Tahir Faraz

Tahir Faraz sahab was my introduction to the world of shayari and mushaira. To me, before him, the doors of the Urdu had felt ridden with difficult Persian words and ridiculous stereotypes of drunken loners and estranged lovers- none of which I could ever relate to. It has been more than a decade since listening to him singing his poem for the first time smashed those doors and showed me the pathways to a gentle, loving and welcoming world of simple expressions and a warmth that to this day I relate to Urdu poetry.

It was in my college days when I used to read or listen to a lot of poets to inspire some writing. Imitation is the cheapest form of flattery. I used to imitate anything that I used to find great. It could be said that it was not limited to that time or just to poetry, but we all have our flaws. To put together words and force them to rhyme with something that was written by Mirza Ghalib would feel like an absolute achievement to me. If anything beat that feeling, it would be the accomplishment of adding difficult words in that mix. On one of those days of pure ignorance and bliss, I stumbled upon this Hindi-Urdu mushaira recording where I for the first time listened to Tahir sahab. It was an absolute revelation to me. He sang two of his poems and I was awestruck by how simple all of it was.

Countless times in the last decade, I have repeated his asha’ar in my mind. Their meanings evolved, my interpretations of what I remembered evolved, my understanding of the depth of emotions in those couplets evolved over time, but my connection remained intact and unchanging. A true analogy of this relationship would be the kind of connection sons have with their fathers where they move from worshipping to critiquing to understanding, accepting and cherishing them.

As my taste for finer things and pretenses developed over time and I started liking Mirza Ghalib and fell in love with Faiz for better reasons I lost touch with what Tahir sahab was producing over the decade. But I am just assuming that he did what he did best and was working on not letting that softness and simplicity be eroded from the statue of Urdu literature by composing more songs.

His passing yesterday feels like a personal loss- of a severance of a personal connection with a world of that magic and innocence.

mehsoos kar raha hoon main khushbu kii baazgasht

shayad tere labon pe mera naam aa gaya

It feels like fragrances are returning back to me.

Could it be that you called my name once again?