The Blind Girl Monologue (reading 1 and 2)
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Pigeons and Cats
I love to make pigeons come to flight by nudging them with a friendly move forward towards them
Cats, sleeping mostly, are aroused by the game of “who won’t eat this, tonight?”
The animal kingdom is a sacred birth chart for the Chinese
Though taking a deeper look, the Indian too, had things to say.
SHE/THEY’S DOG
QUEER GOLD OF A DOG OLD SMILE
QUESTIONING EYES, PERPLEX-ME-SIGHS
ODD GIRL INTUITION, WITH BLACKENED EYES
SCENT OF STUD’N’ SEQUINN NIGHTS
NATURE & I
The sun-washed trees, the went-for-a-walk breeze
All invited me to the labyrinthine garden
I saw diamonds in a puppet; studded stars for his eyes
I dreamt you placed him in the garden that mystified
The onlooker’s gaze.
You used to say ‘I want to work with my hands’
As you would dig up the Dionysian of earth
The mud of it all made me think of childhood
And the sudden urge to sleep on the grass
Lay bare my soul to the sun and bask
In her glorious stare.
Light of heaven on summer grass
Elongated dickinsonian blades
In my nail-dirt eyes full of you.
Mother, you took me by the hand
And we went to the earth embrace &
Brother, you took me to the lake
In reflections in the water I saw
what narcissus missed – just ordinary glances
of hesitant urges. Careful with that platonic.
When nature says, “Come here”
we should give up technology and listen.
The Wash
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First,
Clean the utensils with electric charm
Bring home the woods
Strike a fire in the soul
And clean its very hide
The raw in its reserves.
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Then,
Rise out of the soul’s unit
Where nothing is material
Where nothing is economic
Where nothing is political
It’s just you with your self.
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First,
Let the artist thrive
For his is the world
Her's is the intrinsic value
Their's is the creation
Once you feel there is no external
Corruption left
Once you feel, there is nothing
But that damn burst of art
For no other sake at all
Then,
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Arise from your soul shell.
Then, tell the world who you are.
Only then, let the world in.
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(But keep your soul sanctuary clean,
And wash it with the wood fairies’ hymns
And keep your sanctuary clean
Wash it with your dreams.)
Fatima Ijaz, September '22
#unity #Soul #nonmaterialsoul #SoulIsAllThatMatters #dreamsarereal #workonself #art #artist
FOR THE DANCERS
When has the rose been so chica
Been so sync-a-sweet rhythm and beat ya?
When are we going to go all the way
In a way somehow never before?
Let us dance, world.
We won’t cause a stir
We won’t stir a wing of the stray bird
We won’t cause the hypnotic lap of the wave/s
To split and swerve
The moonlight, either
No, we promise we won’t
Promise, we won’t
Dance like there’s no tornado
Spilling, no wanton erupting
No lava-ish crave
No rock no rave
We’ll just
Pretend we aren’t even dancing
We’re just speaking.
Speak and dance, girl
You’re the tom and Gerry,
You got that rule, boy!
Dance, dance, dance
No care, No tomorrow
No fear, no forever
Just here and now
This is all we have,
this is all we have.
Dancers!
This is all we have.
I AM MODERN
I fly close to the sky
So high like a fluent souvenir
Of the hidden hemisphere
Of sighs and fears
I fly so high, so high
I am the modern woman
written in inky hair
with a script tied back,
severe.
I am the achtung baby
Would you like to see for yourself?
Step into my mirrors!
Appear as the echo of glass
And fall short of touch!
Do I amaze you?
Who is playing marbles?
Whisht; the silence of an Irish Word
The way a word could sway a silence
And abracadabra shut your pious eyes
I’d like to say a good-bye to you
But the wild winds through these trees
Whisht me dew-drop-lipped
Thirsty once again…
Whisht!
How I wish upon a mountain star
I could ash these last words
As an experimental psychologist
Lit & Ling their residue
And out of Whitman be born anew:
You left too soon; the winds answer.
The Dark Interpretation
Hold it near the eye
the hologram multiplies
wherever monsoon comes
it comes as a kaleidoscopic sky
Hold it as a monsoon
and when it multiplies
disperse as beaded rain
on stone pavements!
Loneliness 1
from "The Shade of Longing and Other Poems"
Let us pretend that the heart is vacant
& longs for the moon again,
the chord, the cry, the cut is played
once again
let us pretend that it does not matter
because words carry the weight of water
& because love is an unwritten letter.
We sit by that ancient lake, and draw
tarot cards: the three-faced goddess glints
with a shining tooth, and Venus’ cup bearer
holds the old-familiar poison;
I cannot draw any more cards tonight
for it pains the vacant heart, on which the
moon has eternally died.
Sherezade F Minor
If on the pious silence of the lake, sat a without-me snake, should it alter the fact
That listening is a nuanced skill. Or then perhaps, a jungle-rhythm of grass: snake’s vision
Should alter the anatomy of a photograph. Jo guzree mujh me matt unn sei kaho
Though in the references to the past, you pick up a violin – but I preferred keyboards and indian flutes
This is not to say that time hasn’t altered or colored my receptions to rainbow, Since she left it at
That merciful murder. This is your name: Sherezade, but I won’t tell you lest you flee and never come back. So I will tell you a song instead. It goes something like this: Far away, long ago…oh well Disney that, I snapped. You laughed. It was those sort of days.