Someone's Gone Today

Someone's gone today, left the earth
And here I am, writing this poem

Nothing's changed much, the world's still passing by
Someone's gone today, left the earth

His atoms have been displaced
His existence left to trace

Someone's gone today, left the earth
And here I am, writing this poem.

If I Die Young

If I die young

Lower me into the ground with care

My soul should have left the body by then

But the limbs that guarded me

And the shoulders that made my spine up righted

in self-righteous confidence

Will be honored even in death

If I die young

Check my internals to see if my heart still breathes

and my lungs still expand like the flutter of a butterfly's first flight

My life has ended

But my heart still breathes

Maybe for someone, hanging on the brink of death

 

If I die young 

Wipe my family's tears with a song

I'm in a better place now

I'm in my Lord's arms, rocked by the never-ending lullaby into sleep

Tell my family, that life less body they saw

that's not me, it has never been me

The me had always been cocooned, only for Allah to see 

If I die young

Look up at the sky tonight

and say a little prayer for me

We'll meet again soon, very soon

In the eternal bliss of sunshine.

BLACK INK

Sprayed across my white wall was the blood of the boy they killed, hanging in shiny goblets threatening to break away and drop. Drop all over the red carpet in stabbing never ending rivers. It was ink. It touched my toe, just a fraction of a nail and I saw it was black. Mixed with the tears of the mother who won't, who can't stop crying at the son who smiled and laughed and never hurt anybody. Who would cry when he saw a puppy in pain. The black ink was mixed with the sweat of the father, dripping in oceans of rivers, as he worked hard to enter the dollar into his son's education. But the only dollar he entered was paying the grave digger to dig his child's last haven. A proper goodbye to a death nobody gives a shit about.

And why should they? One less nigga in the world, that's what'll come out of their moths, tongues lolling dangerously in filaments of lies and ignorance. The world is black, blacker than ever. The sky is shining. It is more lighter than the black inkiness they have in their hearts. No one ain't black or white. Deep down inside they're all black and they know it. They lie about it 'cuz they don't wanna be black, just a nigger in a soulless world.

I wish, I just wish I could scrape off everyone's skins and replace ourselves with what makes us humans. Bones and muscles. Nerves and Arteries. The blood rushing at the speed of sound. No one can argue at the colour of each other's blood. We're all red.

These skins, I'll burn 'em, destroy them, delete them. After all, we don't really need them to cover up our feelings. We ourselves cover them up, loading them onto a train leaving for Timbuktu in 15 minutes flat.
Those skins, I can hear them calling. No Black. No White. Just human.

The Dance In The Morning

I woke up to the sound of my alarm bell ringing rhythmic bells of morning

My feet kissed the ground in a touch of surrender, the electricity resounding from the caves within

Today is another day, to hurl the way
through the streets, lost in the sea of faces
So ordinary
Only my colour, beating in resounding waves is compatible
with the rest of me
Dancing through life like a shining sunbeam.

