It's compelling beauty makes all men
Enjoy the glory of the bloom;
But the eye should take in every view,
The brighter shades, the shades of gloom.


Although love's pangs may fatal be,
There can be no way out
Without love too this heart would grieve
For want of things to grieve about.
To whom, alas, shall I complain
If luck with me does not abide?
"O, give me death" was all I sought,
That blessing too I was denied.

Ask me not why I am sad,
What grief doth clutch my heart.
My heart hath built me a prison-cell
And raised grim walls of narrow truths,
Of cramping loves and hates.
It shuts in the horizon of my thought
And clips my fancy's wings.


Love has left me, O Ghalib, a good-for-nothing,
Otherwise a useful man I was.