middle-ground

my professor and i, we were both nervous about saying
general-iza-bility
can you say it one go, congratulations on pronunciation

there is a t.v. serial that makes me laugh,
i don't have to hear it twice, no innuendo i miss,
a history, a politics i do not have to grasp to learn, to reach, how can you not know this?
sometimes our teacher asks us about people with strange names
we do not raise our hands

we cannot talk about this t.v. serial in class because nobody knows
i imagine my awkward laughter at mahboob ahmed's play of words, i imagine a silent audience,
my laughter.

in fourth grade, we were handed dictionaries for
our mother tongues, we thought they were so special because
we didn't know they existed
we already had a Oxford one at home, its spine worn from use

we spoke middle tongues
safely lodged in the middle of of each language
far away from its unease, far away from its home
there is an urdu i cannot understand, there is an english i cannot speak

we're learning big words, secretly hoarding them like trophies but
presenting them like our own breath
there are new words everyday that slip from my tongue, that i have to look up
furtively, referents of language i have no image for, but i say yeah, yeah
yeah, the middle ground for yes and no, yeah

my heart pounds in happiness, anger and sadness,
grief and joy, the knock on skin, a call for words
and i give you the thing that i can speak
in emulation, in parody, in mimicry

there is a t.v. serial that makes me laugh,
it is old;
jehan aara's tongue is quick, sharp in the urdu
that i cannot speak.

mirrors

dear friend,

i'm learning
that mirrors are compelling
things -
and then i stand and
i stand
in complete reflection
in complete summation
the flux made whole
the silent, languageless composition
of body

i'm also learning
the shame of
disintegration
of constantly negotiating
being and becoming
of sometimes pretense
of sometimes lie
of sometimes overstepping airs
of sometimes
over-spilling
of sometimes
being and becoming at the wrong places and
wrong times

i'm also learning
places that rescue shame
places that make pathways out of guilt
places of Understand
places of Overcome

i'm also learning
escape
i'm also learning
staying

perpetual
impermanence

but
then the mirrors turn on us
then we turn on ourselves
to see the genius
of the flux made whole
the silent, languageless composition
of body
the relegates of language
of seeing things Exact
and
silenced forever by words

i am not sinking

dear friend,

sometimes this awareness of being alive comes and rests in the air of my throat, and I can almost swallow, but I am not sinking. 

we are as halo as we can be in the language we are made out of, and in the language made out of us. we are queens of light-outs, we are kingdoms of midday hair, we are freedoms in our flickering lights when the voltage breathes in and out of  bulbs

 we are seeded balance, a skin-made strength, a spinning space in grand schemes, a subtraction from all else, darts of fate now learning what shoulders can do, how bones can bend, like pages, close and open like folds, like pages made out of body

 and when we throw our heads back, and give, and just give, then we are so unheard and so heard and all the spaces bridge and we are such a part of 

everything

my heart is finding its breath again; whirlwind words from point a to point b, from this bone to this bone; ya rab, ya rab, ya rab

(the answers build, the laughter slips)

 our gazes forever trained to sky, our verses forever made out of the luck of a bird tunnelling into the air between tree branches

 and the climax: always one breath that brings soul to your lips; almost, almost, and all the parts of the universe fit,

and so do we,

and so do we. 

the palms of winter are pressing now

the wind has lost its fiery vow

the flames are smoke

the water ice

and you have left this deep crevice

i keep finding between my bones

the summer doors are closing now

and memory is folding how

the day welds in 

and becomes a thin

wedge of life 

and now we wake into a newer dream

and flow into this seamless stream

(that will not mend) 

of discovery that all our odds and ends

will be taken by the storms 

A city girl's take on chaos.

dear friend,

there could never be enough metaphors for our cities — we are sweet children of afternoons where there is more smoke than sky and evenings where there is more wind than air, sweet children of lessons in breathing, in rolling up the windows when the smoke gets too black, bringing them down when an orchestra of night plays across streets and the Sun trusts us with our streetlights so it sinks in relief behind neighborhoods made out of clay

friend, we will always understand when we are eighteen and the pages of our books tell us that some people believe that chaos breeds in order and it’s not a bad thing, that when mismatched skins and non-polar voices brush against each other, there are sounds that we can make poems out of.

so we will always know we can melt into mess, descend into anarchy within our ribcages, wage war against our silence, and that while we break we will give way to rivers of broken faith, we will give way to light and the six’o’clock grace of the breeze, and howl so that the universe will never be the same again, because it shook in places where we went and broke our fingernails, knees, bones, and hearts.

friend, don’t you see that our cities might well be the universe’s snark at the human proclivity to set things in order, to set things straight, to dress up and head there, and get here and have that so when rain accidentally trips over our streets, we are flooded, and when some things strike, we have no cover, and that the paint is always scraping and that the walls of my favourite places aren’t tremor-proof.

