The Story

I must finally start writing this story. For I have nothing left but this.

I am still in all sorts of doubts. A story is your creation, but it also creates you, for others to see. In this I am somewhat comforted by the fact that I might never have anyone read this. In any case, though I always wanted to be a writer, I stopped trying. I could never write anything that sells. One has sold oneself enough already - now how painful to sell even the story of that sale. I could never bring myself to change a single word, or edit a line. How cruel a punishment for the sin of exposing oneself, to have parts sliced off. What is then left is neither you, nor them - those who would read it. Let them read me as it is, or not at all. Perhaps not at all is so much better. For everyone.

I have nothing left. Everything that I ever wanted, never came to me. It came tantalizingly close to make one's desires and hopes reach where they could. And worse, it came close again when one had survived and moved on. To have it come back close again is to wrench out one's guts all over again. To feel the pain of the desire and the loss. And to feel the movement of time and realize that the loss was that much bigger, for nothing, not even it itself, can bring it back, once the time is gone.

But I might be excused for writing in generalities. No matter how specific the pain, it occurs to one as the most general state of one's life. Nothing is specific - one either loses it all or wins it all. The rest is just make-believe.

How easy it is to be born in this world. And yet how difficult to live. So easy to be born in fact that one makes no decision and no conscious effort about it. It just happens. Would that anyone would care to ask - here is the list of things you will have, here is how the world is and will be - would you like to be here? Although, knowing humans, one wonders if they wouldn't be foolish enough to still want it. Yet to stay alive requires so much effort - biological - to breathe every moment, to eat, to excrete, and to spend every moment making arrangements for these, or for the illnesses surrounding these. Psychological - to think about things around - the bewilderment of it all - nothing makes sense. At first, or later. Not till the end. Yet one must think and be enticed to believe there is free will and choice and freedom to act and determine our lives. What nonsense. Where did these ridiculous thoughts originate?

For we know nothing at all. And what is choice or freedom or anything, without knowledge? Any man standing up and contemplating about the thing closest to him - himself, is faced with the most basic questions for which there have never been any answers.

And so was I born, with ease, without so much as knowing about it. Yet consciousness came early - what a burden. And let the optimists charge me. The fact that they do so suggests their own insecurity in their house of cards. The more one lives, the more one suffers - and there are no two ways about it. When one ignores one's suffering, one can, in moments of intoxication, almost convince oneself that all is great, that life is wonderful. But these people are not in their senses at all. In fact, these people are not alive at all. For anyone alive, could not ignore the suffering - of one's body, every moment that it breathes and tries to survive on this planet, of one's soul that tries to fit into the body and make sense of what it is doing on this alien planet. Not to mention the continuous suffering of all others that one cannot be shielded from, for in the very act of trying to shield, one perceives and registers.

Those who teach one to write ruin one forever. For it is through avoiding all influence that one can sustain oneself, not the other way round. I have not read for long. Every word tears one apart. Not to mention the images and sounds and such. It tears one apart from oneself - snippets of this and that person and this and that life - that don't hold together, and never can. They only confuse and influence to render one meaningless. For it is only one's own story that holds together - every snippet, every little day and hour and moment - it is a complete story - yet so hard to tell. There is so much in it. So much that we avoid observing ourselves. So much that we must not know, to survive. And it is best that way, for to tell it to others makes it another snippet in someone else's life that adds to meaninglessness, and nothing more.

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A suddent burst of prose, unedited. Some might find it too dark, but that's in line with this space. This is fast becoming a place for experiments of all kinds in (re)discovering myself...but perhaps that is what a blog is about...(?)

Siyaah-e-Dil

Use kya, khud ko bhula dunga
Is tufaan ko bujha dunga

Main teri raah mein ab bas
Har ek lamha naya dunga

Mohabbat kya, qayamat kya
Main farq inme mita dunga

Hai darya uske ishare par
To kashti hi duba dunga

Naye rangon ki ek duniya
Siyaah-e-dil se bana dunga

[by Siyaah]
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An earlier attempt at a musalsal ghazal - a somewhat unusual theme and state of being - finally had the courage to post.

What Does A Bomb Know? - Manzar Bhopali

On a somewhat different note than usual, I am compelled to note Manzar Bhopali's commentary on the times. Manzar's forte is his ability to have a finger on the pulse of the people - touching upon the issues of the day, conveyed often through simple words using popular imagery. His mellifluous recitations always add a haunting effect- listen to this one here (third link). I have transcribed and translated one part of the poem below.


Bum Ko Kya Maaloom?
[By Manzar Bhopali]

Koi bhi mehfooz nahi hai, phoot rahe hain bum
Jaane kab ho jaaye kisi ka taara raara rum

Kaun hai hindu kaun musalmaan bum ko kya maaloom
Kaun hai sindhi kaun muhaajir bum ko kya maaloon
Aashiq ho, mehbooba ho, ya ho koi maasoom- bum ko kya maaloom
Bum kya jaane rishte naate, bum kya jaane ghum

Jaane kab ho jaaye kisi ka taara raara rum


What Does a Bomb Know?
[Translated from the Urdu by Siyaah]

No one is safe, all around burst bombs-
Who knows when anyone of us will be gone?

Who is a hindu, who is a muslim - what does a bomb know?
Who is a native, who is an immigrant - what does a bomb know? [1]
A lover, a beloved or an innocent - what does a bomb know?
What does a bomb know of relationships and friendships - what does a bomb know of grief?

Who knows when anyone of us will be gone?


[1] I have used the general word 'native' to contrast with 'immigrant' - the use of 'sindhi' and 'muhaajir' in the original points towards one of the post-partition problems of South Asia - the integration problems of immigrants in Pakistan, but the theme is general.

Tanhaai

Khwaab ki tarah bikhar jaane ko jee chaahta hai
Aisi tanhaai ke mar jaane ko jee chaahta hai
[Iftikhar Arif]

To shatter like a dream, I wish
Such loneliness- that to die, I wish
[Translated by Siyaah]

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Not much more to say these days.

Is Dard Se...

Is dard se nejaat paaun to kaise
Waapas ab us duniya mein jaaun to kaise... [1]

Abhi tak tumhaara khwaab meri aankhon mein hai
Main apna sab kuchh chhorh jaaun to kaise...

Main khush hoon bohot, pareshaan hoon bohot
Apni haalat tumhein samjhaaun to kaise...

Main kuchh bhi sochun tum aa jaate ho khayaalon mein
Khayaalon ke is jaal ko ab suljhaaun to kaise...

Tumhi the chaand, tumhi suraj, tumhi taaron ka falak
Din raat main ab apne bachaaun to kaise... [5]

Tum aaye the to yaad aaya tha ke zindaa hoon main
Ab zindagi ke mai'ne phir se bhulaaun to kaise...

Khushiyon ki horh mein hai har koi mubtelaa
Kamzarfon ko gham apne dikhaaun to kaise... [7]

Lo kehne laga phir se kuchh sher Siyaah
Ab hosh mein main aaun to kaise... [8]

[by Siyaah]


[1]nejaat: escape, to become free of (especially hardships)
[5]falak: celestial sphere, sky, also used for orbit, which gives this couplet a nice touch with reference to day and night in the second verse
[7]mubtelaa: deeply involved, especially in misfortune, misery, difficulties...thus bringing out the irony here with 'khushiyon ki...'
kamzarf: literally, those with less wit, capability, elegance, beauty
[8] Siyaah is used here as a takhallus, and could also be read as a characteristic of the sher...both interpretations connect to the last verse.