When I was working on a summer project after my third year, I stumbled upon four songs in a Mohd. Rafi playlist, written by Ghalib. There was a strange beauty about them, a strange melody. I liked the songs even though I did not understand all the lyrics. I listened to them again and again and mugged some of them up, so I could sing them to myself back in the hostel.

After I came to Bangalore I discovered during a Google search, a site called urdupoetry.com which lists Urdu Ghazals of several popular poets. I found the lyrics of the Ghazals I had loved on that site. The ghazals are generally long ones and only parts of them were perhaps adapted to the film songs which Rafi had sung.

I discovered one kutti piece of film trivia. "Dil Dhoondtha hai phir vahi phursat ke raat din, baithe rahe tasavvur-e-jaana kiye hue" (from the film Andhi) is a sher from one of Ghalib's ghazals, though the rest of the film song was written by Gulzar.

One evening during Channel surfing, I found a program where Jagjit Singh was singing ( Singh-ing? ) lots of Ghalib's ghazals. I found another ghazal to add to my favourites , "Yeh na thi hamari kismat ke visaal-e-yaar hota". My interest in Ghalib was rekindled and I eventually decided to look for casettes of Ghalib sung by Jagjit Singh.

So there exists such a casette. Sung by Jagjit and Chitra Singh. The songs are the soundtrack of the serial "Ghalib" which used to come on DD long ago. I have some vague memories of that serial, including a song "Dil hi to hai na sang-o-khisht, dard se bhar na aaye kyon".

So I bought this casette. Actually a pack of two casettes. And by god, are they fundoo! Again not all lyrics can be understood straight but that doesnt stop one from mugging the 'sounds' up. There is always urdupoetry.com to find out the meanings. And as the Prinicipal of my school in Trivandrum once said, good poetry can affect you even if you dont understand the meaning.

I simply have to have to put here at least the first song from the first casette ( By the way, the serial was produced by Gulzar and had Naseeruddin Shah in the lead role. The casette has a very difficult-to-understand intro by Gulzar).
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Har Ek baat pe kehate ho tum ke tu kya hai
Tumhi kaho ke ye undaaz-e-guftagoo kya hai ( guftagoo = conversation)

Ragon mein daudate phirane ke hum nahi kaayal ( kaayal= shaukien, enthu about)
Jo aankh hi se na tapaka to phir lahu kya hai

Chipaka raha hai badan par lahu se pairahan ( pairahan = cloth, shirt)
Hamari jeba ko ab haajat-e-rafoo kya hai ( haajat-e-rafoo = rafoo ki zaroorat ; rafoo = darning, basically patching up)

Jala hai jism jahan dil bhi jal gaya hoga
kuredate ho kyon ab raakh justajoo kya hai ( justajoo= khoj, search)


The second verse is especially beautiful to me, though I can't quite say why it is beautiful. There is some very different, very subtle technique in it that is different from general direct poetry.