اب کے ہم بچھڑے Ab Ke Ham Bichhde — If We Part This Time

Ahmad Faraz

1931– 2008

Ghazal

Two people are about to separate, and one of them is already doing the arithmetic on what will be left. There will be a meeting, he allows. In dreams, probably. The way a pressed flower turns up when a book falls open years later: still there, still recognisable, and long past being alive.

That is the temperature of the whole thing. Ahmad Faraz was writing under a military government that had jailed him for his poems, and the ghazal keeps sliding off the subject of one lost person onto the subject of a lost country, then back again, until you stop being sure which loss you are reading about. Six couplets ahead. The last one takes away even the two people who were supposed to be meeting.

01 — ab ke ham bichhde to shayad kabhi khvabon men milen Matla · the opening

اب کے ہم بچھڑے تو شاید کبھی خوابوں میں ملیں
جس طرح سوکھے ہوئے پھول کتابوں میں ملیں

अब के हम बिछड़े तो शायद कभी ख़्वाबों में मिलें
जिस तरह सूखे हुए फूल किताबों में मिलें

ab ke ham bichhde to shayad kabhi khvabon men milen
jis tarah sukhe hue phul kitabon men milen

If we part this time, perhaps we will meet in dreams — the way dried flowers turn up in books.

A pressed flower keeps its shape and loses everything else: the colour, the scent, the life. That is what he is offering as their future. And ab ke, this time, admits they have parted before and got over it. He does not think they will get over it again.

بچھڑنا bichhadna: to be parted from someone

02 — dhuundh ujde hue logon men vafa ke moti

ڈھونڈ اجڑے ہوئے لوگوں میں وفا کے موتی
یہ خزانے تجھے ممکن ہے خرابوں میں ملیں

ढूँढ उजड़े हुए लोगों में वफ़ा के मोती
ये ख़ज़ाने तुझे मुमकिन है ख़राबों में मिलें

dhuundh ujde hue logon men vafa ke moti
ye khazane tujhe mumkin hai kharabon men milen

Go looking for the pearls of loyalty among people who have been ruined. It is possible you will find those treasures only in the wreckage.

The argument is that faithfulness does not turn up in people who still have something to lose. Kharabat means both a ruin and a tavern, and the two meanings point the same way: the wine house is where Urdu poetry keeps its honest men. He is telling her where to look for him afterwards, and the telling is a way of saying goodbye without the word.

اجڑا ujda: ruined, laid waste
وفا vafa: faithfulness, keeping your word
خرابات kharabat: ruins; also the tavern quarter

03 — gham-e-duniya bhi gham-e-yar men shamil kar lo

غمِ دنیا بھی غمِ یار میں شامل کر لو
نشہ بڑھتا ہے شرابیں جو شرابوں میں ملیں

ग़म-ए-दुनिया भी ग़म-ए-यार में शामिल कर लो
नश्शा बढ़ता है शराबें जो शराबों में मिलें

gham-e-duniya bhi gham-e-yar men shamil kar lo
nasha badhta hai sharaben jo sharabon men milen

Fold the world's grief into your grief over the beloved as well. Wines poured into wines make a stronger drink.

The old quarrel in Urdu poetry is whether to grieve over one person or over the state of the world. Faraz refuses to pick and gives a drinker's reason for it. Mix them, it hits harder. The refrain earns its keep here, because this is the one couplet where milna means things being blended rather than people meeting.

غمِ دنیا gham-e-duniya: the grief of the world; sorrow at how things are
غمِ یار gham-e-yar: grief over the beloved

04 — tu khuda hai na mira ishq farishton jaisa

تو خدا ہے نہ مرا عشق فرشتوں جیسا
دونوں انساں ہیں تو کیوں اتنے حجابوں میں ملیں

तू ख़ुदा है न मिरा इश्क़ फ़रिश्तों जैसा
दोनों इंसाँ हैं तो क्यूँ इतने हिजाबों में मिलें

tu khuda hai na mira ishq farishton jaisa
donon insan hain to kyuun itne hijabon men milen

You are not a god, and my love is nothing like an angel's. We are both human beings — so why do we have to meet behind all these veils?

He throws out the two compliments the ghazal usually runs on: the beloved as divine, the lover as pure. Both are flattering and both keep the two of them at arm's length. What is left is the smallest possible claim, we are two people, and the only real request in the poem. Hijab is a veil, and also the modesty that puts one there.

