A humble glimpse –

Of my fickle imaginations –

Spilled on the canvas

In a jiff –

An atrocious darkness

In a trice –

A glinting flutter ––

Days and nights

Then the darkness stilled…

The monsoon roared

And wrathfully splattered –

The transparent dread

And gushed in the maples and ebonies

And the yellow pale moon –

Hid behind the shuddering dense hazes

The owl against the glow –

Flew by

A gaggle gaggled –

In the sky

As I asked meekly a mask of his health –

Without the face

It’s funny, when life happens to anyone, none can define. It’s neither like one’s ennui in barbershop nor like one’s fright while roaming with a fiend in an unknown market.

It’s funny to see the sunshine and the rain – at the same time and to be hopeless and the luckiest at the same time. Even nature makes fun of you.

It’s funny you have something, but you’re not supposed to own it. It’s like the feelings of a kid in a bakery, gazing savory pastries with sheer craving. I don’t know how but I find it funny.

It’s funny when you find your flair, none’s there to appreciate. When you master the art of crying on walls and pillows, they offer shoulders. When you are (happily) numb, someone actually starts loving you. It’s just funny.

It’s funny, when the only thing you are supposed to trust – brainpan doesn’t respond to the fixes you’re in – at times.

It’s funny when you’re the brightest yet the dingiest gem.

It’s funny when you care (give a damn)… Yes it is amusing!

It’s funnier when you get used to this fickleness of life’s persistency.



And eventually you start learning breaking away every twist and turn – malevolently adorned – of the pathway – that is supposed to lead you towards the terminus. It serves you its swinging random lanes for the repast in a crooked fashion – to scare you. But you hate not it anymore. Life… Is a fickle persistence and we are the meek grace. It dances in its ways in its folly like a kite up above the sky. It is just funny when you exist only – to follow the rites and go with the flow to curb yourself away from the taboo term called ‘rebel’.

Funny when you wage a war against nothingness and eventually you lose.

And

It was the last day of the perch. It’s time to fly again. I just hope the new sun brings smiles and happiness anew. I have been told that I am bright, brighter than the sun.
So, I must fight every eclipse I face, and regain the light.
Because I have ‘something’ worth fighting for. I am indeed the luckiest boy on this planet I believe. And hopelessness, I will conquer! God will help.
And as Emily Dickinson would put in,

"Hope" is the thing with feathers—
That perches in the soul—
And sings the tune without the words—
And never stops—at all—

And sweetest—in the Gale—is heard—
And sore must be the storm—
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm—

I've heard it in the chillest land—
And on the strangest Sea—
Yet, never, in Extremity,
It asked a crumb—of Me.



If hope is the thing with feathers... Then hopelessness should be unfeathered.

=)

Tick drop tock drip tick drop tock drip was what one could hear in that shallow twilight.
The noise of the wall-clock and the leaking pipe in the bathroom –– was quite grudgingly harsh to him in that silent twilight.

It wrote,
“I prevail. I prevail –– as a lowly slave.”
“It’s passing, it’s consuming me from inside and outside –– the times –– tabooed times.”

Another second passed, followed by another – the hand moved and went on, and then trembled a minute – and a minute melted into an hour followed by another hour and hours and hours.

The miles and the hours.

Tick tock, drip drop. Tick tock, drip drop. Tick tock, drip drop...

It wrote, “I’ll bend space and gravity, only if...”

The visions – blurred, emotions numbed and a sob unthinkingly was heard.
It slightly shed off the eye and made a way for the others to come; some followed it while others made their own ways. The tears they were, gleaming waterfalls against the room-light from the dark one could see. Trickling twinkles. Tick tock, drip drop. Teardrops embellished the cheeks like stars do to the sky.

Sobs.

The thunders of restlessness rumbled all over the place.

It wrote, “My thirst for you has become vampiric.”

Tick tock, drop, tick, drip, tock, drop, tick, drip, tock…

The night had risen over the world and covered it like a shawl. The night it was.
The dark and the room-light and…

A broken heart, a pain –– seared,

It wrote again, “I’d dive far below the oceans… I’d fly far above the clouds… only if…”

“None is to be blamed, oh my love. I hope you’re fine. I hope.”

Silent in disbelief, with awkward clingy emotions – he was. At square one – he was. He was.

The death each moment – he embraced.

Music played: “With every kiss and every hug you’ve made me fall in love.”
And silence crept again. Tick, drip, tock, drop, tick, drip, tock, drop, tick, drip, tock, drop…

It wrote then, “Only if I could lie within your soul and mind… and in your arms.”
And, “I’d sell it all… all my materialistic treasures.”