SKIN

When you hear someone say

Yes I have a family

They're great

I have a momma and a pops

and a sister who's always on top

in her class, in the F-A-M-I-L-Y

And there's a grandmother, a thousand feet old

and my pop's sister, who doesn't seem like a sister

More like a best friend

And the circle is completed by a cat

A black cat, ironically

You wonder, what does it mean

To go to a house filled with laughter and joy

To light and blood

mixed into the arteries of ours

Family spelled O-W-N

To own what is yours and never letting go

It is a circle of trust and love

sharing the same last name by the bonds of hemoglobin

stretching the ligaments in the skin

The same skin, worn throughout the centuries that passed us by

When someone cannot remember their great grandparents names

It is indeed a great sorrow

For the people that you call your own

You have somehow forgotten

To leash them onto the string of your amygdala

And remember, try to remember

The mothers that gave birth to a generation

by pain and contracting one second later

Family spelled H-A-N-D-S

Holding each other tightly, curved into a tight bond of Hey, you have my nose

Or her eyes are indeed her dad's

The brownness of the pupil is reflected

By all the people who share

and care, for their futures together

Family spelled W-O-N-D-E-R-F-U-L

There can never be another

No matter how many times you sit down with people

Of the same skin and talk same talks

But the blood flowing in undercurrents under the century-old skin

can never be replaced

By any other place

Family is spelled M-I-N-E

MICHAEL

Michael
I cannot believe you are gone
I first saw you when I was six
my mind ready to disregard all the infamous chatterings
uttered by the giants in my life
But when my eyes finally laid rest on your skillful skeleton of wonders
I could hardly digest you

It took time, the digestion
You were too large a prodigy to swallow in one gulp
Your limbs, as if dipped in the magical waters would come to life
electrified by the rhythmic motions of your cerebellum
leading your feet to their impossible destination

At that time, my six year old mind was only mature enough to call you an 'American'
What would I have known of the disease that plagued your insides, dissolving the person you were supposed to be
I thought you were ashamed of being black, that you had somehow reduced the melanin in your skin to thin tiny goblets splattered onto the wall as your nose grew thinner and thinner

But I was not convinced
The rugae lining the insides of my stomach knew it was being protected by the fearsome acid in my stomach
But the words 'Vitiligo' seemed to pass in front of my eyes at the speed of light, travelling through the islands of ignorance until these eight letters registered into the grey matter of my brain, exploding at the speed of firing neurons

You were proud to be black, you made us feel proud of ourselves
To have an enigma, the dancing man belong to us
Be one of us

But alas, death beckoned one day and took you for his own
Your music's still here
Your dance moves? Everyone's copying them nowadays
But what made you YOU is somehow lost in the gaps between the silences of your words, forever.

Heart

Yesterday I saw
a pigeon and a crow
sitting on the edge
of my window ledge
in perfect harmony of peace
they continued to enjoy each others
pleasant company
Why can't it be the same with humans?
The beings Allah created to be superior
Our status in the hierarchy is supreme
like the specks of stars glittered in the night sky

Yesterday I saw a black man applying for a job
His skin shining like polished marble with his confident aura
of education and simplicity
His resume, I did look at
was like the earth, whose light the moon steals to light up like a lamp

He did not get the job
His color was noticed, discussed in pieces
It was too dark to read his resume

On Saturday, I saw a beautiful black woman ask for a doughnut
And the man looked at her and went
"Sorry, we're all out"
And I could spy seven  doughnuts all ready to be bought and eaten
The woman took out some money and said," Look I can pay for a single doughnut "
And the man looked at her money and shook his head
in a perfect symmetry of discrimination and prejudice

Today I saw a lady, carrying her first child in her belly
like a proud woman with a full hammock
A black man asked for some money
To which she shook her head in a perfect symmetry of racial hate
I could imagine that woman thinking, my child is going to become a surgeon
Or a lawyer or a famous writer
Oh, how I wanted to shake her up and tell her
Lady, if you keep doing what you just did
Your child is going to become a racist
who will break someones heart someday just like
you broke that poor black man's heart

The pigeon and the crow
are still sitting
on the edge of my ledge
in great triangles of yins and yangs
They are not fighting
nor are they judging
They are animals, as some may sneer
Above all our indecent idiosyncrasies
If we could get an X-ray of a racist
I'm sure it would be seen black and carcinogenic
with the malignancy of hate
And no matter how much chemo you give to this cancer patient
The days of cure are way behind him

The Sea Creatures

It's hard to imagine life under water, a place I've never been to before except for the beaches, leaving small traces of that blue substance after it's been washed away. When ever someone mentions water, all I can imagine is the cool trickling of the river onto the rocks or the deep blue sea but only from a distance.

What happens underneath, I've read a lot. Sharks whisking their tails, the clown fish swimming in a perfect symmetry around the anemone, the dark liquid squirted by the octopus. But what is happening right now, while I'm sitting in my room, my feet resting on the floor, mere inches away from the fresh glass of water I've set out for my cat.

