I Gave in to my Light.

I looked through the peek hole,

And jumped across river stones,

For ages I ran for pomegranate trees,

A Jester's truth is maybe what I seek.

But then,,,

I gave in to my addiction.

I saw the Heightened Sparks

Yet, in a sorrowful glance

Oh! These nostalgic afflictions

They are all yours and not mine,

Yet in the gaps of those subtle moments,

Of unshackled chains, and lovers' schemes:

I gave in to my daring dreams.

I saw you out beyond tenses of time

and ideas of extreme ends

Of right and wrong and black and blues,

I kind of got struck when I saw you

Cause' then, you were without form or truth.

And in those moments of clenched breathing,

I gave in to my needs of whirling.

I stumbled through aroma of abandoned books,

And inhaled you among charcoal and woods.

In historic cannons and reigns of Tsars,

In given up balconies and Imperial wars.

And in those moments of utmost abstractions:

I gave in to my Unknown past.

At last, I surrendered in Silence's court,

It taught me to sing out from oblivion,

and disperse into thin air.

The buzz of dragonflies and years of solitude,

My vibes all went into vein,

And thus, in those lazy moments,

I gave in to my long buried pains.

Hey you! Can you solve this dilemma of sight?

Why do I see conquering yellow and a lot of white?

Why don't I see purples, black and blues so bright?

Is it something like when you imagine Icarus's flight?

Or maybe I just gave in to my Light? 

Death of a Shipwrecked Sailor

In those moments of unknown knowings,

I acknowledged YOU with the flicker of that light.

Waiting for lover's Dawn in an impregnated pace,

It told me stories of cholera and a Caribbean face.

Those passing tranquility in me aroused:

Stories of valor, blood and chaos.

Thus began a new chapter of struggle and growth:

That brought glory like sun at Noon:

Of cemented floors and tinned roofs,

Of laced curtains and muddy grooves. 

Outspreading my aura over to the cliff, but,

Saw the Twilight of my life--- and thus:

Reminded me of my days of shredding and mourning,

When left were pieces torn, of dreamt dreams.

The pieces I so carefully gathered:

Cause' then I knew a distant light.

The drama of unknown knowings thus came to a halt. 

I stood to see that light:

Coming from the dock of that ship:

 It reminded me of my Belongings.

As the ship brought the Twilight to Night:

Thus Heavens sank into grief...

Tearing the angry sea, that ship,

It simply came to me. 

I, a shipwrecked sailor

I, who once departed, 

Was meant to return to the ship.

Where I belonged. 

Just like Life Belonging:

To Death.

Deja Vu

THESE were the people whose lives were getting on on at endless road, with same pace, same heart beat, same everything. It was like looking at a sand clock, its sand flowing down into the same, boredom-struck yet nostalgic-struck pace. They had their faces covered with layers of oblivion, of untold lies. It was like as if they wanted to convey a lie, that wasn't ever told, but that which destroyed their lives. These people, small and red cum light-brown race of wilderness, living at the top of Monchara peak, had never seen fireworks. Simple and simple enough. Simab, a young girl with cosmos dwelling in her almond eyes, could never imagine the severity of a small moment. A moment that took her by surprise.  A moment having the very power to change the outcome of her entire life.

Soon after the arrival of monsoon season and arousal of signs of her puberty, she could not stay at one place. Her mother could see the signs of the time that were justifying itself all over Simab's body. She wanted to marry her off, before she would throw herself over to love and ecstasy. She wanted to shackle her into society's prison before she could even learn to fly. This was what Rashida was planning for Simab. But nature had other plans...
To put in a right way, nature was just a catalyst, it was merely the arrival of gypsies which maddened her like a moth, and gave her light like a "chingari"(spark of fire) over her growing age.
                                                             
                                                                       -----------------------

"You know what, we should go to see this mela.", Said Sajida.

"I know... But only when ami's gone, or else there is no way out for us.", said Simab, her restlessness appearing all over her face.

"I heard from Mumtaz, that there is a clan of huge women, even huge than men of our area! These women possess natural powers to turn fire into gold. He also told that they seem to possess an emerald, the size of an egg, which is possessed." said Sajida, with eyes of wonder and heart of lust.

Simab got up from her bed, wrapped her shawl around her shoulders and went to her balcony.
She was looking out at the cosmos in agony.
"Why are these stars so distant? Why can't I reach out my hand and touch them? Just like that" Simab was breathing heavily with her finger pointing out to North star.

"I am often carried away by the flickering of Subh ka Sitara. It glows like a lover's spell. It makes me dwell in a higher state, you know. This state,,, it feels like I am numb. And that I am not here any more. The time seems like a distant tragedy drama, whirling to the madness of that flickering." Simab was now pouring her heart out, her eye balls stung with lustful madness.

