Lets Hum Along

The bus stopped in that ghost village in the middle of nowhere, the name of the village was Chillas, somewhere in the midst of the bosom of a rugged barren mountainous terrain. I wanted to slide open the window of the bus but dust got into my eyes and nose making it impossible to breathe and see after a while.

I distinctly recall that being blinded by the scorching sun rays and choking on at least a handful of glacier sand, I found a small firefly ignite somewhere deep within me, being cupped ever so gently by an uplifting sense of presence. The presence of my being.

I closed my eyes as my heart filled with a warm glow that had ignited a profound idea, that somewhere down the road, there will be no sandstorms to clog my throat and if I get lucky I might wake up next morning to find myself lying in a boat gliding upon clear turquoise waters and a puff of air would carry cherry blossom petals along.

Surging Bliss

She drew out the penknife that she carried in her bag in a most calm manner, but the fiery furnace of her warm brown eyes gave away the love she felt right at that moment for her year old son who was bundled warmly and sat plopped like a boulder in some Japanese garden, acting like the ying to her yang.

She cut the apple into small slices and handed it to him one by one.

Gul was so oblivious of her surroundings that she might as well have been sitting on the side of a busy road than the bustling airport terminal.

Looking at him, her heart surged with exploding bliss while she smiled down at him.

Climb On

Her eyes were welled up with tears. She couldn’t see clearly as to where she was going. The wind slapped her tear stained cheeks as she tried to wipe her nose on the grubby sleeve of her sweater than had changed from a bright red to a dull crimson, as that of clotted blood sprinkled by dust. Her loose bun loosened more as she climbed her. Strands of chocolate brown hair swashed against her face every now and the. Her straight, pointy nose was red at the tip from the chill in the air and the storm that howled inside of her. Her foot slipped as the gradient of the hill got steeper. She slid down a foot or two as she tried grabbing on to the earth, pulling out tufts of grass while making an attempt and managing to get quite an amount of the sweet deep brown earth stuck in between her fingernails as well as into the herringbone knit of her sweater’s sleeve.

She saw a bit of a rugged rock jutting out, covered with moss. She pulled herself on top of it, her feet dangling down into the air. She stared straight into the sky thickened with layers upon layers of clouds. The tears had dried up by now, her heart had calmed down a bit too. She picked up a daisy from a bunch that grew on her right, next to the rock. Closed her eyes lightly and brought the flower right under her nose. One could see her taking the scent in. and she thought to herself. “All in all, today went by well!”

Asha smiled to herself as the wind sang her a silent sweet melody. A smile that said: come what may, I’ll make it through one way or the other.

Puddles and Stories

She wasn’t born on a bleak January night and it wasn’t pouring either, but that’s how she liked to imagine it was when she was born.

The sun had just set. A faint hint of an orange tinge in the horizon showed that the sun was here a while back. The air was heavy with moisture and everything seemed pregnant, the air pregnant with moisture, the horizon pregnant with the on setting night and Zinnia pregnant with her baby. Pregnant to the point that it all seemed ready to brim over any minute. Partially it was Zinnia’s imagination and partially it all was true, because that’s how monsoons in Lahore make one feel anyway, especially one who is not accustomed to the uninvited guest that the weather like playing the role of.

She poked her finger into the ground, turning it by bending the lower bit into an L. she seemed to be looking for something in there. She took out the finger that had turned all muddy with the monsoon rain lazily pattered away as if it had all the time in the world and whispered to her between the plip and the plop, “This isn’t your land, this isn’t your story.”

Cursing Her Memory

She blew into the straw pipe.  A glint and flicker in her eyes showed how happy she was. She looked at him, sitting beside her. His perfect smile and the sound of his hearty laughter taking her into a different realm. She broke off from the world around her and went to her own oblivious, floating world, just for a split second and thinking to herself, that if she could, she would treasure this smile and laughter and place it in a trinket in her memory as to never forget it. Little did she know that, she would, in the future, forget. She would blame herself and cry till her throat ran dry and the streaks of tear-stains would become so excessive on her face that they were hardly detectable. She just had to wait to see that day. The day she would swan dive a million times in a limbo created by her own thoughts.

Smile a Crooked Smile

Skip a step. Whistle a song even if you are pathetic at whistling or humming songs. I know the sweat is trickling down the nape of your neck, but who cares. you have now and whats more beautiful than now? To tell you the truth, nothing. So sing that happy song that plays in your head whenever you look at your childhood photo albums.Smile at that stranger on the street from your way back home from work. I know its been a tough day at work, but cheer up sweetychums because this day, this wind blowing in your hair,  the birds chirping in the twilight, nothing is going to be there again. Its all here. Its all now. Its all happening.

My Bleak Remains

You said I need not worry as long as you are around. The smile on your face and that confidence in your tone was all i needed at times. You were the best friend I could ever have had and yet more than that. I don’t know how to classify that “more”. But I’m aware that you were that. 

You aren’t around anymore. So the things you said I need not worry about as long as you are around, seem scarier to deal with while you are absent in person.

It all seems a little bleak now. Like a fake plastic world with fake plastic houses and hollow empty people that have keys in their backs to make them march around in an almost zombified manner. A world that’s fake like the tawdry flowers you see at a carnival made of cloth and even the corners are tethered and worn with all the black rain that continuously keeps pouring down, making these flowers that were once still acceptable to the eye just a mere props whose sight is now nauseating in itself.

I miss you. Not in the manner the word suggests. But like a gradual leprosy that’s overtaking me. Slowly, gnawing and chewing at the corners of my remains.