فرشتہ farishta: an angel
حجاب hijab: a veil; the reserve that keeps two people apart

05 — aaj ham daar pe khinche gae jin baaton par

آج ہم دار پہ کھینچے گئے جن باتوں پر
کیا عجب کل وہ زمانے کو نصابوں میں ملیں

आज हम दार पे खींचे गए जिन बातों पर
क्या अजब कल वो ज़माने को निसाबों में मिलें

aaj ham daar pe khinche gae jin baaton par
kya ajab kal vo zamane ko nisabon men milen

The things they hanged us for today — do not be surprised if tomorrow the world finds them in its schoolbooks.

Nisab is the syllabus, the approved list of what children get taught. So the couplet stands the gallows and the classroom next to each other and points out how short the walk between them is. Faraz had been jailed for his poems by a military government, and he is not predicting his own vindication so much as remarking how casually a state changes its mind about what was worth killing over.

دار daar: the gallows
نصاب nisab: a syllabus, the prescribed course of study

06 — ab na vo main na vo tu hai na vo maazi hai faraz Maqta · signed by the poet

اب نہ وہ میں نہ وہ تو ہے نہ وہ ماضی ہے فرازؔ
جیسے دو شخص تمنا کے سرابوں میں ملیں

अब न वो मैं न वो तू है न वो माज़ी है 'फ़राज़'
जैसे दो शख़्स तमन्ना के सराबों में मिलें

ab na vo main na vo tu hai na vo maazi hai faraz
jaise do shakhs tamanna ke sarabon men milen

That me is gone, and that you, and that past too, Faraz — like two people meeting in the mirages thrown up by wanting.

He removes them one at a time. Not me, not you, not even the past we might have gone back to. So the meeting the whole poem kept promising finally happens, and nobody is at it. A mirage is a real optical event rather than a thing you imagine, and it shows you water where there is none. That is his last word on the subject: the longing is real, and it produces the picture.

ماضی maazi: the past
تمنا tamanna: longing, a wish held for a long time
سراب sarab: a mirage

Reading it whole

This is a poem about the difference between being remembered and being alive, and it will not pretend the first is any consolation for the second. Everything it offers has that quality. A meeting, but in sleep. A flower, but pressed flat. Loyalty, but only findable among the wrecked. Faraz hands over the thing you asked for every single time, with the life taken out of it.

He never raises his voice doing it. The cruellest word in the ghazal is shayad, perhaps, sitting there in the first line, withdrawing the guarantee from the one thing he appeared to be promising. Nothing after that is safe either. By the closing couplet the two people have gone as well, replaced by figures meeting in the shimmer heat throws off a road.

Halfway down it stops being private. It sends you looking for loyalty among ruined people in ruined places. It suggests, deadpan, that you pour the world's grief into your own on the grounds that mixed drinks hit harder. And then it says the thing people still shout at rallies: what they hang us for today may well turn up on the school syllabus tomorrow. The distance between the gallows and the classroom turns out to be about a generation. What they kill people for saying, they end up teaching children to read.

The one place in the ghazal where a meeting could still actually happen arrives disguised as a complaint. You are not a god, he says, and my love is nothing like an angel's, so why does there have to be this much cloth between two ordinary people. It is the smallest thing he asks for anywhere in the poem, and the only one that sounds like it might be granted.

Mehdi Hassan sings it slowly enough that the shayad has time to work on you.

How it rhymes

Every second line closes on the same word — میں ملیں , men milen. That repetition is the radif. The rhyme falling just before it is the qafiya: The -abon sound just before the refrain: khvabon, kitabon, kharabon, sharabon, hijabon, nisabon, sarabon. Hearing the two land together at the close of every sher is most of what makes this form sound the way it does.

Recordings

Mehdi Hassan

The recording that fixed this ghazal in most people's ears.

Text and rights

Devanagari text supplied and checked by a reader who knows the language. The Urdu script and the transliteration follow that reading.

Ahmad Faraz died in 2008, so this poem is still in copyright. It is quoted here as the subject of Harf's own criticism: the translation, the reading of each couplet and the essay around them are original work written for this page. If you hold the rights and would like something changed, tell us on Instagram.