Music played: “Tum bin jaa’un kahan, ke dunya mein aa ke – kuch nehi chaha….”

The swollen eyes watered the sear cheeks again. The heart moaned. And then it wiped off them, all of them.

[What does he hide? Behind those scarred humid eyes.]

And it wrote, “You are my strength, and I shall keep the promise, I shall never fall apart, I shall mend my heart, even before it breaks.”
“I shall keep the promise and you will keep it too.”
“I hear, miracles happen.” Hand trembled, but he continued in imperfections. “For roses can bloom amongst the wrinkled rocks.” “For water can spurt in oasis in midst of deserts” “And if needles and threads could not do it, I shall mend it with love –– that is still alive.”
“Distances are mere a frail thread, our love is the robust string.”

The night was young, but the feelings were feeble.

Tock, drop, tick, drip, tock, drop, tick, drip…

The night kept on growing. Seconds passed. Minutes passed. Hours gone by.
And a dewdrop fell from the heaven on a leaf outside his window; it smiled at him and fell asleep on that very leaf, he saw it sleeping and waited for the sun to rise.

And then the sun fought its way up the horizon. Beams came in from the window and he saw the halos.
It was a new day, but the promise was the same.

Remember when I told you, “I strangely sometimes fall for dead people.”? I was not kidding. And then my love is not like just a crush, it is as deep as an abyss – an abyss so deep that your eyes will give up, your brain will cease thinking. I love them with all my breaths as I carve everything – trait, habits and style about them in my soul and run my fingers on the carving until it gets imprinted, I might sound insane and yes, we all have the right to go insane sometimes. When I was 14, I read somewhere that ‘they’ lived an isolated life, that sentence –– I have still not forgotten. See, what I figured out the meaning of isolation.

Solitude

Such a little room ––– I keep
Where teenage musings and I sleep
The ink yet in my pen is aware
At night my heart descends the stair
Dove at my door put a mar
A lightening bug escaped from jar
Who flied and glowed and dreamed and died
So secretly, the neighbors think –– I hide
Within these walls and windowpane
Away from clichés like hurt and pain
I’ve sealed my doors from the world so cold
While everyone breathe –– and grow old
Within my fence lies copious solitude
Such a lonely life with blue ingratitude
And lies in my backyard – desires’ flags unfurled
In a ruined dingy cemetery state –– once my world
So long ––– after my earthly grave
A girl –– on bench by the secluded lake
Will spread each page beautifully swept
O such a little room ––she’ll say –– I kept
By B.H

Us, The News

***

What N.A. says about the poem “Why do I love” You, Sir? by Emily Dickinson:
“One of our regular contributors, Bahadur Hussain, contributed the following poem by Emily Dickinson. The poem is an example of typical Dickinsonian verse – fragmentary and yet conveying a world of emotions through its extreme pithiness…”


“Why do I love” You, Sir?
By Emily Dickinson

“Why do I love” You, Sir?
Because –
The wind does not require the Grass
To answer – Wherefore when He pass
She cannot keep Her place.

Because He knows – and
Do not You –
And We know not –
Enough for Us
The Wisdom it be so –
The Lightning – never asked an Eye
Wherefore it shut – when e was by –
Because He knows it cannot speak –
And reason not contained –
Of Talk –
There be – preferred by Daintier Folk –

Te Sunrise – Sire – compelleth Me –
Because He’s Sunrise – and I see –
Therefore – Then –
I love Thee –


http://thenews.com.pk/newsmag/mag/detail_article.asp?id=654&magId=9


***


“Mujhe ishq kyn hai” Tum se, Janaab?
Kyn ke –
Hawa ko nahi hai zaroorat Ghaas ki
Jawaban – ke Wo guzray jab
Wo qaa’im nahi reh sakti.

Kyn ke Wo janta hai – aur
Kya Tum nahi –
Aur Hum nahi jantay –
Yeh buhat hai Humaray liye
Yeh Danaa’i se mutta’lliq’at –
Bijli ki chamak ne – Aankh se nahi kaha
Par Wo band ho gai – jab Wo yehan thi –
Kyn ke Wo janto hai Yeh nahi bol sakti –
Aur koi wajoohat bhi nahi –
Baaton ki –
Behter logo ki tarjee’hat mein se – ik yeh bhi

Tu’loo-e-Sooraj – Meri zaat – mujhe majboor karti hai –
Kyn ke wo Tu’loo-e-Sooraj hai – aur Main dekhti hun –
Isi liye – phir –
Main Tum se Ishq karti hun –

Translated by B.H. “Why do I love” You, Sir?
***