24

Phew! 24 years. Still got many rivers to cross. I want to write more but I have a dull headache. Well, birthdays!

I think I miss something in my life...

I had planned that I'll try to write at least one line every day leading to my 25th birthday but guess that won't be possible.

Here they come, the beautiful ones...

So I've been thinking about a few things lately. And mostly laughing and smiling... The life of a manic depressive.

The highs and the lows.
The valleys and the moutains.
The crests and the troughs.

That's the beauty of life. To be riding these waves like a maniacal surfer and then getting washed ashore like the pieces of a shipwreck.

When I joined dA, I joined it because I wanted some technical comments on my work. It wasn't because I wanted to be judged for what I did. No one likes that. Did I judge anyone? No. Did I judge the thoughts and the feelings that someone put into what they did. No, I did not but why do I feel that I'm being judged for these very same things. I put my works here so as to be judged for their artistic merit and not for the subjects themselves. If you don't know me and if you're not God, please do not judge me. I don't like it. It makes me feel smaller than I actually am. It makes me afraid of my own shadow. Makes me want to hide somewhere never to be found again.

I get scared easily. All these sad feelings lurking, lying in wait to pounce on me. Sadness scares me like anything. I'm afraid of it just like kids are scared of the bogeman. I actually feel like it's sitting under my bed and I just can't put my legs down because it will come and get me.

Enough of this. I'm happy right now and enjoying it. Happy without any reason and those who've felt this way know that it's like being on a high (whatever that means). Anyway, I don't think happiness actually needs some reason. You just need to create that place inside your head. Yes, lately, I've realized I love a lot many people. In fact, almost everyone I come across I find myself loving. It's never been easier than it is now. I feel like telling them, yes, I love you. Yes, I do, I do. Again, feel scared of being misinterpreted in this modern world. What a beautiful world it is! No, I'm not being sarcastic. I mean it. Being sick has had this affect on me. In fact, I think this tirade is partly motivated by the sickness.

That's another thing I hate apart from sadness; sickness! Being sick makes me sick. Then there's the L word: Loneliness. I had been lonely for a bit. Yes, for a while I was. I've come to this conclusion (maybe others have too, before me) that being alone sucks. It's the worst thing in the world. You realize soon enough that you're not an island. I kept getting a picture of "The Man Who Loved Islands" by D.H. Lawrence. Often, I've pictured myself as that man and that thought runs shivers down my spine. No more lameduck thoughts for me.

So, what should I say now? Guess, I started thinking again. LOL! Too much thinking and then the thoughts go away. Dissipate. Vanish. Just like ether. I think I'll finish this on the fact that I'm in love. Never found it easier. Never been in love this much and it feels good to be in love with so many people and things.

"Love... love is strange...
Many people take it for a game..."

So, beautiful ones, keep coming so I have more to love.

Poem For Cornelia

Mar 9, 2005

Poem For Cornelia

You looked sad when I first saw you through the window
But then I looked into those eyes, the windows to your soul.
In them I saw a universe taking birth
In them I saw a world taking shape.
In you I saw the changing of seasons.
I saw Autumn change into spring; I saw you blossom
with the plum, cherry and almond blossom trees.
I saw what you could not see and now I know you will see it too
The coming of your spring, for eternity.

MSNBC - Babes Up in Arms

MSNBC - Babes Up in Arms

So much for workers' rights. Ha!

Untitled

...

I called out to my God. I knew that He was in that light or maybe He was the Light.

And I realized, I could be light too. I wanted to reach out to that light and be a part of it. To touch that warm light. And I realized, I could feel His warmth even from such millenial distances. I got up on my feet and started running towards it. But still, I was nowhere near it. The source of the light was constant. It neither dimmed nor brightened. There was no day or night. If there was any, then I was in the twilight. Night lay behind me with a gaping mouth and day stood ahead with extended arms that never quite reached out to me. I thought I was being driven into madness.

So, I realized that in this state, madness would be much better than sanity: running but never quite reaching anywhere.

I called out to my God and I thought I heard humming...

And how fast I ran, faster than the speed of light and still I was far, far away from destiny, from that cool-warm light that was so beckoning and enticing that the feelings of claustrophobia were lost upon me. The percepts of my mind became faster than they ever were.

Sadness turned into happiness even though I was still so far away. It was sheer joy...

Na tha kochh, to Khoda tha, koch na hota, to Khoda hota

July/August 2002: from my little book

A thorn in YOUR flesh

But where was he going? He began to come out of his trance of delight and liberty. Deep within him he felt the steady burning of shame in the flesh. As yet he could not bear to think of it. But there it was submerged beneath his attention, the raw, steady-burning shame.

