Illustration by Suhail Naqshbandi.
subuh
get news
from the baker’s
secretly open,
smoky
gash of a shop,
between
old groaning homes
girddeh are hot,
newspapers cold
and only good
for packing pickle—
essential reading in Kashmir
are the epitaphs
..
peshinn
walk the festering road
keep watch with one good eye
the pellet-blinded
is painful, shut—
with the empty hand
shoo the flies
that mistake
your wounds
for a meal
try
to get home alive
guns cocked,
soldiers in the streets
are rooted,
where Chinars stood once
..
diggar
again, no azaan
sigh—watch from afar
hungry pigeons
garland the Khankah spire
ashen, hopeful still—
waiting for worshippers
bringing dried corn,
when the curfew lifts
if ever—
...
shaam
wonder if Zoon
is still a Kashmiri?
no longer a subject
of the state
but she is a forever friend
to the valley skies
and eyes that watch from below
Zoon lights the waters of Dal
made dark by the calls
of those butchered
on the hill
and thrown in the Jehlum
stones tied to their feet
there are cries growing louder—
heard clearer in the twilight
hear—
.
khoftan
dreading dinner
mother, has again cooked
a favorite—
phohar maaz with dried turnips
and garlic she grew herself
sizzling in the mustard oil
she dreams a meal still—
with. every. one.
with. every. one.
on her dastarkhaan
please let her—
.
qayam
it has been a year
of plague, tyranny, locusts,
floods and angry seas
in Kashmir it feels no different
than the one past—
enter the existential battle
with curses, stones,
poems, and prayers
[prayers are open-eyed dreams of the oppressed]
never stop,
even if grandfather
was killed praying—
hold on
to the wings
of dead butterflies
they are safe in old books of meaning,
beyond fragile, beyond beautiful,
luminous portal to Chinars
standing tall, bowing,
their lush branches
in subhuk gaash
on the other side of the war
