The sun going down ashamed
and bruised all along its predictable course,
takes with it the picturesque translation of the bid:
Wherein men are made to scream hoarse
and women relegated to the hue in eyes half sunk
Children return to forgetfulness: wishful and drunk.
(That ‘alcohol’ forced up their tender eyebrow tips)
One couldn’t make out their dry lips;
we were never given to forgetfulness.

 

Eid was skipped in all its repetitive sanctity,
Small girls don’t want to go to school...

Mucky labyrinths lead to castles of pain
Dingy, choking alleys give way
to spaces of loss.
Shrills of outlanders echo in the fearful silence
Trampling Jackboots walk up to the House of God
Piercing metal cuts through dreams;
rosary falls apart.

Bullet holes on the mosque door,
lead to tunnels of pain- infinite and dark!     

Rain moans as it falls,
on graves dug last summer
in row, without epitaphs.
The ageless Wilderness where we belong!

Wild flowers surround a grave-  Bud
Buried...

Every day, I pass aloft
The quivering murky surface
Of Jehlum, four rhythms.
And behold not a change
In its course or ebb and flow
Or its slowly receding glow
When dregs are churned in the eddies

Augmenting its haze
In dribs and drabs

Yet it consumes and goes on....
As has it always and always will.

Today my eyes are glazed
As Jehlum stares at me
In fixity…
With puffed eyes and bloated surge
For want of succor

I look on
Till nebulosity blurs my vision
And through the slowly dispersing...

This burden that I inherited from my life,
A life in which nothing has ever stayed,
I shall carry along the pathways of mortal existence.
“I shall live by forgetting myself”,
Dancing endlessly to the tunes of that divine flute;

That with its spirited music weaves and unweaves all that exists.

There won’t remain the flute, or its life-weaving music.

For they never exist.

But He shall remain in all that remains and not remains.

 

How many times have I assigned myself the...

Winds blow wild carrying along vicious dust,
Alas! The nights are dreadful again,
Fears familiar have occupied their breast,
Ah! Mothers lament the longevity of pain;

Holding fragile fists children run asunder,
This crowd aligns for a destination blurry,

Woes woo the conscience and reasons wonder,
Let us loiter for honour and our fears worry;

Streets spill blood as the tears run dry,
Sisters fear the approach of an ugly cloak,

Desires sob when the expectations die,
Faces blush as the...

Through endless alleys in a distant fog,

I recall belonging to certainty,

I recall feeding a stray dog,

I recall fading away into generosity,

I recall the birth of a pensive yore

When children would shy away

From belongingness,

I recall the prelude that vehemently tore

Our wisdom- the phrase “God bless”

We strolled down the aisles

Wallowed in hesitant smiles,

We paused,

It was not the charm of boyhood

Men clad in horror ate in galore plates

Serenity famished

We saw blue...

Through endless alleys in a distant fog,
I recall belonging to certainty,
I recall feeding a stray dog,
I recall fading away into generosity,
I recall the birth of a pensive yore

When children would shy away

From belongingness,

I recall the prelude that vehemently tore

Our wisdom- the phrase “God bless”

We strolled down the aisles

Wallowed in hesitant smiles,

We paused,

It was not the charm of boyhood

Men clad in horror ate in galore plates

Serenity famished

We saw blue skies...

Moulting the mortal a soul smokes out dripping light,
From this paradise to that of the sky;
Left is yours a crimson of mine tonight.
On a cold winter night he lies coagulated outside,

His dripping blood paralyzed bijou’s of might;
He retreats seeking forgiveness tonight
Rubies dipped in honey sheen black witness dolour,
Sobs blacken the moon tokening demise;

And stars hum elegies canonizing our perished tonight.
Dismembered  bullet torn is ne’er then afraid,
Inside his eyes diamonds...