Wednesday, June 04, 2008

Tahayya-e-Toofaan: Ghalib

Ghalib humein na chhed ke phir josh-e-ashq se,
Baithe hain hum tahayya-e-toofaan kiye hue.

[By Mirza Ghalib]

Ghalib, tease us not again with the flood of tears,
We sit with a determination to rival the storms.
[Translated by Siyaah]

josh-e-ashq: literally josh means 'to boil', ashq=tears. There is no exact expression to capture the effect in English. "Flood of tears" has a similar idea.

tahayya-e-toofaan: tahayya=determination. One could interpret it either as a determination to face storms, or a determination as strong as that of storms - I have tried to capture both ideas with 'to rival the storms'