agha shahid ali

[mercywaits.livejournal.com]

and when we -- as if from ashes -- ascend
into the cold where the heart must defend
its wings of terror and even pity
and below us the haze of New Delhi
grays, In your eyes I look for my wounds' deap sea.
But five hundred years waved with history?
It is to song that one must turn for flight,
But with what measure will I shed sunlight
on pain? In you eyes -- was her sari turquoise? --
I look for the deep sea... That is her voice --
Begum Akhtar's. "You were the last, we know,
to see her in Delhi, Desperado
in search of catastrophe." Heartbreak of perfume
is mine again. The pilot turns up the volume:

Attar -- of jasmine? What was it she wore
that late morning in October '74
when we were driven (it was the sunniest
day) from Connaught Place to Palam Airport? She pressed
a note -- Rs. 100 -- into my palm:
"Take it or, on my life, I will perish."
They announced DEPARTURE. I touched her arm.
Her sari was turquiose! She turned to vanish,
but then turned to wave. (My silk is stained,
How will I face my Lord? she'd set in Pain --
her chosen raga that July in Srinagar.)
A week later: GHAZAL QUEEN BEGUM AKHTAR
IS DEAD. She had claimed her right-to-die:
She had sung "Everyone Will Be Here But I"

-- from I Dream I Am the Only Passenger on Flight 423 to Srinagar

Comments

[peccare.livejournal.com]

this is pretty cool