Chalo phir se/ Once more

 

Let's unravel that

Moment in time they

Stripped us off our childhood.
Is this
Scar the first time you felt
Your youth ripped away from you
Or is it this
Strip of skin when
Your innocence
pulled away
From you in shreds.
Did you feel this black n blue
Bruise when
They attacked your soul and you
Cowering in your fear grasped
No one but yourself?

Let's discover how carefully

We, those who see another and know,
Identify another scar, yet another,
Disguised as a birthmark
As if your suffering too was a Birthright
You inherited.
As if you too
Were born with targets on you
you spent years
Trying to hide.

Divine predestination
What a mouthful of words to explain
This, gossamer silver threads that
Bind me to you across spaces,
corridors, hallways, all of our
Spaces between us as we walk together,
spaces between ankles
Accidentally touching, spaces
Between our fingers, spaces
Between our tongues, threads
Binding bodies together, nectar
slipping down your silken gossamer into my
Parched barren earthy
Soul.
This
could only be divinely ordained.
The way my soul twinges when
You are far and the threads stretch
Taut, the way
you and I are the
Same in our names what
We mean to each other and the world, unique the way
You, four letters, complete my six
Form ten,
fingers intertwined, our hands fit
Like lock and key, fingers
Bent at the same angles, bones jutting out, crooked
To align the mole on the third of
Your finger with the matching
imprint on mine.
God
Must have created us in wholes, we
Broke in halves traveling across
Skies, oceans, realms,
Universes
But He
Left these imprints on your blue skin my
brown flesh,
Clues
So when we collided I could
Know it's You. Fitting my crevices, filling my
Senses,  finishing
My sentences.
What more divine predestination do I need, when
All I know is that
In the stark white dead of my winter, only your
Manna
Could make my soul bloom.

fragments

To hear the soul unchained but remain caged screaming for freedom, for release to its Other.

The soul will forever want what it wants, the decision imprinted on its fabric even beyond the rationality of your conscious mind.

..........

you must write. There is a story, several, bubbling beneath your outer shell that you cannot contain. Like fissures on a volcanic surface, you are unable to hold back what issues forth as billowing steam but sometimes, also, rosy gold substance.

You must write.

.........

Charting my course through my own destiny as we chart our way across maps to our destinations. From the sky: white billowing clouds like oceans within stormy oceans, earthy plains, green rolling upon greens, a feeble river mightily cutting its path across through sheer lucky stubborn persistence.

..........

Writer's retreat would be great right about now. Moved enough hurdles to finally start remembering what Inspired felt like.....tasted like, on an eager parched tongue.

Like glistening beads of the honeysweat of the Beloved, the Batin that moves within. 

to contain and manage fragile egos under
false pretenses, gloss over
the pain anguish longing hurt questions
caught between two
and smile smile smile everything is all
contained, smoothed over, crystal
clear, packaged in clingfilm, plastered in
acrylics we
are all
a okay



these mishaps you bubble wrap when
you have no idea what you're like

she stood in the New York winter cold, looking at the dewy haziness shining off the metallic towers and thought instantly of Mordor, but also(and now chuckling to herself), of Karachi. Those early winter mornings bundled in blue cardigan over coffee colored uniform, walking across the long fields hazy with dew settling on the grass in her convent school. It reminded her also of Dubai, but the haze was golden bristling sand in the sun, masquerading around twisted metal and steel sculptures.

One of the other side-effects of diaspora she thought. Not only did it never really leave your genes, but also, you found a little bit of one place in ever other place you ever went. Or maybe, you were so busy trying to make one place less foreign and more like everything else you had ever known, that its own uniqueness was completely lost to you. Unless that is, you moved again, and then the nostalgia would re-shape every dusty mote into a gleaming gold memory you would now long for.


Nomads never really stop longing, do they?


...............................................................
there is poetry my soul sings I cannot hear.
Days when it blazes in vivid reds and yellows,
and days when it sputters and chokes, and barely makes a sound.
........................................................
So much can happen in a space of 2 weeks. To a phoenix soul, it is several lifetimes wrapped in a microcosm.
A thousand soul-crushing deaths. A thousand hopeful re-births, spluttering, fluttering of wings, tentative first steps back into the cruel world.


to the naive, the brave, the wise say,
do not go gentle into that good night.
rage, rage against the dying light.
.................................................
nomad on the grass. nowhere to go. nomad on the floor. no place to call home.
nomad with a heart of stone. nomad all all all alone

.............................................

 all the force of nature contained in one tiny defiant body

if a rivulet goes over barren bare land with enough of the tiny might it holds, it will eventually carve a way and leave an imprint even the cold unfeeling land cannot deny.

 ................................................

Fire in my heart. Fire in my mind.
Heart hammering away at its cage to be free.

Sometimes subdued feelings come in waves.
Sometimes the whole ocean sucks you in and sweeps you away.

