Omer Tarin

  Was this the town I called ‘Home’ For so many years, after My father’s death?   His home was here. The house still stands And the maggots that infest it. Writhing, slithery creatures, Black to the sight, Drooling over the rocks, Like prunes gone bad.   The rest is all changed. The town itself, I mean— The distant valleys strewn with pines, The old poplars along the roads, The mown grass fragrant in the breeze, Slow-moving clouds etched against the hills --All gone.   It is sad this slum, With its shops, Bus stops, Garages And more shops,   Fat women and scummy men   That’s all that’s to it, and memories of another Abbottabad.   -----------  -------------------- ---------------------------  from Riverbeds Flowing, 1999 

  An old man With an exasperating song— No two ways about it.  Syllables and branches Ran into the woods.  In maimed silence, Sour, pickled smile  -------- -------------------- -----------------------------  ----------------  from Riverbeds Flowing 1999 

  I saw her catch love in a mirror, the almond of her eyes blossoming into truth;   I saw him freeze in that moment, pitching the tent of his wandering upon her doorstep;    When the kohl of night  stained the ivory of their cheeks I stole quietly by, holding my breath within the hollow of my hands;   Not even the soul dare suspire on the brink of love's embrace.   ---------------------------------------------------------------------   from Riverbeds Flowing 1999 

  Then, to be awake in the sound and harmony Is to be deluged by the flowing murmurs Of divinity;   A host of godlings enduring this captivity Ripen into a molten core And burst out of silence Clamouring for attention;   That which we call “brain cells” Achieve fusion with the blood And trysting within the heart Become as mindful as the tender Green mosses;   Birds and butterflies, Slanting in the sunshine Come alive And every wing, feather, leaf and bough Stands out in vivid relief Talking from world to world, with the boundless potential Of spirit passing into spirit;   I shudder and they laugh, “ Hic vigilans somniat ”—“He dreams awake”.         ---------  -----------------  -------------------  --------------  from the collection Riverbeds Flowing , 1999 

  The frenzied clash and din Of horsemen Sounds about my ears, As in the harshness of the morning I see The rocks glistening with razor-sharp dewdrops;   It was a remote valley, this valley, Quiet and gentle yet also a fierce land Feuding with itself And here, it was a disgrace To be born anything but a boy;   So, she surprised me, For other girls , more demure, Fought only with barbed tongues- She, a tomboyish figure, would rather Punch your head in, Herding her father’s sheep with the boys of the clan;   I asked he is she was actually an Amazon, born I suppose, centuries later Than her wont? She said No, defiantly, But said, when I was born, My mother wept Tears of shame and cried out ‘’You are cruel God, Why send me a girl? Take her back! She lies heavy , like a stone upon my heart!’’   That Is the curse I was born beneath- And therefore I labour To wash my stain And endeavor to be As much ma...

  Dawn lingered over the river,                     Unearthly hues dancing across The conical heights of snowbound ranges Yawning in pantomime, Shivering in anticipation Of the sun’s warm promise;   When the icicles melt Life returns To pools of frozen crystal, Once again, waters meandering down To the great, roaring torrent;   Once again, The soul’s immemorial longings cascade;               --------   ---------------- ------------------ ------------------ ------------------ From Canto 3, The Harvest Season of Love Songs, 1997    

  In the dead of winter I wept Praying and prostrating myself Upon the cloth of your infinite compassion;   Were I a musician, I would express your elusiveness In symphony, Weaving songs on violins;   Were I a poet, I would declaim your mystery In rhapsody, Walking soundlessly on words;   I am neither tonight   Never having learned, I am not adept At recalling An event that transcends All attempts, Transcends language and form, Transcends communication Into the fatal realization Of my own meaningless;   Half-veiled,my friend, I solicit the madness Which is past cure; Burnt am I, out of all delusion, Groveling in a delightful insanity;   At times, I may come Close to loving you.               ---------    -----------------------------    --------------- -------------- From Canto 8, The Harvest Season of Love Songs, 1...

