Shubnum Khan's Blog, page 13

A Moment (from on the roof)

I stand on a rooftop looking down at the street.

Waiting.
my heart,
an ache,
pulled taut,

there's a hundred roses that day
suspended from the sky.

Quote (Novel)

'I could only reply that I think - I theorise - that something - something else - happens to the memory over time. For years you survive with the same loops, the same facts and the same emotions. I press a button marked Adrian or Veronica, the tape runs, the usual stuff spools out. The events reconfirm the emotions - resentments, a sense of injustice, relief - and vice versa. There seems no way of accessing anything else; the case is closed.'
Julian Barnes - A Sense of an Ending

A Moment (on the couch)

One evening in Durban, F gave me two letters. One from Aisha and the other from Zeeshan. Written words for me, down the mountain in a bag, on a plane. And I, stunned, opened them, read them, my heart bursting, the pain so strong I could not see anything but blurred words for a moment.

Ah, I thought, and so life still surprises you, still has the ability to shake you, make you feel something in your bones.

A Moment (in the mosque)

I walk up the hill, walk along a winding narrow street and at the top I find a mosque (later, I tell myself the mosque found me). I wrap a scarf from around my neck on my head, climb up, remove my shoes (hide them low on the shelf, afraid that someone will steal my shoes - odd the fears that arise when travelling alone) and walk up the red carpeted stairs, four floors to the top. The signs tell me I shouldn't enter, that I am unclean and yet, I have to go in, know I would regret if I don't. A woman, as always in any mosque is sleeping in the corner, I find a spot on the balcony overlooking the main mosque space, put my head into my hands and think I will say a prayer, but instead, I find my face wet and then when I think I had nothing left to offer, I begin to weep. Head in hands, a shawl wrapped haphazardly around my head, on that dusty carpet, I feel after a long time, what I have forgotten.

God is merciful. God is kind. He is always close.

My whole body shakes into my hands.

Later, walking down the hill, I stop at the Iranian pizza place. Drink tea. Listen to stories of men who came to this country and slept in churches in the winter. I thank God. Listen to the night passing by. Say my name out loud, to myself, to remember who I am. A truck is passing in the narrow street, calling out something, bumping along with its wares. I walk home. The ground begins to fall, the lights filling the street.

God is kind.

Quote (A Sense of An Ending)

'How often do we tell our own life story? How often do we adjust, embellish, make sly cuts? And the longer life goes on, the fewer are those around to challenge our account, to remind us that our life is not our life, merely the story we have told about our life. Told to others, but - mainly - to ourselves.'

Julian Barnes - A Sense Of An Ending

A Moment (in the former French Concession)

Sitting under a tree on the sidewalk at night in the French Concession, the Italian women, who work for a designer, dressed in heels , bright red lipstick, laugh loudly, smoke cigarettes from small silver cases, tell us about their friend who is getting married, how they are taking her away for the weekend even though it will rain. They are mesmerising, we are mesmerised, surprised ourselves to be sitting amongst them, and I am too conscious of my flat shoes, my flat hair, my flat voice and I listen, take in the night, the smell of smoke, the laughter, I smile, catch the eye of the Dutch writer, she smiles too, knowing just as I know, how perfect nights can unexpectedly emerge from nervous nights, how these are the moments that can be pinned down later in history, trapped flutterings of nostalgia when every single second is perfect.

The End of Anything is Sad More So When it is Life

The orchid fell now. Right in front on the desk.

The ending of anything is sad, I find and more so when it's life. Today we passed a dead cat. A policeman, smoking a cigarette was looking down at it. I wanted to take a photo, fumbling for my phone, I missed the moment as he walked off. As we passed the cat, it twitched, and I knew then that it was dying, not dead and we were passing it in the moment of death and I walked faster, looked away, unable to watch that moment when life ended. I once saw a poisoned rat in the garden, stumble, in death and grindingly come to a halt in full view of our patio.

I cried, I don't why, for it was only a rat and we had poisoned it ourselves and I thought I was harder than that, harder than most things and people. 

The sense of an ending

The orchid fell now. Right in front on the desk.

The ending of anything is sad, I find and more so when it's life. Today we passed a dead cat. A policeman, smoking a cigarette was looking down at it. I wanted to take a photo, fumbling for my phone, I missed the moment as he walked off. As we passed the cat, it twitched, and I knew then that it was dying, not dead and we were passing it in the moment of death and I walked faster, looked away, unable to watch that moment when life ended. I once saw a poisoned rat in the garden, stumble, in death and grindingly come to a halt in full view of our patio.

I cried, I don't why, for it was only a rat and we had poisoned it ourselves and I thought I was harder than that, harder than most things and people. 

Quote (Poetry)

'And I cried. For myself. For this woman talkin’ about love. For all the women who have ever stretched their bodies out anticipating civilization and finding ruins.'

-Sonia Sanchez

Quote

'And I cried. For myself. For this woman talkin’ about love. For all the women who have ever stretched their bodies out anticipating civilization and finding ruins.'

-Sonia Sanchez