Bobbing for breath but each breath lights up my lungs on kerosene.
Can't stay submerged can't come up for air I'm
Caught at the surface
Fire and ocean consuming me whole.

birdsong this heartstring
twing
ing aflutter, sometimes
joy, grief, despair
sometimes the sing
song, monotony of existence
humdrum beats
life courses through your veins
your eyes are red
alive

fragile

we think we are mountains of strength, moving with self-assurance between office corridors, head held up high on the street, conviction with which our feet pound the gravel, urban warriors, war-painted, shoulders back and pride in every step.

hold your fingers up to the sun and see your fingertips glow pink. nailbeds orange. our very fibers so translucent, a burning star millions of light-years away can illuminate right through the fragile tissues that make up, you.

so fragile, and yet so self-assured.
does it not make you fearful?
have you no fear?

what makes up your mountain that makes you so?

mountain my heart,
rocks where my soul used to be

unfurl your wings, unleash
the embers burning in your heart, in your
soul. April
showers draw near, and the ram
paws the ground, charged
passion, fury, roaring
rage; seeking redemption
release
of the lost, burnt, charred
pieces of soul.
This phoenix spring

Begin

fragments

dreamy kisses, this
Is familiar, unwanted and
Wanted (when rational). Have
Your way with me, my life
How much of this is grief how
Much
An agenda for self
Annihilation

............

Neck shoulder back whispers whimpers spirals.
My lips are raw I bite
Down hard to keep this inside. Where to begin
Unravel
Ling.

............


voice over the shoulder, breeze below the wrist, touch on the arm, face next to cheek.
dreams.

i smell the sea salt in the shaker, the sea salt in the turquoise of the sea. i am gulping breaths of seaweed and salt and the sky and the golden sun, on the green hill, rolling towards the sand. the scene is imprinted behind my eyelids, alternate universes tattooed in the crevices we don't see but can't unsee. spaces between the fingers, pink under the nails, the flesh inside the elbow, the yellow of the inner arm.

hiraeth.

i am in longing for somethingsomeone of which i know not. running in my sleep, weary when awake, question marks in my soul.

poetic torment always inspired by a want so powerful it becomes need, wrings your soul and leaves you wanting, like sex, like food, like air. gasp,
fill your lungs and your toes with salt.

salt in my tears, salt in my tea, salt on my tongue, salt of the sea.


..........................


I can't breathe
I can't breathe
I can't breathe

Yes you can
Breathe
Remember the glimpse of him you saw when he hugged you and held you at the beach
Breathe
Remember all is not lost
As you stick your head out the window and sang, what is it that you did in gulps and lung full, embracing the moment? You
Breathed
When he poured his heart out to you in the car and you finally remembered what it felt like to love him even fleetingly? You
Breathed
When you drove to the house and remembered driving up the first time and throwing up at the curb and late night walks and remembering how it was you smiled at him and he smiled too you remembered you used to
Breathe
When he kissed you like he meant it and you felt it like you used to
That is how you had, all those years ago, learnt how to
Breathe


now your lungs are on fire
your mouth is burnt raw
you are strapped on a pyre,
burnt to a crisp, your desires.
heaving and gasping
on all fours, charcoal, burning embers
there is more to aspire.
there IS Hope. mirages
shimmer in the distance,
i know you are tired. but
there is Love, within and
without, not Him but others
and others and others.
crawl. run. inhale. aim
higher
the light that blinds you is the light
that alights you, this fire feeds on oxygen but remember
it is all wildfire
what your soul was made from.
So now, you can choose
to let it burn you
or YOU can choose
to let it Inspire.


...............................................

Rage

silent screaming yellowredhot rage curling
inside from intestines intertwining with
reason rationale morality sanity
everything is lost
in a burning fire that rips
me to shreds i
don't know who i am is this
how burn victims feel when
they see trauma, nightmares of
burning houses screams and
no water no relief no one
to save them?
i want to scream
and scream
and scream i feel like i left
a child in the house that
burned down
(the child was me)
i'm
knee deep in ashes, quicksand i
cannot get up, cannot get out, cannot
do not cave
in, still and frozen, Medusa's
wrath i am goddess
victim, slain and
spared
which do i be grateful for?
what (who) do i mourn?

sticks and stones

i
live in fear the
tumultuous beating of a heart
wrapped in slivers of plastic
my
ribcage cages my breath cloaks
coal black fear choked
up in my throat i
cannot scream.
i cling onto life like
a slippery seal doused in oil this
world is like a big rock on the edge of madness
rock like my heart, rock where
my soul used to be.

strawberries and salt

rosy pink some
days are like bleeding lips, some
days like
grains of salt lodged between
the toes remind me of
sand, sea, spirit
run free. There is a
pinky hued edge to my memories
my hair still reeks of salty ocean my eyes
still drip with longing of
homelands, never mine to claim.

I keep
strawberries and salt
close at hand, close
to my heart
the strawberries remind me of home
the salt reminds me of me

my brain twirls gently between throbbing membranes, interlocking
spider veins, steely tendrils to hold
it in place.
my face
an empty spot
between the faces of others in photographs,
the blank space i wish i could fill,
but cannot erase.

i look at ghost albums displayed
frivolously
at my windowsill.
still moments of shock, surprise, shared
passion,
i will never feel.
locked, Pandora's box, my
heart,
concealed.

