Tears of Blood

‘Tears of Blood’ contains poetic renderings of selected Urdu verse of Mirza Muhammad Asadullah Khan Ghalib (1797-1869). These sixty-two ghazals and ninety other shers in English translation, present to the reader the amazing richness and beauty of Ghalib’s poetry. Acknowledged by many as the King of Urdu Ghazal, Ghalib belonged to a period when the Mughal Empire was crumbling and the British ultimately established their paramountcy all over India. His ghazals mirror the vulnerability of Man, his grief and sense of loss, his unfulfilled longings, and his soul’s yearning for Eternal Beauty and Love. The strains of Sufi thought are clearly discernible in his poetry. Though a Muslim, he was liberal in his outlook towards other religions but ridiculed all ritualism and sectarianism of the priestly class. His poetry is, indeed, timeless and he remains the most oft-quoted poet of Urdu language and literature. His popularity may also be gauged by the fact that almost all prominent singers in India and Pakistan have sung his ghazals at one time or the other. As Ghalib himself proudly proclaimed: These verses that I write, descend from some Unseen Power; The sound that my quill releases, is an angel’s whisper.