  Beggars sat huddled In harried rows;   Their bowls were made From burnished gourds;   The Market was full Of people And every provision, Fruits were in abundance, Fowls quite plentiful, The grain-store was good;   Yet, I heard the howling of dogs, Wretched skeletons Groveling in the gutters, Beside themselves with misery, Shouting their starvation to the world, Unfulfilled creatures, Unhappy with their lot, Fast-fading into oblivion, Their gullets choked with the gall Of a violent hatred; Meanwhile, t he dance had begun When I bestirred myself To participate; Their voices rose in lavender tints Evaporating in the mists, Roses fell in profusion And the cobbled by-ways Clattered under my feet, Clouds of roses Clusters of lavender, The fragrant echoes of a music, heard And easily remembered, Staining the garment of undress, with The hues of a glory long-forgotten, Alive somewhere Within the ca...

  The dead land , cracked and parched for the rains of mercy lies spreadeagled along the way; the bitter thorns of the Kikar tree threaten menacingly , and the wells are all poisoned with hypocrisy         -------     -----------    ------------   ----   From The Harvest Season of Love Songs 1997 , cc  

 The wine of life sparkled in her eyes  in zest and joy  and vintage vitality ;  Beneath a blooming bough she bent for  the sweet sugar plums that were proffered;  And I saw, too, reflected there in those eyes the energy she drew from Nature and love and all that was new; Sweet dreams, awash in moonlight,  Pathways of stars that twinkled in the night, White doves that cooed songs of springs yet to come-- white-frosted winters, sultry summers, the sheer sensuous exuberation,  light flotation on fairy wings, of the mad musicality of the mind under the solstice sun, by gushing rills and fantasies of garland flowers;  Thus Nature spoke to her, in all its eloquence-- the waltzing wind led her round and round  the grassy knoll and old, hoar trees swayed in time,  and hummed a tune or two;  The momentary magic  I thus beheld  enthralled me and it seemed, for a second,  as if all the joy, all the vitality ever,  had...

 I told him the world was going places.  But he wouldn't believe me me and only smiled and said I was making a fool out of him; As if I needed to !  He tilled his ancestral tithe and cringed low before those who lived by his credulity;  I told him men had visited the moon,  but he frowned and said 'twas blasphemous--  Why, his wretched old nag could not make it  to the top of the hill,  and the moon, he knew,  was much much farther !  And anyway, what was the use  of going there? He had his land  and was content,  or at least he thought he was , because  they told him he should be.  Only, he said,  with a strange yearning in his eyes,  he thought a lot  at night  when the moon was out, and wondered  what it must be like, up there?   --------- ----------------- --------------------  ---------  from The Anvil of Dreams 1995 

 He is a young man with a young man's walk, but old Blancmange;  Too sweet by far, too much by far, the syrupy confectioner of his own legend;  His is a rummy's smile, boozed up with his own self-importance-- ''Yes, yes'',he says with every bone, with the marrow, with his supple soul;  The master-balladeer, singer of panegyrics, rotating prayer-wheel of servile supplication, intricate carpet of covetousness, clever and intricate no less, most likely to succeed I'm sure, young yes-man, pimp of the soul,  cradle dog. In youth, at least,  one should not be so.  ----------- ------------------- ----------------  from The Anvil of Dreams, 1995 

 I follow the glitter of a far-off star in my wid, wild wanderings marching to the rhythmic throbbing  of a distant drum drumming its stocatto sequence,  sharp; I hear the elliptical music of the spheres play out their concordant harmonies, heaven's grand chorals,  as I dance in time to an unearthly waltz whirling; All this, while waiting for the final curtain-call-  ''Bravo! Bis! Fortissimo!'' But tell me, now,  what shall I do  for an encore?   ----------  -----------------  -------------------- ------------------- ---------- from Burnt Offerings 1996 

 I consecrate you, twin-horned ram, to ritual glory; You may celebrate  your consecration  before the butcher comes to cut your throat . . . .  --------   ------------  ------------- ------------------  From The Anvil of Dreams 1995 

  Balsam nights, nights heavy with perfume, balsam-scented earth at first rising of the full moon;   And the hard roads that led to different destinations, the hard roads mellowed into silken strips of asphalt, bathed with particular guile, smothered in sudden mystery;   All of a sudden did I see a wraith-like figure swaying, dark and musical? Did I see such a thing? Under a sweet moon, such dark shining? Something or someone swayed, some voices whispered some softt things, under the tamarinds, against that subtle light, a silhouette glowed, glided and was gone. Where am I now?  -------------------------- ------------------------ ---------------------------  From  A Sad Piper 1994   