"Look Simab, it is fine to have a bunch of friends to engage with. You have made the bandhan of time, my friend. You have embraced the chain of events that lead to silver liquors and the world of magic, of alchemy."

"What's wrong if I have?"

"You will end up in the darkest pit of death I must say."

"And what if that death of Simab leads to another dimension of reality? Where I am able to fly? Hey, just look at these cracks in the sky. "
                                                           
                                                                  --------------------

Simab had always been a wonder child. Her mother used to tell her that she was born with a blood clot in her hand which was a symbol of madness of Ishq among pagans dwelling in the outskirts of Monchara. Those were the people who were directly the descendant of the famous imperialist Brochovich clan, coming down to the region of Mongolia in the times of Tsars in Imperial Russia. Maybe their genes were flawed by unlikely intrusion of captivating Indian influence, at least that is what their local scripture said. These people believed in many other things apart from blood clot...
They believed in the power of sparks of fire, which are manifestations of slight beauty of suffering before it goes into the pit of darkness. It was that same spark, that chingari, that bore the seeds of civilization on this barren peak of Monchara and made this peak, a home to a whole century of solitude, gypsies, magic, mysticism and fears, where the rules of nature worked in reversals, where avalanches were not natural catastrophes, but only a symbol of a chingari, or nostalgic familiarites, where love was meant to die into the dark pit before a brief show of beauty.
They would not worship effigies of any kind, neither did they worship fire. Instead, they would worship the spirit of uncertainty brought every year on the monsoon season by a clan of gypsies, big women with powers to turn fire into gold...
But this time, Simab, a growing beauty, didn't know. She didn't know that the very thing she was suppressing was the very cause of her existence, of  her ancestral believes, of the sacredness of the spirit of a chingari, a chingari her mother wanted to kill, a chingari the origins of which she was unaware (maybe deep down within the Siberian or Brochovich unknowns of her flesh or Indian magnetism of her eyebrows?).
She just knew that she was to go to the mela. A mela where the gypsies were waiting for her for revelations...
                                                                 
                                                                -------------------------------

Have you ever thought of a distant beep of a ship coming out of the blue in a sea storm? And how it breaks the soul of lighthouse at the far end? It is like day dreaming when centuries of silences of waves are intruded by a total stranger, an entity of land belongings. It seems to provoke waves to shatter their bounds and echo their madness for others to realize that this is their territory. When the solitude is broken by a ray of sunlight, peeking through a daydreamer's dream, it is like waiting centuries for a surprise. Just like waves, just like us. Then, the mankind waits for the time, the time in their lives, when they will encounter a moment where they will remain... for life. This is how Simab felt when see went to the mela... To see life.

That carnival was her death. It took practically everything she ever earned in her life, her belief, her happiness, her remorse, everything. She wasn't there any more. Adolescence leaves its mark within the heart of lovers, hers simply took her heart away.
It was the dawn of a new century of repose, her mother was an old but still young lady, with love and remorse, when she realized that her only marriageable daughter was possessed by a demon. The demon that would make her explore her painful depths of flesh.  The hakeem sahabs of the area said that she is grief-stricken. Simple enough. However, the turn of events suggests that grief was synonymous to surprise-stricken possibilities.

"Ladki ko sameh ka rog lag gya hai.", said they. (The girl is grief stricken with a particular time (moment) of her life.)

When these words were bought to a sense-full realization, Simab's mother couldn't believe her ears. She felt embarrassed because it has never occurred to her that a girl can be capable of such ambiguities at such an age.

"I thought only men like Majnu were capable----"

"Now that she is gone in her own wilderness, you should let her be. Give her up. To mountains or those big women.", he interrupted with authority.

"How can I let my girl dwell among gypsies who do not even worship Goddess of Monchara?", said she, feeling agitated.

"You think your girl does any more?"

"Why my girl only? Why? Why was she out of many to be given over to be an alchemist? Or a shepherd of Ishq?"

"You know why was Majnu a shepherd of Ishq?", he paused, searching for oblivion over Rashida's face.

"It is because Laila was dark brown.", revelled he to her.

