A Night Of Despair

IT was quarter past twelve. I was reading Orhan Pamuk while taking sips of Lipton tea, when my younger sister entered my room with index finger placed across her lips and her eyes quite wide, as she conversed her silence into words, it took me a jiffy to hear her humming sound; “It is an Army cordon outside; turn the lights off”. Following the instruction, I put my book and half filled goblet of tea on the night stand. We both looked sneakily through the windowpane and the street lights in the dark served us the ring of soldiers patrolling the streets. An uneasy calmness had engulfed the atmosphere with only the soldiers’ murmurs breaking the quiet of the night. I saw some cops were alert while a few of them smoking cigarettes, one on phone call and another resting against the electrical pole. As if they were waiting for someone’s arrival.

None was aware of the reason behind the cordon. My Dad’s cousin had buzzed him revealing the army personnel have barricaded the entire village. Instead of pleasant sleep night brought the ordeal alarm. The tension deprived every eye of the sleep and the horror left folks miserable. Everyone was anxiously waiting for their departure, so that they could sleep in the remaining portion of night. But a big thanks to our street dogs it didn't happen the way people wished.

My grandfather once told me that in the times of my adolescence, they had witnessed such nights frequently. Crackdowns and cordons were a routine be it during the day or night. They never slept during many such nocturnal raids. Someday night would pass atrociously while at times; it would bring a half fractured sleep into one’s eyes. It’s not so nightmarish now to witness cordons or raids as we are used to these experiences. They don’t terrify people to that much extent. In those times they would barge in the houses. They would keep families even the female folks and infants outside in the teeth chattering cold during the night hours; they would even beat people especially the youth without any justification.

From the past tyrannical times, the bone-chilling incident of Kunan-Pushpora is another case in point. Where a night like this one passed and took everything away of people. Where files of justice are still waiting to get unleash. Where every eye is moist, every heart numb, every mind restless. Where people still struggling to let justice prevail. Where the regime has always miserably failed to meet the demands of people; where people are alone left to suffer.

It was quarter to two when the voices abruptly arose outside. We awfully peeped through window glasses. There was an array of soldiers coming down the alley leaving past our house and then neighbors. A spark of relief reigned on our faces. The rest of night passed away with a mixture of feelings – sleep and obsession. Obsession of past despotic nights and the one I witnessed.

Next morning came. The stories about night started surfacing regarding someone’s abduction and much more. On that particular day, while waiting outside the bakers’ shop I happened to listen to a dozen of old men and women talking about the hot topic – “last night’s cordon”. An old wrinkled woman addressing the another person “Mea booz Ramzanun qayoom chuk nemut rattith” while the latter responded in a low voice “ Hatai naai, dapaan hey kem’taan che easmech kastaen mukhbirii karmech”. I took the bread and left.

My valley has been witnessing such horrific nights for decades; when it lost its chastity and glory. When it witnessed bloodshed and wailed. When it suffered and complained. These suffering are so long and pitiless.


A version of this article also appeared in printed edition of daily kashmir reader on 30 April- 2015, http://www.kashmirreader.com/a-night-of-despair/

She Was Always There For Me.

The Noble Quran has illustrated it this way “Every soul shall have a taste of death”

SAIDA: The immortal love of my soul and the ravishing memory of my heart. Whose inestimable attachment, heed and warmth of love came to an end was Almighty’s most beautiful and priceless endowment to me. For I will – Certainly I will always crave [badly] for her companionship and in no doubt will always be deprive of – because I’ll never get my Granny back into my life for I had laid her for rest in the eternal space – GRAVE, and the universe is too weak and worthless to bear such a phenomenal soul anew and I – too dimwit to put her on a lone paper.

By Allah I ain’t in my sanity and I have no guts to express that moment when I was taking her to her last abode on my shoulder, inside a livid coffin, wrapped in a colorless garb and holding bulk of tears back into my eyes was extremely hard job I had done ever in my life. I was merely reminiscing those old-gold & beautiful moments I cherished with her. I was musing and musing over her fathomless and invaluable love and care which shall never rain on me for a second time. And POMPOSH will wither away – how can it flourish when the gardener is lifeless.

With Granny I have had an emotional attachment [that’ll last forever], be it sharing things, my studies, my shopping and other daily stuffs I would never do it without bringing her up to date about what the matter be and of course she would habitually irritate me by examining it more than a scientist would examine his or her creation for last spin. My beloved Granny you were the shining star in my seclude life. Your demise has left a great void in me, in my heart and in my life. It has depopulated my world. Phew! Who will examine those things now? Who will take care of my belongings? Who will irritate, love and nurture me like you did? Who?  – – – – NOBODY! And it hurts like anything when I think about you.