Maybe, the sea is calm, with whispers of sudden mist arising from the top. Maybe there's a battle going on right.this.second. The eels vs the puffer fish. Or the Hammerhead's vs the Great White. One can only imagine.

When I was 5 years old, I saw a sea anemone on the television. I thought it was an animal, a dark and dangerous one like so many others in the deep crevices of the sea floor. My mother told me it was a plant. Just a plant, I laughed at my Neanderthal self. To think a plant would scare me! Later many years ago, I realized, the sea anemone was really alive.

In the water, the fish swim about pleasantly. A stingray passes them by, straddling small purple creatures, on its back. A mother shark is giving birth to a baby that will one day devour ten people near the coast of Karachi. The vulpine sea floor gives off a charming glow. It is silent.

Here's another one by Sarah Kay and by god, it's the most beautiful piece of poetry there ever will be.


 “When they bombed Hiroshima, the explosion formed a mini-supernova, so every living animal, human or plant that received direct contact with the rays from that sun was instantly turned to ash. 

And what was left of the city soon followed. The long-lasting damage of nuclear radiation caused an entire city and its population to turn into powder. 

When I was born, my mom says I looked around the whole hospital room with a stare that said, "This? I've done this before." She says I have old eyes.

When my Grandpa Genji died, I was only five years old, but I took my mom by the hand and told her, "Don't worry, he'll come back as a baby." 

And yet, for someone who's apparently done this already, I still haven't figured anything out yet. 

My knees still buckle every time I get on a stage. My self-confidence can be measured out in teaspoons mixed into my poetry, and it still always tastes funny in my mouth. 

But in Hiroshima, some people were wiped clean away, leaving only a wristwatch or a diary page. So no matter that I have inhibitions to fill all my pockets, I keep trying, hoping that one day I'll write a poem I can be proud to let sit in a museum exhibit as the only proof I existed. 

My parents named me Sarah, which is a biblical name. In the original story God told Sarah she could do something impossible and she laughed, because the first Sarah, she didn't know what to do with impossible. 

And me? Well, neither do I, but I see the impossible every day. Impossible is trying to connect in this world, trying to hold onto others while things are blowing up around you, knowing that while you're speaking, they aren't just waiting for their turn to talk -- they hear you. They feel exactly what you feel at the same time that you feel it. It's what I strive for every time I open my mouth -- that impossible connection. 

There's this piece of wall in Hiroshima that was completely burnt black by the radiation. But on the front step, a person who was sitting there blocked the rays from hitting the stone. The only thing left now is a permanent shadow of positive light. After the A bomb, specialists said it would take 75 years for the radiation damaged soil of Hiroshima City to ever grow anything again. But that spring, there were new buds popping up from the earth. 

When I meet you, in that moment, I'm no longer a part of your future. I start quickly becoming part of your past. But in that instant, I get to share your present. And you, you get to share mine. And that is the greatest present of all. 

So if you tell me I can do the impossible, I'll probably laugh at you. I don't know if I can change the world yet, because I don't know that much about it -- and I don't know that much about reincarnation either, but if you make me laugh hard enough, sometimes I forget what century I'm in. 

This isn't my first time here. This isn't my last time here. These aren't the last words I'll share. 

But just in case, I'm trying my hardest to get it right this time around.” 
― Sarah Kay

B

Here's a poem that I absolutely love from the bottom of my heart. It's written by Sarah Kay.

B (If I Should Have a Daughter)

“If I should have a daughter…“Instead of “Mom”, she’s gonna call me “Point B.” Because that way, she knows that no matter what happens, at least she can always find her way to me. And I’m going to paint the solar system on the back of her hands so that she has to learn the entire universe before she can say “Oh, I know that like the back of my hand.”