It behoved him to be intelligent. As yet he dared not remember what he had done. He only knew the need to get away, away from everything he had been in contact with.

But how? A great pang of fear went through him. He could not bear his shamed flesh to be put again between the hands of authority. Already the hands had been laid upon him, brutally upon his nakedness, ripping open his shame and making him maimed, crippled in his own control.

The Thorn In The Flesh
D.H. Lawrence

And how far will you go before you can get away from it? The voices will always follow you as they have been for more than 15 years.

Enjoy the silence now.

Obituary

As soon as I signed in, Asad asks me if I had heard the news and I said, "What news?" With this deadweight feeling that I knew it was not good I told him not to tell me if it was something bad and then it comes, "Didn't you hear about Sir Hidayatullah?

no
dont tell me

And to make the news come slowly, I said, "I wasn't online."

But I had known what was coming. He had cancer but I still asked how and when. It didn't really matter how and when.

Sir Hidayatullah was dead.

He had died the day before yesterday. I cried a lot when I heard it and I cried even as I typed all this.

"I cant believe that he's dead".

He was a great man. Sir was an institution, an asset, that has now been forever lost.

I thought about his kid, the one who was our junior. I liked him a lot. Not just because he was a good guy but I guess mostly because he was that great's man's son as well. The last time I went to IMSciences, I asked him about Sir's health. It was well known in IMS circles that Sir had stepped down when his cancer was diagnosed, and now he was dead.

I dont' know if many people sound my sentiments for Sir but he was one of the first people in my life as a university student to have impressed me. He never taught any of our undergraduate class but we had this confidence in ourselves due to his leadership

It was this leadership that got him into trouble with many of the authorities in the bureaucratic set up of the university. His dream of seeing IMS as a great and independent institute, one at par with LUMS and IBA was shattered when IMS was broken into two pieces due to the vested interests of a few. Though our part of IMS has gone downhill since, Sir's long term vision led the other half to new heights.

I remember the many who used to say, "Sciences will not take off. Sciences is (sir) Hidayatullah's personal pet." I didn't agree with them and he proved it when he stepped down and let someone else take it from there. Even as he was stepping down, Sciences was setting new standards and many of us saw it when we used to visit it. Today that other IMS is headed by another capable head but it was Sir's auspicious leadership, which has put IMSciences where IMStudies hasn't been able to reach yet and maybe not in the next few years.

We've always been the students of Sir's IMS first. The visionary's IMS, the one that didn't want to churn out clods but kids who turned into businesspeople. It was that vision that I remember from my first day in IMS where Mr. Zia ul Qamar addressed us.

"...You are the future of this institution, of this Province. We want you to be at par with the undergraduates of IBA and LUMS. We want that you should look and talk like business graduates and not just ordinary university folks..."

Though that vision was lost halfway through the middle for us, it's still alive for many other people. I wish there were more leaders like Sir. I know there are among us. We might not know it. We might not believe it but it's true. I hope that our part of IMS, IMStudies, will have a renaissance and that it also gets the visionary leadership that Sir had had.

Sir, we'll miss you.

Ushering in the New Year

So it has begun... on a sad note, the year 2005. I can't believe that just yesterday i.e., in 2001, I was only 20 years old. :

Nopes, I'm not feeling sorry about getting older. What I feel bad about is that as a 20 year old, I had positivity (believe it or not!), I was very hopeful about everything (yes, that includes myself as well) and I was wiser. As time has gone by, I've become stupid, negative and downright idiotic with too many expectations and far less efforts to put in. Haaa! I don't have any new year's resolutions as usual. They're made to be broken anyway. BUT! I've decided, I'll try to be a wee bit more positive. Things might not always go my way but then who the hell ever says that things have gone their way; so to hell with perfection. :P

Untitled

For the Tsunami victims...

Ghar hamara, jo na rotay bhi to veeran hota
behr gar behr na hota, to bayaban hota

Tangi e dil ka gila kya, yeh woh kafir dil hai
ke agar tang na hota, to pareshan hota...

Asadullah Ghalib

From Deewan e Ghalib

Crocus: After Valentine's

I always wanted to write this poem. Imagine that. In any case, one could say it's for the blatant commercialism that plagues Valentine's Day or the concept of love or love itself (if there's any such thing called love). For myself, it's something else. Just ironic how things never last.

10:30 pm Friday, December 17, 2004

Crocus: After Valentine's

Losing their color
in a white enamel vase,
crocuses wilt,
feelings die
after valentine’s day.