“Waloo haa nigaaro be haawai jigar
Tahas gow mea balaa,
mea maa leg’h khabar”

 I Love You [APPA] my Mother, my undying Love. I Love You so – so much, beyond the limits of infinity. I Love You more than my fractured words can convey. And I swear by Allah that your Son will turn that every dream you knit for me in a reality. May your beautiful soul flourish in heavenly spaces! I will miss you forever.

Cheerless Portrait

(I)

In this winter like spell
a ravine splits the foothills
this rain invites melancholy
to her home
where her babies
crying in starvation.
In search of chow
mother
nomadic – akin
from hill to hill
from bough to bough
in spite of food every time
with bare jaws and beak
holding the false hope
of continued existence.

(II)

The dull sheets of sky
sends the deluge of pitiless drops
lessening on the fresh daisies –
spangled grassy knoll
on the deadly boughs of fallen tree
passing life to its naked roots.
Where this feeble mother
with finite sufferings
rests a jiffy
and croons
to her creator
the refrain of severance
and the searing pain
emerging from her eyes.

(III)

From some corner
she too writes to me
the yarn of downpour
disturbed the fine slant
of her nearby hillock
and the shore of striking creek
running past her home.

She writes to me
with a lump in her throat
drawing her deciphered musings
and fighting back her tears
scrawling on a drenched paper
the brutal tale of deluge.

From the smeared shore of Jhelum
she writes;
the fluctuating
distance of filthy water
and the frozen eyes of fishermen.
She writes;
temple chants the hymn
after the bell’s every boom.

She further writes to me
the yarn of 2nd oppressor.
She writes it never warns
it visits you in the dark
akin to First one
and leaves your corpse
in the lanes of neighbor
it departs you
damped not in blood
but
fairly in ruthless water.

(IV)

To the spring I beseeched
come Oh spring
and convey life to my demised vale.
To its distressed folks
explicate the riddle of ecstasy.

Out of suffering and extreme ruin
come and attire my land
in apparels of arresting beauty.

Come and visit my perished paradise
its glum gardens
and foul brooks.
Come and heal the scene of desolation
Come and cease this growing rift
of man and nature. 

If Ever

If ever you talk to your soul
 It speaks of life and death
 And the tales of severance.
It speaks about you.
The uncanny you carry along.

If ever u get to listen to silence
It sings soothing chorus.
It speaks of the nature.
It speaks so beautifully.

If ever you watch tides
They rise and low
They come and go
How to love, they show.

If ever you listen to night
It whispers through twinkling stars
Through moon it smile on dark.

If ever you smell the breaking dawn
 It smells delicious.
It travels through dark pavements
so to bring the day.
It articulates through light.
Ahead of mountains it leaves the night.

If ever you snoop on a grave
It speaks horror
and the tale of unbridled slumber.
It speaks about the deeds and fallouts
It speaks about ail and aid.

And
If ever you pay attention to my Kashmir.
It'll speak to you through million tears.
Of whispering nights
and curfewed days.
Of her bruised bosom
and crimson lap.
Of her sunken eyes
and beloved people.
It'll sing you her agonizing lullabies,
And elegies for her martyrs.It'll sing you the slogans of FREEDOM.

The Phenomenal Woman

From the moment I have stepped onto the threshold of this dusty planet to gradual maturity, in addition to numerous blessings, God has laid his hands on me with a fringe-benefit in the unique shape of my maternal Granny. To the best of my recollection, I have always found this wrinkled woman with me exactly in the manner we carry breaths inside our bosom; holding me in her luxurious lap, singing lullabies to me in the times of melancholy, washing my soiled stuff, taking care of my belongings and narrating bed-time tales of Shal-kak and Hemaal – something, at least in what I believe, the luckiest grandson on this earth.

The amount of her love I have felt myself engrossed in is simply irreplaceable. She is the treasure in the cradle of life, a kind word uttered to me by deity, a star from the heaven, a droplet to drown my child-like thirst, even as I have grown through many summers now. It feels like God has used her rib to create me like Eve was created from Adam’s rib. It feels like I’m the fruit and she is the forbidden tree and nobody shall detach us.