She’s gonna learn that this life will hit you, hard, in the face, wait for you to get back up so it can kick you in the stomach. But getting the wind knocked out of you is the only way to remind your lungs how much they like the taste of air. There is hurt, here, that cannot be fixed by band-aids or poetry, so the first time she realizes that Wonder-woman isn't coming, I'll make sure she knows she doesn't have to wear the cape all by herself. Because no matter how wide you stretch your fingers, your hands will always be too small to catch all the pain you want to heal. Believe me, I've tried.

And “Baby,” I'll tell her “don't keep your nose up in the air like that, I know that trick, you're just smelling for smoke so you can follow the trail back to a burning house so you can find the boy who lost everything in the fire to see if you can save him. Or else, find the boy who lit the fire in the first place to see if you can change him.”

But I know that she will anyway, so instead I'll always keep an extra supply of chocolate and rain boats nearby, ‘cause there is no heartbreak that chocolate can't fix. Okay, there’s a few heartbreaks chocolate can't fix. But that’s what the rain boots are for, because rain will wash away everything if you let it.

I want her to see the world through the underside of a glass bottom boat, to look through a magnifying glass at the galaxies that exist on the pinpoint of a human mind. Because that’s how my mom taught me. That there'll be days like this, “There'll be days like this my momma said” when you open your hands to catch and wind up with only blisters and bruises. When you step out of the phone booth and try to fly and the very people you wanna save are the ones standing on your cape. When your boots will fill with rain and you'll be up to your knees in disappointment and those are the very days you have all the more reason to say “thank you,” ‘cause there is nothing more beautiful than the way the ocean refuses to stop kissing the shoreline no matter how many times it’s sent away.

You will put the “wind” in win some lose some, you will put the “star” in starting over and over, and no matter how many land mines erupt in a minute be sure your mind lands on the beauty of this funny place called life.

And yes, on a scale from one to over-trusting I am pretty damn naive but I want her to know that this world is made out of sugar. It can crumble so easily but don't be afraid to stick your tongue out and taste it.

“Baby,” I’ll tell her “remember your mama is a worrier but your papa is a warrior and you are the girl with small hands and big eyes who never stops asking for more.”

Remember that good things come in threes and so do bad things and always apologize when you've done something wrong but don't you ever apologize for the way your eyes refuse to stop shining.

Your voice is small but don’t ever stop singing and when they finally hand you heartbreak, slip hatred and war under your doorstep and hand you hand-outs on street corners of cynicism and defeat, you tell them that they really ought to meet your mother.” 
― Sarah Kay

I Wish I Could

I wish I could fill my entire house with books
So that wherever I go
Words lettered together track my progress
Page after paragraphs, chapters into the unforgivable silence
that greets a reader in the grips of epiphany.

I wish I could break out of my phone booth
and put on my cape
ready to save the world, the people
not limited by thoughts or images anymore

I wish I could talk to animals
and feel what really goes on in their cortex
Is it envy?
Or do they ostracize our idiosyncrasies?

I wish I could eat and share my sandwich with that boy whose mother forgot to pack his lunch because their house was on fire
I wish I could gather up that little girl, because her heart had been broken.
I wish rainbows and big round bubbles could mend relationships
and chocolate be the only medicine that could cure anything, even cancer and catracts

I wish I could give my energy to old people
hobbling along in their wake
And the happiness that greets me
when their stiff joints function like a bicycle
will provide me my energy which I gave away

I wish I could hunt down that little dog, lying in the forest with his leg oozing blood
and I wish I could put my hand on it and the cut would disappear
I wish I had John Coffey's skill
The life of a healer

I wish this world would look like a giant big red apple
to children and people and animals
So that way, we can always be reminded
At the first bite, it starts receding slowly
until only the seeds are left
ready to be planted into the soil, to give birth to new red apples
thus beginning life all over again

I wish this message be proclaimed by every parent, every teacher into the hearts of their children
Then maybe, just maybe
The world could be a better place after all.

