Muntakhab al-tawarikh 348: CXXXVIII. Muhammad Yusuf.

348

He was a handsome man who was born in Kabul and brought up in Hindustan. In penmanship he was the pupil of Ashraf Khan. He died in Gujarat at the time of the siege of Surat in A.H. 980 (A.D. 1572-73) in the prime of his youth. Ashraf Khan composed a hemistich which formed a chronogram giving the date of his death, and Mir ‘Ala’u-d-daulah completed the stanza, as follows:—
“Muhammad Yusuf, that residence of beauty, Went from the world shedding tears from his eyes. An honoured man gave this chronogram for the date of his death. ‘Where is Yusuf of Egypt, O ye honoured ones?’”
When I asked of him the year of his death That man of auspicious qualities said, while he still lived, ‘Without the world-illumining face of that lovely one I suffered at length by the greater martyrdom.’
This chronogram appears to have been composed by Mir ‘Ala’u-d-daulah, the author of the Tazkiratu-sh-Shu‘arā. The following opening couplet was composed by Khwāja Mu‘azzam:—
“It is impossible for me, my soul, to recount to thee my heart’s anguish, I suffer from this anguish to an extent which cannot be told.”
In quoting this opening couplet of the Khwāja’s I have simply followed Mīr ‘Alā’u-d-daulah. Otherwise, in spite of the following opening couplet by a master of poetry, I should have said that the Khwāja’s couplet was mere trash. The couplet of the master is as follows:—
“Since I heard that I could call thy ruby lip my soul A fire which I cannot describe has stricken my heart.”