Choun Rokh Poshwun Gulab Chuna you face is rose in bloom, is it not? Gulshanan manz su intikhaab Chuna chosen one among gardens, is it not?
Mayen dree chay Dyakas grih mutchraav i beg you, unwind sad lines of your forehead yoot chasman andar tche aab chuna water in your eyes has dried, has it not?
chyen dree zaenith be chus khamosh I swear on you, I know, yet I am silent na kya zan me’nish jawaab chuna not as if the answer, I don’t have
Dil ratchun fitratan me aadat chum to nurture heart, this habit, is my nature Dil bajaey wanum sawaal chuna a happy heart, is a question, is it not?
Jaanbaazaz asar novi saazas Jaanbaz’s music casts a potent spell nati prathkeasi’nis Rabaab chuna else everyone has a Rabaab, is it not?
~ Ghulam Nabi Dolwal “Janbaz” Kishtwari, Singer-Lyricist-Poet
We are still no closer to finding the writer of “Harmukh Bartal”. I still maintain that it is a love song.
We find a line “Be’no ye dooryer tchalay Madano“…while of course can also be found in Rasul Mir’s love lyrics “Butino Ye Doorer Choon Zaray, Bal Marayo”
However, mystery deepens. I recently came across another version of the lyrics. The version is given by Pandit Anand Koul in his “Archaeological Remains In Kashmir” (1935). In this version (unattributed to any poet), instead of “Harmukh bartal” (Gateway to Harmukh) we find “Achhabal gachhi dabu” or “the grass hut of Achhabal garden”. That it is a love song is driven home all the more by use of word “Shakarlab: sweet lipped” and reference to Shirin-Farhad.
There is a tradition in Kashmir of poets getting inspired by work of other poet and including them or building on them in their own creations. So, we find refrain from Habba Khatoon in a work by Mehjoor, even though two are separated by centuries. And often lyrics become so popular that the poet is lost. Maybe something similar happened with “Harmukh Bartal”. We still don’t know.
In 1990s, they complained that the villages didn’t rise up, if only they too had joined the chorus, that poet Rehman Rahi was silent, that he didn’t sing the popular tune. Now, his silence is being explored and re-marketed. There are villages to be inflamed, what better than the tongue of the man who sang of villages in which even birds recited Koran. Now, Rahi too is a poet of the Tahreek, when a Hizbul Mujahideen dies in some village in Kashmir, people on Facebook share “Zinde Rozan’e bapath chi maraan Lukh che te marakh na. Lotte paeth chakha pyaale kyoho Uff te karakh na.” (People are dying to live. Will you drink your poison in silence, won’t you protest)…like it is some kind of primal call to embrace death, forgetting that among the charges on Socrates was the charge that his beliefs were not same as rest of his community. His charge was blasphemy.
Poets, real poets, are complicated and even more so are the worlds and words they deal in. There is story that in the charged atmosphere of late 60s Rahi read a poem on death that shocked people as they thought it was all too propagandistic and reactionary. Only later he told his audience that his work was just a translation of Maxim Gorky’s ‘Death and the Maiden’, a favorite of that man named Stalin. There is a famous painting of the scene: Gorky narrating the poem to Stalin and Molotov. Poet Rahi all too well knows how Stalinism turned out for the poet and that country. Do his readers know? If is fine to dig out that Kashmiri poem and sell it in villages of Kashmir minus the context? Will it not be called propaganda?
farewell to the voice of Kashmir. Rest in Peace Raj Begum. End of an era. Last of the great songstress from valley.