Pearl

he was always bemused to see
the calm oyster shrivel
in the face of the slightest purple
sunset.
and he always wondered how the dark inside
could be more comforting than the paler
blackness of the skies.

said the oyster to her bemused audience
the dark inside may be more frightening, but it and me are
well-acquainted, closest friends
these past few years.
the vast expanse of the sky is yet an unexplored
stranger, and fear
shuts all my doors,
even the ones through which the light may come.

sepia pearls are born, not out of beauty,
but out of the coal black fear.

For better or for....

At 9 and 20 and in-between,
All I was told was
to grow up. Not told,
Insinuated
By words fought between mom and dad, siblings
Needing helping hands, life
Got too big too soon, and
I was 40 

On my 22nd birthday.

 
By some twisted stroke of luck, I

found myself in a picture, big
Doe eyes staring back with naïveté
Unrestrained, unknowingly seeping, my
guard was down (Iron Warrior).
I blindly pursued this child. Only now reclaiming
A childhood my heart didn’t believe it was
Worthy it deserved. This
Brown, soft, doe-eyed girl
Who sang and laughed and skipped and survived
On a diet of cotton candy and crepes, no
Holding back.
 
Today my life has brought me back at

The precipice. The screams are back but
They’re all on the inside. The
Little girl bobs in waves of
Confusion, helplessness, the
Sheer unfairness of giving it everything
I have,
Without acknowledgement, more
Criticisms, contempt.
She
Is almost lost again to my naked
Eye, I
Wave frantically, reaching out
Holding out both hands but
Adult arms restraining
Me back, I
Can’t touch her defiant
Fingertips. No life-vest, no
Lifeguards, this
Time I feel I have lost her
For good.

Battle-weary

She says to me in the car
Pointing at the woman
'Omg, she has so much cellulite! It's Disgusting!'

Later at night, he
(Twain of her core, sprung
From the same two souls)
Kisses my cellulite away,
Says
The cross thatch on my hip
Is as beautiful as any
Battle scar.

Demarcation

i could start this story
and say that it began this morning in the kitchen,
but perhaps this narrative was better spun
some sixty odd years ago
the mitosis of a nation
(1947 )
created these demarcations
seeping into the narratives of
mine, yours, ours,
today.

my
mother had warned me
cautioning,
'soch lo
beta, they
are Punjabis
and
its not Just Geography'
I
starry-eyed child of the world
argued with her over perpetuating labels,
perpetual stereotypes, and
'let's please
get 47 out of our system
already'

it's just a number.

numbers.
when one nation cell split
into two,
7,226,000 of me
had walked into
new labels,
and new homes.
(not easily forgotten)
who is to say
those each individual stories don't
continue to shape the narrative we
now spin on this tiled floor,
you 'othering' me as we
other-ed each other all those years ago?

i had assumed that since we
both sand-grain in hue, vehemently
opposed to injustice, inherently
poetic in nature, tone, spirit,
both sip
our chais with pleasurable urgency
love
the crunch of well-fried chicken,
and fault Pakistan
the minute wheels touch tarmac, yet
lovingly call it Home,
we
had overcome those labels of old-yore, hairline
differences between us compatriot and now, in-law
brethren
yet,
the disdain i
am failing to forget, barely
concealable in your words as you
commented on my khaliz
urdu, and said
'you're so weird, bhabi'
i now realize
that 1947, the number,
still rings its tolls
between you and i.


it is my numbers today
that make me victim now
to the labels you unknowingly
afford me and i wear,
among them
'migrant, muhajir, urdu-speaking....
'weird'.
(it will forever be
sawa eik, to me
and not, one fifteen')


i could fault you with that dear brother
(in law), but brother still,
that you have borrowed this 'freedom of speech' to
call me out,
better from your adopted west
over the 'aadab and tameez'
more emblematic of people of your own color.
that
there is no shame i speak
urdu proudly and that maybe
if my words were punjabi you
would have found them less foreign.
but
maybe 47 and its
subsequent narratives,
are so ingrained in our
sand-grained
bodies, these
accommodations, 73 years later, will never reach
the red heart core of
you,
the core
beneath my labels
identical to yours.

.......................

i
will console
the starry-eyed child in my heart
we still have years left
to dream
years left to not
let the numbers define us
anymore.

..and since by no means am i bereft yet of all that is beloved by me, contained in your embrace,
i will persist in soldering on even in this bright sunny gloom of summer days..

if only it would suffice to spew out precious nothings as odes in your wake, and to end the matter thus, confined to some dark forgotten corner in rust caked memory.
or to carve your name as a bronzen emblem on shivering bare blue skin.
were it sufficient if i was to seal your lips on an eternal canvas, paint color motes drawn from corals of sunsets, the pinky hues of tissue and flesh from petals of amaranth.
to end the matter thus and call this evidence of love. accolades of you reverberate in every miniscule second of waking consciousness, and be it enough of you.





Somehow it is
never enough.

i write poetry with my words.

you,

with your (infinite) kisses