Not only to me but all around she has remained eternally nice, sympathetic and ready to lend a hand to the deprived folks, to her fellow citizens, to every needy person who comes her way. A very plain, down to earth lady who had no extravagances – only fathomless necessities, I can still reverie in my head that in the catastrophic times how she would conceal her glumness behind the wide smiles.

After every dreadful moment she would assure her family that God will consider her every sacrifice and tear yonder – while rolling her eyes heavenward – he will bless us with fortitude and aid. Being unlettered woman, she would occasionally preach like a thinker, “and whosoever suffers the obstacles while fulfilling the responsibilities handed over by him [God]; whosoever plant tears in his [God’s] way will harvest smiles”.

In her wise counsels, one goes like this “never get afraid if you fall short in one subject it doesn’t mean you failed your life, conquer and triumph over all the hardships of life, they will enrich your strength that will assist you to complete the voyage of life. My prayers are with you my son”.

Besides my mother and the rest of affectionate members, granny has gifted me with a pair of lovely women –maternal aunts; who have had nurtured me like a monarch, who have endured my every bitter nature, who have taught me the world and the life we breathe within its confines. My granny would be the cause behind all my victories – more than for myself, I have always wanted to win for her.

In her mid-sixties now – the once energetic and lively woman, has now been enduring with a brain tumor, the extra mass the family would never have imagined she would need to carry one day. Doctors seem to have given up, medicines go ineffective, and prayers –bunch of which she once showered on everybody – also seem to be going unheard.

This unkind malady is dragging her towards the door of death and I’m standing here unarmed before God’s will. It feels like my world is falling apart gradually and I can do nothing to prevent the arrival of an impending catastrophe.

I have neither any courage nor any strength to give in return something to a woman from whom I have always been receiving, without questions asked, which is why I am penning down this half-penny’s worth write-up, an outburst of intertwined emotions, as a tribute to the only gracious woman who has been in my life. I still have faith in prayers, yours might help. Do please pray for us

A version of this article was also published on the print edition of Greater Kashmir on Friday 13 March 2015, http://www.greaterkashmir.com/news/2015/Mar/13/my-ever-loving-and-caring-granny-15.asp

Nocturnal Melody

The night begets,
the melodious pitter-patter
of rain - a mercy
the bald moon
sent shadows beyond,
the dark mountains and
melancholy to earth;
and disappears
behind the fleet of clouds.



Etching the lines of irk,
on the fine surface
of star-spangled firmament;
resigning to its fate
that couldn't glitter
the braids of night.



Moon laughs at night
and men
in the shattered houses
on the hearthrug,
facing the glum hearth.
And the sheen of,
half burned candle -
dances on their dismayed faces.



Envy of rain
moon;
as droplets raise the Jhelum
night befriends dark
and moon remains alone.

Vulgarity Of Indian Cinema

Being a Kashmiri and member of a self-effacing and religious family, I have always found it ill at ease and uncomfortable to watch movies with elders. Gone are the days when parents had no objection in watching movies with their children just for a change. With the intolerable increase of western exposure in Hindi movies, it has become achingly complex for us to accept anything like these that is served in the name of entertainment.

The depiction of blatant and disgraceful scenes of indecency in Indian movies is highly nerve-racking. Such scenes, whether or not the story demands them, are dovetailed at every peculiar place. Whole crew feels that their film shall thrive only by a liberal inclusion of scanty-clad actresses in all kinds of crude ways. On account of this most of the Indian movies are proliferated with disgustingly lewd scenes and are utterly indecent for mass screening. The behavior of producers and directors in Indian cinema of making money at the cost of our social and cultural ethics is indeed objectionable.

Indian cinema is making bad impression on our society and is a great reason behind the engulfing rise in rape and murder cases by contaminating the sensibility of youngsters. The incessant unravel of decency by Indian cinema has corralled the youngsters in the vibes of negativity. It is rare now to find films based on any cultural and intellectual notion through which one may get to acquire something good from.

The onus is on Indian cinema to encourage and educate the youth about their ethical and cultural beliefs, values of life and the status of woman rather to discourage them by never-ending interpretation of vulgarity every time. It should highlight cultural, religious and moral values and way of life so as to spread positive instead of negative vibes, so that our modern generation can come to know the basic values of being in the human life.

And at last, if we are serious about to give woman respect and to treat her the way she justify to be treated, all an Indian cinema has to do is just to illustrate these immodest scenes and violence in such a manner that it should seem hateful rather than glorious.

A version of this article was also published in the print edition of Daily Kashmir Monitor on Friday, 13 February 2015