Some random artwork

I took photos of a few more art pieces by my brother, Syed Tufail Taab. Hope they’re worth a look.

Writing Haiku

Below here are a few random attempts at writing haiku, courtesy the inspiration from a few nice fellows at DWL.

1)
Alone in Isloo;
I enjoy the company
of mom in mardan

2)
Nineteen, forty five;
a generation lost
on a spur of rage

3)
Worshiping haiku,
we count on our fingertips
seventeen syllables

4)
Gigantic egos,
collide in futile battles,
relations suffer.

Ghalib

پرتو خور سے ہے شبنم کو فنا کی تعلیم

ہم بھی ہیں ایک عنایت کی نظر ہونے تک

A single glance of favor, nothing much, O’ my lady luck!!

Life

Of all the great definitions of life brought up by many a great mind, the one that truly manifests it is short like the life itself which says, ‘it ends’. However, the enormity of trials and tribulations one suffers makes one wonder as to how come they fit into the tiniest of times an average human is allowed to spend here.

Domestic worker Shazia lived a small chunk of an average human life but the marks on her tortured body revealed an agony well beyond her 13 years.

We are largely a race of myopic merry makers, blissful in our escapism, tut-tutting phrases like, ‘life is an ice-cream; enjoy it before it melts’

The death of word, verse and dream

The malaise sat into my senses and trickled exactly into the lacunae left by the departed dreams. Now I feel I’d shortly bid adieu to whatever remaining links I have with the world. I feel like I have been living whatever Mr. Moeen Nizami said in the words below;

Hamaray lafz

aaghaz e marasim may tau kuch ma’soom say logo’n ko

bayhad achay lagtay thay

na janay in may kya kya tha, buhut mashoor kun thay woh

magar woh lafz jhootay thay, unhay tauqeer kya milti.

Hamaray shaer aaghaz e marasim may tau kuch ma’soom say logo’n ko

bayhad achay lagtay thay

woh dil darya kay mauti thay, adab may ghair mamooli izafa thay

magar woh shaer khotay thay, inhay ta’seer kya milti.

Hamaray khawb, aaghaz e marasim may tau kuch ma’soom say logon ko

bayhad achay lagtay thay

magary woh khawb andhay thay

inhay ta’beer kya milti.

Yeh anjam e marasim kay marahil hai’n

shikast e lafz o shaer o khawb kay yeh dil garifta aayeenay dil kay muqabil hai’n

Islamic Calligraphy

My brother recently worked on em. I thought to share it with you people.

An Exercise III

Here the theme is Parallax with I having all the liberty in the world to use whatever words I can. But all I am able to conjure are these ordinary lines below. I’ve promised to myself to try out the theme with some other interpretation, but for now I have all it is.

what was the point, then
to lionize

my pale,frail,filthy frame

to that of a man
for all the seasons
of love

when you gazed upon me
from a point of no return
through the scarlet
shades of what
ran in your veins,

only to distance to
a place where all
that were sought were
golden returns,
by investing sentiments.

Distances sure make
one require lenses to see;
gilded in your case.

An Exercise II

The theme is Mirror(s) and the words to use are Stall(ed), Plaque, Grille, Stellate, Scar and Daylight. The concept is rather tricky for me to keep a consistency with especially to incorporate in it the mentioned words but I shouldn’t whine as long as it helps me un-knot my mind. So here’s the attempt I came up with. Your suggestions are welcomed.

There’s no complexity here;
we’re no more than a few animates
and a handful of cosmic granules
juxtaposed in the recurrence
of eternal themes,
manipulated by the shades
of divine incandescence.

The Sun tries in vain
to whitewash its pain
in broad daylight that is
imprinted in scars
on the countenance of Moon.

There have always been men
having stellates in their chests
whose glow show paths
to many a lost tribe.

My father fixed his eyes
in those of the eternity
but the dusk drank up the light.
Now I’m transfixed to the plaque
of his memories
as I stare deep
into the looking-glass of time.

Its been the same fire
grilling us forever.
You’ve stalled to admit,
but I know it all;
we’re blind yet we can see
ourselves through the eyes
of Farhad and Shireen.

An Exercise

Cav is generous in help and I’m indebted for his gesture. He gave me a theme of ‘memory’ with words like ‘grove’ ‘midgets/midges’ ‘tingle’ ‘dusk’ and ‘window’ to be used in the development of a concept. I tried it abliet with a frozen mind resisting to unshackle and came up with a raw, rushed up (I wasn’t hastened, though) story. Here it is. It will be shaped, reshaped and even written off, in light of you people’s suggestions.

Sitting poles apart

in his cozy room

he would crave to be

a part of the scence

when he’d watch

on his tv screen,

the glistening Himalayan peaks

kissing the Indus-blue cheeks

of the sky that would blush

into all the possible hues.

As if a speck of a mettle

enchanted towards a gigantic magnet

he found himself moving

towards the mountaneous range.

Standing at the feet

of the Nanga Purbut

he was a midget

filled with the naivete

to surmount love.

Pinching the body

of the slumbering beast

he crawled up

unaware of the pitfalls

waiting under the sheets

of white snow.

The arrival of dusk

emboldened the air

that lanced through

his mountaineering gear

as he was tingled

before being gobbled

by a cavernous hole.

It all happened in a trice;

his body writhed like a fish

in protest of decption,

his heart blissed out

and froze like that

of the beloved

and his mind rolled

in a backward motion

showing him the glimpse

of his wife sitting across

the window pane

staring deep at the

grove where they’d play

hide and seek.

Rambling …

As dryness prevails with no clouds in sights or those roaming the skies are bereft of moisture, I cannot fish for ideas in the erstwhile pool of imagination, for it is long sucked by the intensity of times. So, I decide to set out on a ramble towards nothingness, than waiting in futility for something non existent. I wander about in the vast expanse of the Writers Block when my eyes catch a glimpse of something shimmering, ‘Ah, thats it, move on lest it fades!’. And it fades the moment I reach there. In this wilderness I’ve found good allies in mirages; they play games with me. But like every other game this game has to end and I dont want to be a loser. I’ve already have my hands full of emptiness. I better make some rain that will fill the pools of my imagination where fish of different ideas will brood to give me a choice to catch ideas from.

P.S: ‘Fishing for ideas in a pool’ is something I heard from Cav