Rashida felt like cracking down into the lava flowing within her lungs, eating her stomach away.
"It is because your daughter was born with that clot of blood. Samey ka rog karkh rog hota hai, Kuriye... (The grief of a moment is a severe grief, child)" , he paused with an intruding thought in his mind, while wandering in a distant thought. With a deep sigh, he looked at Rashida, her almond eyes filled not with tears, but thunderstorms of dreadful revelations. He carried on,

"Our ancestors pass on the story that centuries ago, while they were nurtured in Siberian wilderness, there were few wanderer souls of the area. These souls were restless of their puberty but their red-headed women didn't please them at all. Hearing of beauties of other worlds, they came with the hope of finding women with strange mud colour skin, somewhere down in the South. Maybe in India. These blue eyed and pink lipped wanderers searches for ten years, in search of these exotic women they heard about. According to Turkish myths, their eyes had the power to make a person mad, and eventually perish in the spell of their intoxicating bodies. Some thought these were paries of God, bestowed on the men of that area, for their righteous offerings to Ram and Sita, and to make the land fertile. Their fertility eventually covered the whole of Punjab area with lush trees and Himalayas with pines and conifers. And colours. And life.", he paused, looking at Rashida, who didn't seem to be in the moment. As if her soul has flown away into distant meadows, just in that moment it all seemed like a time lapse until she blinked her eyes to look at Hakeem with attention, while her tears flowed down her check bones, down her chin to become one single drop.

"According to Moncharian legends, our Brochovich ancestors had to face a lot of endless problems of Himalayas till they reached Punjab. According to Mahasatya (holy book), they first arrived at the spot commonly known as the roof of the world. Its dwellers called this magical place Tibet. When they arrived at the place, they were disappointed to death because they were no different then them in terms of their cultural pattern. Worse of all was the fact that they were short people with small eyes and weird noses. Although they were mud coloured, their women were nothing like what the gypsies of Siberia has told them. On the contrary, they were nothing but ugly, with shrill noises that could shatter one's ear drums."

One of the companions started becoming restless about their misfortune. He thought probably the gypsies have lied about those women. However, the Tibetans confirmed about mud coloured women further down in South, who wore colourful clothes embroidered with gold, and bathed in waterfalls.
Hearing this description made them even more restless. They were now ready to bear the load of any disaster or hurdle in order to get there. And truly, they crossed Himalayas with raw meat and the humidity of Kashmir with leaves till they reached Punjab."

They were truly maddened by those dusty beauties and goddesses who looked like Phulkaris. They
were truly paries. They thought they would have to work out something out in order to win them over, or steel them from their men. However, surprisingly, almost all of those women who saw them fell for their blue eyes. And thus, both these creatures satisfied their souls to give birth to a new race. A race of short men and short women, with attractive features and almond eyes, and a lustrous unpredictability and a confused faith: of gypsies, liquors and alchemy at one side, and goddesses of sexuality and recklessness at the other side. the freedom of love and wine at one side and social norms for captivating women at other, the spark of lovers at one side, and the disease of samey ka rog at the other, the heritage of fire crackers at one side and that of khatakali dance at the other." He paused again, recollecting unknown corners of his demons.

"We are that mistaken and by default race, my child. This chingari (spark), this uncertainty and madness of love and its spell is a genetic mutation, prevalent in all of us because of cross between restless men and exotic women. Your Simab was to be a victim of this cross because she is restless to wander about just like her nation's men, and she is captivating just like those paries. "

                                                                ------------------------

The truth to be stated was that the tribe of Monchara had never seen fire crackers. Never heard of it and never thought about it. Yet they could sense the yearnings within their heart, that told them of unknown and unheard stories of some distant past, and made them familiarized with the unknowns of that past in their blood. It was like a maddened frenzy of a moth, until it sees the light and perished itself eventually.
What happened with Simab was similar to moth's fate. She was yearning for something to complete her, she could sense it dwelling within her, like lust for bodily needs. Like puberty, its signs appeared on many Moncharians. The reason being the fact that they had darkness to look in their past and uncertainty in their future. Until they took what they saw with utmost surprise within their heart and wonder within their eyes, yet they knew somewhere deep within the miles of their flesh that they had seen this before. This made them maddened with distance in their eyes, and awestruck to death. This is what happened to Simab when she went to that mela, saw gypsies and firecrackers. She knew them from all the entirety of her being, yet she didn't know them at all. It left her with Samey ka rog.

While according to Hakeems, it dwell in the deepest valley of jin, and halted before the one who opens itself to it, it was nothing than sickness of surprise. While the norms to satisfy Rashida suggested that Simab was to dwell in the madness of whirling until she finds a secret sword that she would convert to gold, they truth was that she was beginning to know her unknowns via madness of ishq and wander. While the Hakeems suggested to 'let her be' because she will be given up to full moon's waves,  and eventually she will perish as a silver liquor, or a maddened moth, maybe; the truth was that she was a part of an overall seed of civilization, beginning to crack its testa of illegitimate or maybe disowned birth, in order to give birth to new shoot. Te truth laid behind the mystery of chingari. Which was merely intrusions of nostalgia, the kind that was not hers. On the contrary, she shared it with her ancestors, who lived among snowflakes of Siberia and dragonflies of Indus delta.

However, in truth, it was merely Deja vu...
And with all its enormity, it struck Simab.


Aug, 11th, 2015.