Wide, dirty swathes of grey are there under the mountains and over them where clouds and dust become the horizons of distant scenes;   No architect planned their facades and they grow out of the soil, tumuli of mud and dung blended with straw dreams- these cottages know something about the seasons, the song of the thrush, about the hearts of men and the bellowing of oxen in far pastures;   As stolid as peasants, they quietly sit, oblivious to the haste of centuries.   ------------  ----------------- ------------------- ------------------  From Riverbeds Flowing, 1999 ed  (an earlier version appeared in an edition of A Sad Piper but it was extensively revised thereafter) 

  Not me, I know the ghouls in the grass and often fear the waking dream;   The cage is quiet- quiet, quiet how many times must we go through it? Forever foolish we begin with laughter and end with slaughter;   I melt like fudge and you harden like nougat, again the chill descends we're ever closer but never near;   I feel lost among the angels where I stand, lost demon, I'm a stork gone to seed a worm to start with woe and end with why;   Small birds peck my cheek this week's its starling-time, whispering its hoarse, dusty whisper- when leaves fall, I fall with woods of them, entire woods, the bluebottle falls your lap's finer;   I desire the freedom of the fen- the fen, the fen! All else is dead I am dust Can't be more Can't be less man is forever steeped in lust;   The wheel has come full circle I dreamt of you again where I left you- Unless I never did.  ----...

Well-defined lines mark your face the etchings of a master hand, the sheer symbols of hanging anguish, the hempen ropes of fate, the scars of mortal combat, ambidextrous designs of duplicity, reflecting mirrors of the torn and bleeding soul, bathed in the crimson of life's slow spluttering, the guttering of a dying fire, the shattering of the cerebral chandelier, the deep-pitted ravine of accumulated hates, the bloated wine-skins of anger, of pent-up emotions tarnishing the spirit, the horrid rattling of skeletal hopes, the burning of the weal, the branding of the self.   Yet, inspite of all, you wear your stigmas well, in defiance of your deep damnation.   ---------- --------------- ------------------- -----------------------  from A Sad Piper, 1994 

Your ravishments dear heart, are the bane of my existence and its  sole supports; Some thirty summers have I pledged my faith in utter servitude  upon the altar of your infidel love; My candle is burnt at both ends and I wax lyrical in the expiring shadows of your waning moon.   --------- ----------------- --------------------- ----------------- from Burnt Offerings, 1996 

 Read my lips dark-haired one of the secret shades- I shall say it only once, so take it to heart; Memorise the litany of your erstwhile desire, the broken-stemmed rustle  of my ragged soul, the carillon of a ringing love, fleetingly mirrored on the smudgy canvas of our parting ways; Seek yourself somewhere within me, maybe I shall be yours. ------- ------------------  ------------------  ---------------------- --------  From Burnt Offerings, 1996 

  The wheeling kites remind me of carrion crows, impiously impaled on barbed wire hanging in silent frieze against the twilight; Sudden blast of wind sets the guttering candle aflame sputtering in the morbid motions of its death-dance, the strange contortions of its finality; Look, how the garden lies plundered- Once silken petals ripped off their stems lie in decrepit decay, edged with brown, dried as old parchment and as brittle, reminders of a forgotten fragrance;   The roses are dead, lost memories, rotting where they fell.  ------  ---------------  ---------------------  -----------------  from A Sad Piper 1994 

  Had I seen the ghosts of this place they would dance their victory dance; Glorious vale Cup, chalice, basin; the glacial streams empty into that lake quiet, ever so silent, rippling lyre, reflection; Snows and rocks frame it; I have no words, only emotions which boil and rise with the thunder of horses the sound of stick and ball thudding across the turf; The ghosts of this place, had I but seen them, pale as the snow cold as the lake vivid as the night fires that light the valley- the whistle of wind the throb of drum the chant of song- had I seen the ghosts dance their victory dance...  ---------  -------------- ---------------- ---------------- ---------------- from A Sad Piper 1994