Of Silly Ruminations

Art by Chugtai M.A.R

I want to be an openness bending at the tip of the sunlight falling on my back. But I’m also afraid of burning in my own fire.

I carry my hostilities like a poet who adores perspiring on a hot sunny afternoon in the arms of an old monument that houses some grand secrets only he can see – and I can’t unsee. I’ve been his muse and his monument – sometimes a pillar draped in silk.

I yearn to be a vastness, much wilder than the blue skies. Someone once told me that I was silly to think of blue skies as wild, and I only laughed. How can you not see the calm that has rained, birthed storms and swallowed deaths? I realise that it’s indeed silly of me to think that people would see how I manage to carry this calm.

I don’t burn in my own fire. I invite other’s to ignite my flame so that I can master my art of living for others – because what is a woman without a role?

Simply a human? No, that is deeply silly of me, indeed.

-Nameera Anjum Khan.

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So yes, day 9 is over, where I live and I really did not want to break my flow. Hence, I quickly looked up this enthralling work of art to inspire me today!

This one is a take on gender roles – particularly the one’s attached to a woman. It takes inferences from the Indian culture as well and the thinking of a family/culture-oriented woman who is made to feel suppressed because of her desires for freedom.

Sometimes, things that reflect a particular emotion aren’t exactly what they’re composed of, the blue skies for example that are not always blue or calm, for that matter.

I always feel that seasons and nature is a very great way to deeply understand human emotions in a poetic light. Hence my obsession with them is pretty evident in this piece too!

Thank you for reading, have a great day/night!

Naked

‘Naked’

And to my mother’s ears, it’s ‘Blasphemy’. I wonder what’s more suffocating, the fact that I am Naked and a mere reflection of her or the fact that she’s had her eyes closed this whole time?

The society is the most illusionary mirror to ever exist. It shows you what you desire, but at the cost of negligence to your own needs. But here’s the catch, it only ‘Shows’ you this understanding that you possess. One single deviation can render you hopeless and so, the question remains; How much do you actually understand about yourself and this so-called ‘Society’?

You see, you’ve got to choose between the two. I choose to strip off of my regularities and give in to this maze of infidelity, I coincide with complicated minds and irrepressive hearts. I’m swinging through the gallant aspirations over to a newer side of things. It’s like a constant dalliance with the impossible heights.

I see my home right here, not up there when I say ‘Heights’. I see it on this ground and between these people. I want to run away sometimes, yes. But I think this distorted mirror has its own gravity that pulls you in, helplessly.

‘Naked’ – Blasphemy? I think freedom is but an unfiltered mind, a careless yet considerate human. When you choose a path of irregularities – it’s neither a garden nor a parched land that have been walked before, it’s a whole new world where you might even fly, who knows where possibilities end, right?

But without taking off those hideous reflections that you’ve been borrowing over the years, how can you expect to let your wings breathe?

-Nameera Anjum Khan

Night Creatures

All the night Creatures crawled up to my desk ~ & I wondered…

What Creature am I in their language? The one with the touch of Death or the God with untimely sunlight ~ as bright as a snowfall in the raging summers?

They keep coming back, I don’t think they’ve a name for me.

Sometimes, a shadow looks like my Father hiding behind the door,

At other times, it metamorphoses into an old hag that laughs at me while I read the ‘Articles’ of the ‘Constitution’ aloud…

& Even the night Creatures laugh – at a nameless horror; but I only defined ‘Democracy’, I only swallowed a slice of cake and brushed aside this noisy mosquito.

It was the only one pricking at my skin instead of laughing – when I (defi)n(ed)

D – E – M – O – C – R – A – C – Y.

– Nameera Anjum Khan

Will You Write Yourself?

If the heaven was the eyelash that stole my wish

If it was the candle that I blew on days I lived,

Then I want to write my own goddamn History

In an abyss that reeks of an unending staircase,

I hand my sins to you, so you may decide my grave

I fall as I fly, unto the blue skies~

re-writing the tears that have forgotten how to be a poem.

-Nameera Anjum Khan

(An excerpt)

On Writing

Writing for a purpose, specially one that’s for a long term, can be so difficult to provide an impetus to. I’ve been so frustrated and annoyed at myself for the past few months. I was in a similar position at the beginning of the previous year, but it was for all the different reasons.

And I honestly love writing about writing, you know?

I’m not making much sense. Also this is yet another pms-ing rant haha, in case it wasn’t obvious.

I want to write for myself, like I always have. But I also want to share myself with the people that inspire me and vice-versa. We all have some inspiration to offer to each other. It’s beautiful.

Life is beautiful, we should write it more often.

-Nameera Anjum Khan.

#1 – Period Rambling

I don’t really intend to go anywhere with this blog post but I want to start a personalized series. Maybe. Lol. Yeah this is gonna be difficult for me because to document my feelings & thoughts online, yeah idk. I mean its not the same thing as poetry you know, you don’t have metaphors or other poetic devices to save your ass. I mean my poetry can get way too explicit and raw most times (because I don’t usually edit it lmao) (lazy lazy) but this rawness and honesty would be a totally different deal. I might stop with this one post and I may never stop. You know, this reminds me of Dark and that one point when the worlds are ending and there’s a portal opened between the two for a nanosecond, if Jonas stays or if he goes with this dark-haired mysterious Martha with bangs, that one point would break or make the rest of the timeline.