friend, we are sweet children of cities that never learnt to place reason above love, that never learnt how not to malfunction in places where it matters most — friend, we are sweet children of chaos, spewing infinity from our mouths in places we break, in places where we couldn’t have reached to kiss if they hadn’t broken.

friend, when we fall face first into our destinies, we collide with language to produce the world how it has never been before --

and this is my collision.

this is my love song.

for the strangers of my city

dear stranger,

i looked through the crack of the window and you had let your hair down and the six o clock Karachi winds make me want to close my eyes and examine the sunshine patches on my hands and trace out the syntax of how your jaw clenches when you have bad news over the telephone and how the freckles on your nose don't give your red nose away and how you stare out at something in between cups of tea and you look down and swirl the liquid and it matches the colour of your skin -

sometimes my poems are what you were on a Wednesday morning - nightsky hair tied up into a hair bun with a red ribbon, one to match your heart. i see you on the sidelines, i write you down in words and everything that doesn't matter to you, matters to me. it matters to me how your eyes dart nervously and how the moon of last night left its traces on your starlight skin while you hold yourself and think of something and thoughts that breathe in between the surprised distance of your chapped lips -

you are the poem in my head because i write it down with how your smile digs into your cheeks and how your hair sticks out and you are the character from a book in the London rain but someone fit you into the wrong story so you laugh it out and are the girl who does not belong because her skin is too white for too much milk in her cup of tea - you glance at me in passing and i have already written you down in miles and miles of invisible ink

and i don't quite know how to deal with it, how to make you understand and grab you by the shoulder and explain to you that you are in my poetry and you are in my prose and they are both seventeen year old but seventeen means being young enough and foolish enough to fall in love momentarily and eternally with strangers and how they laugh and what they sing and how they see me seeing them

i see you, i see you - i see you right now because i asked myself what the patches of sunshine on my skin remind me of and it was you because my bones and my skin take you in and i find reasons to stay alive

so i pray to God that he takes your hand when the gravity of linoleum pride wants to take you west -i pray to God you break free, ride the wind and the wings of the sparrow someone told you were too far away, i pray to God you grease your hands trying to fix things someone said you couldn't and i pray to God that when the six o clock winds displace your hair and you turn your head slightly you find me and i am smiling and i have already written you down and prayed for you and held your hand inside my head and smiled for you in the quick moment i shift my eyes from you to something i don't quite see

love,
a friend

she wore the stars on her hand and she

wore the sky on her sleeves and she wore

the wind in her hair while the evening breeze

wound 'round her hand like a emblem of love

and she walked and she walked and she walked

she's alive, she's alive, she's alive

she wore her dreams broken, she wore her dreams whole

love-bites of her life on her skin and her soul

and she stood in the haze of the dimming days

but she's alive, she's alive, she's alive

you can find her and tell her that she is a dream

the most beautiful silence that you've ever seen

and your roses will wilt and your roses will bloom

and she'll live all the days in between

because she's alive, she's alive, she's alive

and you can write her down so she is read again and again

because i will tell you how she wore her pain:

she wore the stars on her hand and she

wore the sky on her sleeves and she wore

the wind in her hair while the evening breeze

wound 'round her hand like a emblem of love

and she walked and she walked and she walked

she's alive, she's alive, she's alive

oh how it reeks of memory -
a gulp of air
                   that i swallow in
                   the croaking of an old, stained swing
                                                       and how it sways defyingly
                                                  no, i will not have mercy because not this time -
                                                   not this time have i swayed and swung
                                                   not this time have the winds sung
                                                 with me
                 but -
 here i lend a ear
to hear
that the breeze does carry my song still -
and the subtle sound of broken faith
and the hint of a prayer from Fate
                                                 so i turn my back
                                                 - and  i walk away

i do not know how
or where to sit and break -
perhaps on a mossy, wet log
quite as helpless as i
but the nearby town shall be busy and
the sun will be high -
and beside a quiet lake
quiet as inconsequent as me
i will talk to the waters – unheard all the same
of how the wind does not hear me when
i plead and i say –
won’t you take me away
won’t you take me away

