Five Poems by Nasir Aijaz

 

Dreams of Revolution and Freedom

What is the significance of dreams seen after sleep?

Dreams should be those that do not let you sleep.

I also keep seeing such dreams, like an old saying, 

Dreams of economic, social revolution and national unity that have not allowed me to sleep all my life.

But despite not realizing it in seven decades,

I have not stopped seeing such dreams.

Some of them are lying under the bed in my place, on which I sleep with my head every day,

Some of them are kept in the small cupboard next to it,

And some of them are lying between the pages of books.

Every night by opening the closet, laying my head on the bed or opening a book,

I go back to the world of these dreams.

A Cage

Lying in bed at midnight

The bedroom looks like a cage

Where I do live for months

Disconnected from the world

Imprisoned in the state of disability.

It was the first rain of winter outside

Alas, I couldn’t go outside to enjoy.

I just peep through the window glass

Hear the sound of raindrops

Listen to prolonged cooing sound of pigeon

Sitting on the window sill

Running in drops.

It makes me feel

The bird is free to enjoy the rain

I am confined to a cage.

Something is going to happen

Why the roads and streets look deserted

Why the dreadful silence prevails

Has any monster wandered here? 

Or any storm is about to come?

It looks like something is going to happen!

 

Doors and windows of all the houses are shut

Silence reigns everywhere

The sky above has turned black

And far away somewhere sparks the lightning

It looks like something is going to happen!

 

Where the young girls are molested

The youths are murdered

Many of them languish in prison for life

Like the helpless inmates

And mothers lose their loved ones

Their laps are bare

Something is going to happen there!

 

Here, it’s like a *Karbala

We receive the dead bodies’ of loved ones everyday

Our hearts bleed and mourn constantly 

Thick darkness engulfs the nights

Lamps are lit in every home 

Framed photos of loved ones are garlanded

We take a deep sigh

Looking to the sky above

It looks like something is going to happen!

[A city of Iraq where the Battle of Karbala was fought and the grandsons of Prophet Mohammad were martyred]

Search of Existence

When we met after quite a time

She asked: Where were you, I haven’t seen you for a long time

‘Am I not with you?’

‘Nowhere do I live, if you do not feel me living in your heart’, I said

And, since then I am in search of my ‘self’

The search of my existence continues.

Talk of Death

One day there was talk of death.

She immediately stopped and said ‘Don't talk like that’.

‘Are you scared of death?’ I asked.

Everyone has to demise

Death is inevitable

It’s reality of life

And I do not fear of dying.

‘I am not afraid of death either, I am afraid only of losing you, she said.

Nothing but losing you…  

Nasir Aijaz, based in Karachi, the capital of Sindh province of Pakistan, is basically a journalist and researcher having spent over 48 years in the field of journalism. He won Gold Medal and another award for best reporting in 1988 and 1989. He has worked in key positions for newspapers and news agencies. He also worked as a TV Anchor for over a decade and conducted some 400 programs. He is author of ten books on history, language, literature, travelogue and biography. One of his books ‘Hur – The Freedom Fighter’, a research work on war against the British colonial forces, also won a prize. Further, he translated a poetry book of Egyptian poet Ashraf Aboul Yazid, into Sindhi language, which was published in Egypt. Besides, he has written around 500 articles in English, Urdu and Sindhi, the native language of Sindh. He is editor of Sindh Courier, an online magazine and represents The AsiaN, an online news service of South Korea. His articles have also been translated in Arabic and Korean languages. Very recently, some of his poems have been translated into English, Italian, Albanian and Arabic language and published in Albania, Italy, Kosovo, Bangladesh, Egypt, South Korea and Abu Dhabi. He usually writes poems in Sindhi, his native language, but he also writes in English. Nasir Aijaz is one of the founding members of Korea-based Asia Journalists Association AJA. He has visited some ten Asian countries and attended international seminars.