Chiaroscuro Poem by Meer Mushfique Mahmood

(for Mr. Kawsar, my friend)

Dear, won’t we walk hand to hand....
this evening’s tiresome travel,
travel through this path with dim delight?

.....................................weary we are
puzzled with blinks of puzzled lights
puzzled I and puzzled you
puzzled within blinks of darkness’ sight

......bright times(!) ours’ on a café table or on a park bench
endless searching for meaningless meanings
and eccentric excitement we have, and drawing artful art and......
tend to nothing to nothingness to numb nerve
to negotiate with clichés of life.....

Oh desperate dreams
Oh deadly desires
I am undone..........
...........I am undone
................................
my roses that amaze my heart
spread their wings and fly to the yonder sky
and restless I am in my earth
suffering and suffering and suffering............

Dear, don’t you see the destroyed castles?
don’t you feel the dreams murdered in your home?
buds torn in your garden?
birds flued within your yard?

.......and paranoid I am........and paranoid you are.......