Shaayar-e-Fitrat Hoon Main

I've been thinking about which Jigar Moradabadi poem I should showcase and interpret first...I like quite a few.

Today a friend whom I haven't met in a few years called me up...we talked of life's blackening canvas, of the innumerable strands of threads in life needing attention, resolution. "All strands are one", he said. "A tangled up string of thread needs one point of initiation to resolve, and the entire bundle resolves magically...". It sounded like a sufistic metaphor and solution to life.

Unless of course we unresolve it once again...out of choice, as Jigar [Couplet 4 below]. Which brings me to what is perhaps Jigar's signature ghazal. I will transliterate my favorite couplets from Urdu here:

Shaayar-e-fitrat hoon main: By nature a poet...

Shaayar-e-fitrat hoon main, jab fikr farmaataa hoon main,
rooh ban kar zarre-zarre mein samaa jaataa hoon main.

Aake tujh bin is tarah ai dost ghabraataa hoon main,
jaise har sheh mein kisi sheh ki kamin paataa hoon main.

Haae ri majbooriyaan, tark-e-mohabbat ke liye,
mujh ko samjhaate hain wo aur un ko samjhaataa hoon main.

Meri himmat dekhna, meri tabiyat dekhna,
jo sulajh jaati hai gutthi phir se uljhaataa hoon main. [4]

Waah re shauq-e-shahaadat, ku-e-qaatil ki taraf,
gun-gunaata, raqs karta, jhoomta jaataa hoon main

Teri mehfil tere jalwe, phir taqaaza kya zaroor,
le utha jaata hoon zaalim, le chala jaataa hoon main.

Ek dil hai aur toofaan-e-hawaadis ai Jigar,
ek sheeshaa hai ke har patthar se takraataa hoon main.
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Listen to this ghazal sung beautifully by Vinod Sehgal here...and wonder, like me why Vinod isn't more popular as a ghazal singer.

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I'll attempt an interpretation and translation of these couplets soon...