O Asad, my livelihood was being gathered from the wounds of my heart even before the fire temple had become the fiefdom of the salamander.

Ghalib playfully and proudly claims a primal, ancient bond with suffering. He invokes the mythical salamander (samandar), an animal believed to thrive in flames, boasting that long before this fire-dweller was granted fire as its estate, his own life was already drawing sustenance from the burning wounds of his heart. The verse suggests that anguish is neither a burden nor a newcomer—it is the very fuel that has always sustained his life and poetry.