HardShip poem

TAIL OF A FRIEND


I spelled Kitty F-R-I-E-N-D

With her tail in the air, she would pass me by

rubbing her body with my blue jeans

ensuring the relationship to be lasting

her fur contains something that sticks to me forever

and no matter where I go, she can always smell

and know I'm her person

I spelled Kitty F-A-M-I-L-Y

How true is it that cats incorporate themselves

into the bread of our mix

into the bindings of the blood that rages like fire

through our veins

but the blood she shared

ran deeper than any ocean or river

present on this planet

I spelled Kitty L-O-V-E

Spiralled on my pillow

I found her hair today

On my sweater, my notebook

It came as a shock

because I know she's gone

Her past still lingers

in this administrable air

That unheard meow hangs deeper 

as it radiates through my system

I spelled Kitty F-O-R-E-V-E-R

She had always been there

on my bed, in the garden, rolling in the sun

It feels empty

like the moon, hanging in the sky all by itself

the stars have somehow forgotten to accompany it

And I feel the moon looking at me

like it feels the same way I feel 

Think Tank

I feel my mind brimming, with ideas and thoughts I'm unable to write down on good, white paper. It's exploding, unstable like a plutonium waiting disaster. I'm widening my circles, broadening my horizons. Stepping out of the box is not so difficult, only the walls seem to restrict me into the inner ordinary paint. I refuse to blend in, with the colour emaciating in it's wake. But the voices that call, beckon from that box, are lit with the sepulchral glow of who am I? Am I just another person in the world, living today and dying tomorrow? A nobody? Overruled. Court in session, please be back after 2 minutes. 2 minutes is all it takes to summon the courage of my inner calling. It can be done. I am somebody, not faceless, not nameless. Not worthless. I can do it. The power of intellect is spitting out goblets from my grey matter, on the walls, reminding me, don't give up hope. The liquid runs clean, evaporating into the ambiance with slow and gradual osmosis as my hands grab the lid of the box and silence them forever.

It's More Fun in 3D!

Since the past year, I have discovered a vice belonging to me. Yes! I am glued to 3D! Even though, only 3 movies, one of them being a cartoon have been passed before my eyes in double vision, I cannot wait to add a 4th one to the list. And a 5th and a 6th.......
Not being in a cinema before, the 3D effect totally wowed me and I felt like sitting there even when the lights started to come back on, not wanting to take off my ever-loving 3D glasses off from my face. The first movie being Ice Age was kind of (kind of?!) childish and short but last year I got to see Iron Man 3 and Man of Steel and I was so delirious! Even my sister who has a knack to turn everything into a "so what?" shared my euphoria and we both planned to see a really awesome movie in 3D now and then.
The thought of sitting in that cinema hall again with the floor booming away at the sound of the music is enough to make me weak at the knees. You could say I have a new crush now.

Being a huge glutton monster, I didn't (make that couldn't) make my eyes roam even an inch away from that marvelous screen. I was glued.
Recently, we saw Catching Fire, but it was in 2D. Bummer!

EARS

So I wrote a poem for my Dadima like last year and I found it just now! Pretty ducky huh?

It feels like being underwater

soaked in the pillow of the sea

The restless do not await me

The silence does not wake me

The fish swim around

ignoring the ripples I create

It is momentous

not a seaweed stirs

The dream catcher is asleep

His dreams in a bottle of jar

carried off to the sea

marooned on an island

a tiny paper reflected in the shards

Someone picks it, sand sparkling of it's edges

The paper slips easily through the fingers

moist from the sunbeams 

dancing on it's surface

And the reader reads

and the paper conveys

That all is not lost

neither the universe will split

into tiny pieces

Pieces that get lodged

into someones heart

reproducing wickedness

benign from the start

And some find their way

into someones eye

blinding the light reflecting the pupil

While some shards of glass rove around

they pass towards into someones ears

snatching the life of music

or the sound of motor cars,

depriving the listener 

from the sound bars

The crying of their grandchildren

they cannot listen

For every time they pick up the infant

they could silence it no more.