the human intellect
That innumerable enigmas are solved by human intellect

You were the complete soul, literary assembly was your body
You adorned as well as remained veiled from the assembly ¹

Your eye is longing to witness that veiled Beauty
Which is veiled in everything as the pathos of life ²

The assemblage of existence is rich with your harp
As mountain's silence by the brook's melodious harp

The garden of your imagination bestows glory on the universe
From the field of your thought worlds grow like meadows

Life is concealed in the humor of your verse
Picture's lips move with your command of language

Speech is very proud of the elegance of your miraculous lips
Thurayyah is astonished at your style's elegance

Beloved of literature itself loves your style
Delhi's bud is mocking at the rose of Shiraz ³

Ah! You are resting in the midst of Delhi’s ruins
Your counterpart is resting in the Weimar's ⁴ garden


Matching you in literary elegance is not possible
Till maturity of thought and imagination are combined

Ah! What has befallen the land of India!
Ah! The inspirer of the super-critical eye!

The lock of Urdu's hair still craves for combing
This candle still craves for moth's heart-felt pathos

O Jahanabad ⁵ ! O cradle of learning and art
Your entire super-structure is a silent lament

The sun and the moon are asleep in every speck of your dust
Though innumerable other gems are also hidden in your dust ⁶

Does another world-famous person like him also lie buried in you?
Does another gem like him also lie concealed in you?

Explanatory Notes
1. This is an allusion to the lack of recognition of Gh«lib's genius at the court of Bah«dur Shah, the last Mughal Emperor of India. It also means that, though you adorned the literary assemblies and were bodily visible, your real self could not be seen except by those with insight.
2. This refers to the Sufi concept of Waédat al-Wujëd according to which everything in the universe is God in different forms. For details see the controversy of "Waédat al-Wujëd and Waédat al-Shuhëd in Chapter 3. I have stated there that ‘All«mah Iqb«l believed in the former concept earlier in his life and changed over to the latter later on.
3. This is an allusion to Muéammad Shams al-Dân £«fiz (d. 1389), who was an eminent Persian poet of Iran and lived in Shâr«z. He specialized in ghazal, which is also Gh«lib's specialty.
4. This alludes to the famous German poet Goethe who is buried in Weimar, Germany. See Appendix I, No. 35 for his biography.
5. This is an abbreviation for Sh«hjah«nab«d, which is the original name of Delhi after its construction under the Mughal Emperor Sh«hjah«n, who reconstructed it and added the famous Red Fort and the J«mi`a Masjid together with the whole of what is the Old Delhi now.
6. This alludes to the antiquity of Delhi, which goes back to several millennia. During the major part of this long period it was the capital of some kingdom of the Indian sub-continent. As such it was always the abode of the elite of the age.