i will open my eyes to 

the sounds of summer and 

the drilling heat will pierce through my sleep 

and unfinished dreams -

but i will curl up and close my eyes inspite

and let it sting inside, because i will know then

that the winds do change and the trees,

they learn to smile again

but i, i've learnt by heart with unnerving ease

to trace the breeze

right back to you 

then let me be, and let me stay

let me build with air, but you may

stop by and tilt your head with a frowning brow and wonder, too

upon breathing in a thought or two that belonged to me

but found you instead -

until then i will swirl fingers through the orange of a candle light 

and let the rhythm of the flicker speak to me 
with quietude 

with hushed tones

about everything 
i have never known

i am not made of brilliant dreams

of shining lights, of big, bold screens

that scream at you whilst you traipse the big, bold city

on a rainy night, with your head hung low

and how the colours will twirl in an occasional puddle 

and you will walk through all the muddle and how things 

will cease: the day, the breeze

but not the dreams, and not the show

but what i am, i shall present 

for there are chances 

i may earn your consent 

for i will dream with you on a starlit night 

(i will look at the stars and back at you

 and tell you how)

there is only a semblance 

of difference, quite a striking resemblance

and that you twinkle just as well for me 

and maybe even more 

i am not made of brilliant dreams 

but i can keep Yours safe for you

i've known the steady song of rain

and the steady sway of the coconut tree

shaking it's head and smiling at me

and we've known life as it is

perhaps the rainbow grew tired 
of smiling upside down

and rained on you and me

and we've let it even out, my dear

in blobs and carefully patterned fear

and now our souls are works of arts 

and the scents and sounds we've grown to love 

have been bleeding words on our paper hearts

here, take mine, give yours to me 

so we have just enough to read 

when the smiles have died away on

a rainy day
hold it close and keep it safe, do not let it blow away
- my paper heart

i have not seen a snowflake melt to say that it melted for you

and i have not strayed so i could tread upon a golden leaf - a crunch - in autumn hues 

       - or snow capped mountains in all their pride,

         or the baldness of a winter tree

            because you might say to me

that i could've looked and looked, in winter boots and foggy breath - and thought

of you and me; 

    Yet

        still God gave me words, the Sun and the day, 

the night and the stars and the wandering voice of baked-skinned street vendors

coming my way

     and an embrace, or someone's whispers into a listening ear, a smile 

     and the honking cars, and Living streets, perhaps a garland-selling child

and scents of spices and flowers climbing up the wall of my own backyard

                                                          (they fold perfectly into verses) -

i have not less, i need not more

for a thing like love could never be lonely; the skies will clear and the birds will sing

and for beautiful hearts, there'll be beautiful things

 always, my love -

always.

i will watch in secrecy

while Time prolongs the End

- to watch myself as i fall

each time, with more intent -

(i have learnt to imitate the air of

indifference, but of a different kind )

i give, you do not take and

 i break for breaking's sake

but what are you? what have you?

that i sleep walk unto my ache

and like the scarcely lit sky

barring day from night

i will not be, but i will be there

i will not care that you do not care

or know; 

solace - perhaps, up in a tree

with a wooden flute that belongs to me

i will sing  of you and me

and i will sing solo

but have you known me?

have you known me at all

have you loved what you had but hadn't at all

have you lived for the night, have you died in its wake

have you withered and bloomed, have you sprouted at all

have you belonged to a story you have written yourself

have you scripted the ending, have you read it at all 

have you known that i live, that i breathe what you breathe

have you seen yourself in me, have you seen me at all 

underneath the sky we share

tonight i weave, i say a  prayer

from heart to heart; moonlight's kiss

on the crimson lips of dawn..

oh, the heavens hear, the heavens see

and hopes and dreams kneel down with me

to find you somewhere i can reach; the places

love can go

and if the day is kind

and the night benign

you must know..

i wished it just for you

Lady Life;
she whirled and she twirled
and she clicked her grey heels
within cacophonous silence
she pranced and she squealed
and she took your hand nimbly
and she pulled you away;
i looked out of my window and there wasn't a storm
the sun in it's glory was meeting the morn'
and would you believe it (i have too much to say)...
Lady Life, (when she whirled and she twirled and she clicked her grey heels
and when within cacophonous silence, she pranced and she squealed)
she left me amazed, and in quite a bit of daze, and she left me
writing verses on a perfectly good day

i fall into place 

with walking, talking

secrets 

etched into the creases of my skin 

oh, they live and oh, how they live;

until i am my own

whisper

dear london skies

dear london skies

you watch her jet black curls of hair

playing with the wind

and you see her eyes smile

while

they see things 

that people chance to miss;

dear london skies

you see her skip along

the frozen streets;

her quiet giggles seep

into the snow;

her jacket warms her and she

warms it 

dear london skies

do you break down 

with tears and rain and snow

because you think

while her paper boats sink

(into the puddles) how

she'd make a beautiful

rainbow

(un)fortunate

the sight of you

is either-

fate smiling down at me

or

cruelly laughing in my face;

it tends to do the

latter -

how beautiful a tragedy

is a beautiful tragedy

doubling all the ache;

quiet beautifully, dutifully,

entrancing me to dance

to the sounds of the clatter

as i break and i shatter

and melt into verses for you

once again