 |
| Sajid Hussain |
Ashes in the Dry Garden
The rain remembers nothing,
It weeps dust, grain by grain,
As Time buries its face in sand,
The sky, concave and breathless,
Is a priest without a sermon.
The grass prays in brittle tongues
Beneath a ferrous sun,
Thorns rehearse old rites,
Where roots renounced the covenant of earth.
Buds dissolve,in the womb of stillborn hours.
The path no longer pretends,
A threshold breathes but has no door,
A window mourns, clothed in the linen of neglect,
Shadows press their faces to the glass,
And broken panes echo footsteps never returned.
Leaves fall like confessions,
Not from boughs, but from clocks,
Whose hands no longer grasp meaning,
Rust speaks the liturgy of loss,
Iron forgets its shape,
And corrosion writes the gospel of forgetting.
Smoke, the incense of wasted time,
Rises from hours sacrificed to absence,
Walls whisper in crumbling syllables,
Not shattered by war,
But worn by the sighs of the unseen.
Among the ash:
A mother’s breath embalmed in plaster,
A child’s gaze fossilized in soot,
An old man’s dream folded,
In the envelope of an oxidized memory.
And the silence,
The silence chants,
I am the shape of what was thought,
The breath between two centuries,
The echo of a name unspoken.
Sajid Hussain from Pakistan ©
When All Remains But Thee
The lamps still burn with contemplative fire,
Their golden tongues untouched by grief or pyre,
The meadows don their emerald attire,
Yet none lament, none long, none tire.
The birds unfold their morning psalm with grace,
Their wings inscribe soft hymns across the space,
The bells still toll where sacred echoes fall,
Yet none recall thy voice ,none heed thy call.
The paths remain where once our steps were laid,
But Time has brushed thy footprints into shade,
The leaves lift birds to sky’s cathedral
dome,
While travelers pass as though they’re heading home.
O Memory! close thy weeping, sleepless eyes,
Unclench thy hand from what beneath it lies,
Let Past recede into the breathless hush,
Its mournful dirge now but a dying hush.
For all remains unchanged, complete in tune,
The morning glows, the breeze retains its rune,
But thou, O friend art not in any place,
Not in the sun, the wind, the stars, or space.
In The Shade Of Seeking
In blissful torment I sought smiling tears,
Seeking sorrow’s shade in sunshine’s shimmer,
Dark veils of anguish dimmed each golden dawn,
My eyes hunted shade in the arms of radiance,
An eternity dissolved under one teardrop’s weight,
O Pain, thou cruel artist, you inked my time,
A quiet absence visits my inward skies,
Loud silence nests in the heart’s vacant throne,
And chases shadows across the desert of longing,
In endless alleys, I seek echoes of essence,
The path is a relic of a vanished presence,
The dust knows my quest better than my lips,
I seek the trace 'I seek the trace,
And I walk, and I yearn, and I call,
O nameless echo, art thou memory or prophecy?
Who moans in the dome of my soul’s roam?
In the Veins of Mist
Beyond the veil were dust and mist alone,
A traveller was I , yet journey there was none,
The tale once bound by threads was bore of grief,
Though paths bended beneath celestial turns.
I walked through clocks that melted into breath,
Where roads were stitched from shadows of desire,
Each turn revealed a mirror with no face,
Each milestone sang but vanished into fire.
Ideas rained like feathers made of glass,
Breaking soundlessly on the floor of thought,
I sought the ones who dwelled behind my eyes,
But found them drowning in a glass of haze.
No sorrow wept beneath the laughing moon,
I moved, yet floated in a static sea,
Time wore a cloak of whispering spectral wings,
And space knelt quiet at memory 's rusted gate.
The spring I chased turned into mirrored smoke,
And kissed the void with incandescent flames.
My river slept inside a cave of wind,
No wave disturbs the mirror of my stream.
No voice, no flame, no herald of the dream,
No beacon flares ,no shore, no destiny,
No wave stirs forth within my silent sea,
In endless pursuit my compass turned to mist.
In the orbit of seeking lost my compass ,
Diverts in the agony of smouldering path,
Each step dissolves into a vow forsaken,
And vanishes beneath eternity’s breathless veil.
A Vigilant Soul Awaits
A solemn vigil stirs the soul’s deep core,
Veiled fire beneath humanity longs to roar,
An ancient cry breathes through the folds of thought,
Time’s hush prepares the truth ,the seers sought.
The soul desires clouds ablaze with peace,
Tranquility draped in celestial, silent release,
Is a sacred phrase to light the mind’s domain!
And whisper grace through reason’s rich refrain.
For centuries I’ve thirsted for one stream,
A draught to heal the wounds of dream,
A pilgrim bearing thought’s illumined flame,
I name the stars, yet shun all fame.
Let peace arise on wisdom’s tempered wing,
Let every soul in silent union sing,
Let truth be refuge for the bruised and torn,
And tyranny die where light is born.
A day shall come when division’s veil shall fall,
One voice shall echo in the hearts of all,
Those drunk on power shall at last descend,
Marked by the time their might can not defend.
Sajid Hussain from Pakistan ©
