Tag: Ghazal
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They hand you a box
They hand you a boxFour neat lines joined at supremely perfect right anglesYour body, rounded at the edges, pliable, more flesh than muscleSqueezing yourself into shape you triumph, look you say, I fitSkin compacted into nothingnessCells harnessed to behave One day, unexpectedly you spill outOver the edges, across the linesMass dictating it’s ruleslook they say,…
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Alicante is a State of Mind
A well-needed break came in the form of a short summer holiday to Alicante. We stayed at the Hotel Sercotel Suites del Mar; a delightful property with both sea and port views. I especially liked the attention the hotel has paid to little details that made our stay comfortable: extra sockets and USB points in…
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Luscious Fragonard from St. Petersburg
She was leaning on him as if she would fall if he did not support her. Then I noticed his foot on the bottom folds of her carefully pleated white dress. He was persistent. He was a thief; the kiss was stolen, grabbed, plucked. Sahir Ludhianvi’s Abhi Na Jaao Chod Kar gently played in the…
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Dressing Amsterdam in a Ghazal
Do you think I can ever write in the vein of Delhi about Amsterdam? I did not choose Delhi, but once upon a time I selected living in Amsterdam In Delhi, we have serpentine avenues with magnificent trees I could find the cycle of seasons, getting and shedding leaves, in Amsterdam Sometimes I went looking…
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Delhi is a Ghazal
On reading Mumbai’s Ghazal by Raef Kazi I dream of Delhi sitting in Amsterdam tonight Glamor in the lawns, silk whispers to pashmina tonight All that dust, never dulls the white gaadis and kurtas This is Delhi we are talking about tonight Tall red brick walls surrounding gated marvels Ghazals soirees and an open grill…
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Thinking About the Floating Dead
The painting above is a depiction of Shakespeare’s Ophelia from Hamlet. The haunting scene describes how Ophelia, driven out of her mind when her father is murdered by her lover Hamlet, falls into a stream and drowns: There, on the pendent boughs her coronet weeds Clambering to hang, an envious sliver broke; When down her weedy…
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Scratching at Layers of Patriarchal Sedimentation
During my research on the ghazal, I discovered that the work done by several women poets in the eighteenth and nineteenth century had been removed from written history. Women had systematically been excluded from several anthologies. In Urdu, as oral poetry started being complied and printed, the biographies penned by poet and historian Altaf Hussain…
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The Last Post of 2018 – a ghazal
I asked him what should my last post be year end He said, reflecting creatively on the year end How boring, no? All year you follow and watch, still on YouTube, endless rewinds declaring the year end I started work in diversity, submitted my thesis, Going to mentor, gearing up at the year end Revolution…
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Home – a ghazal
That time of the year when people are heading home A glittering tree, boxes with bows, welcoming you home She stayed back in the hostel This girl from the East, she was not returning home I wish you could see starlings during murmuration, flying home She begged for that stamp on her card No, she…
Diligent Candy 