Artist : Wendell Araújo

How very cool. So yeah I mean I guess my actions wouldn’t really affect the timeline as such but when we get down to think about it, how could it NOT affect the people around me on a larger scale? For example I chose to not write after this and continue to only share my usual poetry and prose, would I really be leaving things as they are or would my actions hamper a certain ripple that will be born when I continue to chose? The people I love, total strangers who end up here through my clever tags that seemed to have stopped working i tell you lmao anyway so they end up here and maybe i am to play some part in their life and if I don’t continue to write, I’ll never find out. You see, this is what keeps the majority of us going, “I’ll never find out”. There is this tendency of a negative push that we give to ourselves. Why? Idk man. Like there are times when i think about these extremely positive people and I don’t get the vibes man it’s like a huge facade that they’ve created for themselves and not necessarily for others. It has such a subtle presence that you would easily miss but sometimes you can feel that positivity overwhelming you. That’s pressure. That’s the pressure of all the superficial things that this world is feeding you and you’re eating promptly. The pressure of seeing everyone around you studying their asses off (THEY’RE ALL NETFLIX-ING AND CHILL-ING) and you get scared, you get small in a way, you know. You shrink away, inside. Except that you can’t stay there forever so you get out, get some ice-cream and watch a heart-breaking, soul-touching, mind-opening and thought-provoking anime movie/series and you go to sleep finding joy in small things. Everything makes sense now, no more pressure. I promise you, not all small things are bad, I mean isn’t it beautiful when you realize how you have this cute little friend circle and the person you love is singing you a lullaby and you’ve watched that pretty anime movie and the soundtrack is still running on your mind. Man. Fuck everything else. This is life.

Good night (:

Exposed

In its internment,
My heart was on
Its knees, ever-
Ready to serve
The master’s
Command.

Be it burying myself under
A mountain of responsibility
Or diving in an ocean that
Was never enough to
Satiate your thirst for
Perfection,
I had my mind set
On fulfilling your
Wishes before
They had to
Travel up your
Throat & find a
Way to the tip
Of your acidic
Tongue.

Alas, I was no angel,
I had served my
Term long
Enough.

It was time now,
For me to kill your heart.

Labeled a thief, a murderer
For my crime,
They never saw the knives
Groped in my scars that
I exposed to you with
The only faith I had
In store.

You stole my faith,
I smashed your heart;
That makes us even
But they only see
Pieces of your heart,
What of the mistrust
That will forever
Reside in my mind,
Extracting my soul
Of the last thing
That keeps me
Alive – hope.

-Nameera.

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A broken heart is almost always subject to metaphors & wordplay. As beautiful as it is to read words written for broken hearts, I’d like to draw your attention to emotions that also matter. Trust & hope go hand in hand, they’ve interchangeable consequences. We’re mere human beings, we break hearts & get ours broken by others. The least we can do is cherish trust. Hope isn’t everlasting, I don’t say so because I’m pessimistic but because it’s reality.

Trust is a treasure trove, every time you add little trinkets of hope, it grows.

The Mirror

They weren’t eyes,
They were
Windows to you;
A glimpse of my
Secrets.

No matter how hard I tried,
Pain had a way of making
Itself evident through the
Brown hues fading into
The morbid blackness
Hovering upon my
Existence.

They’re tainted pink & purple,
But exhaustion is always
Crystal clear.

Didn’t you ever feel,
Like you were
Looking in a
Mirror?

Maybe that’s why I
Could never read your eyes,
Because I wasn’t looking
Inside a window,
But at a mirror.

I never understood what I saw,
For I’ve never been
Familiar enough
With myself.

(It wasn’t you I was tired of looking at, it was me)

Shards of broken glass
Still pierce my mind,
But I’d rather be
Blind than give
In to expectations
That will forever
Be unmet.

-Nameera.

Rape – An indelible blot upon society.

I feel agitated every time I watch the news. She’s disrespected in every possible way. Candles are lit once her eyes are devoid of light. In the spur of the moment the whole nation comes to know of her existence. I pray that this kind of fame befalls upon women no more.

After the deed is done myriad of posts are updated in the name of condolences & budding poets emerge. Words filled with sorrow & angst spread across cyberspace like a tsunami flooding the minds through heart-wrenching poetry.

As a writer I’ve done my bit too in order to erase chaos in my own way through words.

But times like these scare me. I can’t pin down the feeling that I’m not doing enough. No, it’s not my responsibility to save every woman from evil doers but it’s my worst nightmare. In times like these neither ink nor do candle marches suffice. While I sit here writing this under the cover of a peaceful night, darkness encompassing devious intentions engulf yet another life.

I can’t write about a prey falling victim to a ravenous predator over & over again. All the majestic names this country has bestowed upon her cease to exist as one word arises, ‘Rape’ – not just of her body but her soul, independence & spirit.

Give me hope to write & dignity to encapsulate my words. Rid me of my fear that lingers as names succeeding the phrase ‘#Justice For______” keep increasing day by day.

Before inks run out replacing blood, candles are distinguished for worse & dignity lost forever between hands that deign its worth, rekindle her stature by taking a just stand against immorality that has prevailed long enough.

Long enough.

-Nameera.

Solitude

It comes
In parts,
Drowing
Me wholly
Within its
Absence.

-Nameera.