Ye kaun si ke wale hain
“Their manner is singular, set apart from all the world — which town, O Lord, do these lovers belong to?”
ये कौन सी के रहने वाले हैं
The couplet in Devanagari — it carries the authenticity of the original, and every Hindi reader can read it.
یہ عاشق کون سی بستی کے یارب رہنے والے ہیں
The couplet as Iqbal wrote it, in Urdu (Nastaliq).
Iqbal marvels at lovers as a different kind of people altogether. Their bearing, their values, their way of being do not match the world's — and so he wonders, almost playfully, what country they could possibly come from. To love greatly is to live by a map no one else is using.
If your devotion to a craft, a cause or a person makes you feel out of step with everyone around you, Iqbal would not call that a flaw. People who love deeply have always seemed to belong to a town the rest of the world cannot find.
Khuda bande se khud pooche, bata teri raza kya hai
Abhi ishq ke imtihan aur bhi hain
Tu agar mera nahin banta na ban, apna to ban