Vesiye Gulan aamay bahaar
Perhaps the best remembered song by Raj Begum. Lyrics by Maqbool Shah Qraalwari (1820–1876)
Here’s a cleared and voice enhanced version of the recording. [The original audio (probably from tape) was uploaded by Muneeb Haroon]
Video: Clipping from “Spring Comes to Kashmir” (1956)
Lyrics:
Parvaan laegith gath Karas tath shamah royas tal maras, chum kal tuhinz moul chum ni haar, az saal antan balyaar. Vesiye Gulan aamay bahaar az saal antan balyaar. Tath prani maaye Goi tche kyah maeshrovthas kyah chum mea rah ousukh zche myonui ghum gusaar az saal antan balyaar Chum loal chi gaemich mea yaad, peoy na zche myonui zanh ti yaad, Goi na kanan paighaam yaar, az saal antan balyaar. Aey yousuf khursheed ro Dar misr tchandath su ba su kaerthas zulaikha khas ta khaar az saal antan balyaar Trevith cholum thavith firaaq, chum loal jigras ishtiyaaq mea haevith anun vanas bi zaar, az saal antan ballyaar. Yaktaash Kot goam dhaali dith Zainul Arab chas jaan Nisar, khhooni jigar kormas Nisar Az saal antan balyaar Shaaman cholum kaerithy sou graaiy paaman mei thavith goam jaaiy daman ratas Rozay shumaar az saal antan balyaar Yas Zaali badnas ashequn naar su Zaani kyah gov hijr e yaar, Maqbool kornas dil nigaar Az saal antan balyaar. Vesiye Gulan aamay bahaar az saal antan balyaar.
I would collect bits from people and sometime they would border on blasphemous. It seems impossible someone would sing this in Kashmir. This one by an unknown fakir from Sopore:
The following song by Mahmud Gami [1750-1855] may be given as an example of a real love song, though even this can be interpreted in Sufi wise. The story goes that Gami wrote the song about a girl of Kutahar (a village in the Maraz pargana of Kashmir) named Azme, and that it became the occasion of trouble for its author. Complaints were made about Gami, and his father reported the matter to the Tahsildar of the district; but the poet explained that Azme meant ‘to-day’ and that the whole song had only a Sufi significance.
Azme
‘Azme lil am vuchh-haet vare
‘Azme hawih di dare, lo lo, ‘Azme…
Azme, love of thee came to me, fortunate vision!
Azme, show me thy face, O darling. Azme love of thee…
Shangas augam van kati prare
Badnam gos kutahare, lo lo, ‘Azme…
Say where shall I wait, in Shangas or Naugam?
An ill name I got in Kutahar! Azme love of thee…
Achhavala neb am brang kutahare
Lachha baedi laegim kola tare, lo lo, ‘Azme…
I sought thee in Achhaval, Brang, Kutahar –
Lakh of hardships I suffered, my darling! Azme love of thee…
Rokh chon sazaposh guli anare
Chashma chani kya chhi ab, dare lo lo, ‘Azme…
Pomegranate thy cheeks, or saza-posh-
How dark are thine eyes, my darling! Azme love of thee…
Guma hatsa bomba chani kya chhi moj dare
Nasti chani kari mare, lo lo, ‘Azme…
Shining thy brows as though with sweat-
How many a one thy nose has slain, my darling! Azme love of thee…
bar taq bhit kong-posh tsaran
Melum chhum na kanhzi ra’e, lo lo, Azme…
Sitting by the door, choosing saffron flowers,
I know not for whom, my darling! Azme love of thee…
Kolagam indrah kya chhi nam dare
Tsakra chhas bedare, lo lo, ‘Azme…
What a famous spinning wheel is there in Kolgam,
Matchless its handle, Azme love of thee…
Indarad chonis rapa sanza tare
Vucch-vaen ta ga’e bemare lo lo, ‘Azme…
Silver are the strings of thy spinning wheel,
Those who see it fall ill with wonder, my darling! Azme love of thee…
Zovilis tumalas dogdivare
‘Azme Hund sarvi qad rutiye lo lo, ‘Azme…
Skilfully pounding the rice so fine,
The good shape of the cypress has Azme my darling! Azme love of thee…
Nol kya chhuy tse lalan trotiye
‘Azme Hund van kapan tsotiye lo lo , ‘Azme…
Bright is her dress as a pearl,
Short are the plaits of Azme, my darling! Azme love of thee…
Zovilis mastas Kaugan fidivare
Vankan karay shumare lo lo. ‘Azme…
Slowly combing her hair so fine –
I will count up thy plaits, my darling! Azme love of thee…
Sor lok yem ga’e avare lo lo, ‘Azme…
[Probably a missing line]
Kamadev has passed through Kutahar,
All folk must yield (?), my darling! Azme love of thee…
Mahmud Miskina ha Van prare
Badnam gos kutahare lo lo, ‘Azme…
Hapless Mahmud, where shall he wait for thee?
An ill name I won in Kutahar, my darling! Azme love of thee…
~ From ‘Thirty Songs from the Panjab and Kashmir’ (1913) by Ratan Devi and Ananda Coomaraswamy.
