thirst

i burn here for her
as she slithers in her lover's arms
isn't she a chalice brimming with poison?

Metamorphosis

they've put today a monument
where once was an empty space
and changed forever
my pristine past,
my virgin landscape

Winter

Each time I pull the quilt over me
It’s like slipping within a question mark
That hangs over my bed
Prodding the false warmth
With which I sleep this winter.

But I know nothing of winter.
I see it only in the news clippings of cold waves
Or in the shivering of a mendicant
Pressed against my car’s window
Or in the vaporous breath of an illicit lover
Exhaled across my married face.

© Dan Husain
December 23, 2005

I Dig Out Few More Haikus & Senryus From The Past...

Summers they parch;
My lips they crust
I drink from thee.

Winters they freeze;
My lips they crust
You warmth me.

....................................

Hanging
amidst conversations are words
that we never said.

Your poem
waltzes on my lips;
I forget my own.

My New Play

I have to be a drunken sod in a new play
And charm women who, to my wit, are blasé.
I have funny lines filled with malapropism,
An awkward gait with quirky mannerism.

But we’re not playing Brecht, Beckett or Pinter,
Not even Tennessee William’s ‘A Cat on A Hot Tin Roof’,
We're merely adapting a genteel Irish tale to an Awadhi winter
And yet we find men across cultures a farce, a spoof.

© Dan Husain
December 21, 2005

PS: The play is 'Aristocrats' by Brian Friel. Our adaptation is called 'Mirza Bagh' and will be staged in Delhi in March, 2006. Watch the blog 'Doing Delhi' for more details. :-)

Ecphrasis: The Gobbled Sun

So now
you've gobbled the sun
and framed it
in your barge shaped heaven
thinking you've it all
under your thumb
but God may yawn
like a gaping black hole
and spoil your fun.

Ecphrasis: Christina's World

Painting: Christina's World by Andrew Wyeth

Christina

Gossamer laden dreams
Of yellow mornings
On green acres
Where air redolent
Of love, longing
And your wildflowers
Wafts through
My poetic musings
Possess me
Spin words
That spill out
Like your portrait
Mauve dressed
Maybe pink
Staring across
Green acres
Lit with yellow mornings
To a barn
Where once
Our love blossomed
But now
It wears thin into
A gossamer laden dream.

Evaporating in your sighs;
Crystallizing
Maybe in my poetic themes.

© Dan Husain
June 25, 2005

last night...

last night
the thought of you was unusual
i didn’t know how to deal with it
as you were also here...

Spring. . .

last night
we spoke in hushed tones;
words irrelevant
falling intermittently
on our ears
with silence an interlude
devouring words
we wish to hear
the most.
I puckered my lips
and kissed
your flushing cheeks;
your lips broke into a smile
and my world within bloomed
like zephyr on a muggy day,
like child's smile making mother sway,
like death to terminally suffering,
like breath to one drowning, gasping,
like Sufi chants to a mystic,
like chiseled prose to a critic,
like thoughts to a brooding scholar,
like discontent to one who cribs, holler,
like power to those who wield it,
like spring's outbreak on a snow laden field.

© Dan Husain
February 17, 2005

Pursuit

Between the lines beneath the words
Often lies hidden men’s intent,
I only seek tales – true or false -
That will make us all content.

A Plebeian Dream

From the land of yellow dust
Where the air is redolent of nostalgia
And everyman hides sorrow in his breast
Comes a soul with a bag filled with paraphernalia.
He meets me at the local mart
Tired but in his motives – steadfast.
He says he is looking for a place
To bury his sorrows and quietly efface.

So we sit at the local joint
Eat chicken and while our time.
From the conversation I learn
That he met an accidental death,
Left behind two daughters, a son
And a grief stricken wife on bed.
He says he had a dream once but…Alas!
It still hangs on the clothesline in his backyard.

Saddened, I offer him my humble abode -
A place where he may freely spread his soul.
He politely refuses, seeking one last desire -
If only the bag could meet his fate on the funeral pyre.
I tumble the bag to find a crumb of bread,
Torn job ads, matinée tickets, few unhealed wounds,
And an old woman’s photograph, perhaps like him, dead.

© Dan Husain
April 26, 2005

Early Morning Haikus...

had it been
just a coffee session
you'd have come

*****************

the truth often
is a lump in your throat
when you lie

Proseonama

Ok! The make over has been done! You may read my updated new prose blog here. :-)

http://proseonama.blogspot.com/

Cheers & thanks,

Dan

Just A Thought!

I've been posting only poetry on my blog. Though if you'd dig deep into the archives you'd find a short story and maybe a thought or two but nothing else. But now I am thinking I should post more of my prose.

I have another orphaned blog of mine called 'Adha Gaon' or 'Half A Village'. I didn't intend to title it that way but it was my first day at blogging. I had no clue and I was half lost in the maze of instructions thrown at me. I clicked on something and lo! I had a blog staring at me with a title 'Adha Gaon'. It is actually a novel written in Hindi by a distant granduncle of mine. The novel is very reminiscent of Marquez's 'A Hundred Years of Solitude'. However, by the time I read Marquez my granduncle had already bid adieu to the world. I couldn't ask him whether he was influenced by Marquez but in a conversation with a friend of his, another littérateur, I realized that it was coincidental that both the novels had a similar structure. They both were written almost at the same time and none could have been influenced with each other. The novel 'Adha Gaon' went on to win the Sahitya Akademi Award and was later succesfully adapted in a sitcom titled 'Neem ka Ped'. It was also translated into English by Gillian Wright and published by Penguins.

I remember at a dinner conversation I told Gillian Wright that the title they've chosen is outrageous. The first Penguin print titled the novel as 'The Feuding Families of Village Gangauli'. Why couldn't they just literally translate the original title - 'Half A Village'? That sounds better. Gillian agreed with me and said she didn't have any choice as the decision was Editor's. However, when the next edition came out Penguins had changed the title to 'Half A Village'. Some relief!

Anyways, coming back to where we were I think I should retitle that blog and use it more for my prose writings. I think I should start by posting an article that I wrote after reading Amitava Kumar's 'Husband of A Fanatic'. I like that piece and I think is a good way to begin if I wish to hit the prose road. What say you?

I'd love your comments. They always encourage and give me hope in my despairing moment when I doubt my ability to be a writer/ poet. :-)

Cheers

Murtaza Danish Husain

Surrender. . .

The Unabridged Version

We just have a promise of a meeting
And I am already filling this evening
With colors – ochre, gold, deep pink.

But every shade that I choose
Is assumed by thoughts of you

And now all I wish
Is to spread
Like a pinch of vermilion
At the crescent
Where your hair
Lords over your forehead.

Forever...

© Dan Husain
December 05, 2005

Surrender. . .

i wish to spread
like a pinch of vermilion
at the crescent
where your hair lords
over your forehead

forever...

© Dan Husain
December 05, 2005

The Irony

Often when nothing to say,
We speak –
Tossing mouthfuls
That clutter space
Meant for feelings.

Often when we must speak,
We prefer silence –
Stifling feelings
That urgently plead
For an eloquent dress.

© Dan Husain
March 18, 2005