Half a Confession IV (final)

TO BE DEAD AND STILL IN LOVE!

> St Martens hospital! It is a hospital in Canterbury for the mentally ill. I
> spent 2 weeks there as a student (part of our rotation;)….a period
> where the line separating sanity from the other side became as thin as a
> hair. And I honestly do not know what is more painful to see, a body in pain
> or a mind insane? Touched with fire, was a title of a book about how artists
> tend to have psychiatric issues. I began reading it about that time and felt
> just as this passion for knowledge and creativity is in me, I have been
> touched with fire too…and if there is no check…I would spiral into myself
> and loose touch with reality.
>
> At first glance the patients there do not `look` sick. A 70 year old woman
> looked like an average 70 yr old woman but the difference surfaces- she was convinced
> she was pregnant and completely refused to take her medication because ``it will
> kill the baby``.

> I remember meeting this girl…beautiful, tall with a face like the moon…convinced
> that she was a saint…and as she sat there speaking in riddles, oblivious of her
> schizophrenic truth, her mother breaks down because you can not stop loving your
> daughter, even though she frightens the hell out of you. The mad are
> human…but how they leaves us so disconcerted and uneasy. A tough two weeks. A reality far from the dreams of rainbows and butterflies.
>
> So I was more comfortable in a medical hospital. Although some days
> watching death and pain up-front was too disturbing to put in words, one
> learned to focus. I worked on an oncology ward. Patients would
> vomit as they approached the hospital for chemo. Even before the drugs were
> swimming in their blood, and burning their veins, the memory of it all was
> enough to make them vomit. How their world falls apart as their body becomes
> its own enemy, starves itself. I learned to appreciate every moment I can
> stand and breath without pain.
>
> Every patient was unique. Some wanted to fight, to live, to go home and ride
> their horse, to smile and I was able to talk about how shalwar kameez is not
> a sari as I browsed through their charts..medical histories, divorced mother
> of 2, occupation Doctor! The glares of irony as she watches her life trade places.
>
> Others had given up, or were still in denial…they didn`t even see me as I
> worked, tears streamed down their faces….Possibly a British thing, be
> reserved about the pain…stone faced…silently swallow the tears because `we
> do not want to attract attention`. I was silent with them, soft with them
> and listened more.
>
> Pyari was a kind ive never met…yet I know she rages in many of those dying
> women. In all of us. Reading Half confessions has illustrated how wel you can get
> into the mind of another... its an art and here is my take on the story.

Some Memories never fade. And even on ones death bed, those people come come, every single one. Temporal, one does not need a photographic memory to experience a rush of the past.
> `You said my photographic memory was an unfair aid for those scholastic
> skirmishes? I vividly recall every moment I shared with Kid.` Pyari, if you
> hear me it is not only the curse of those with photographic memories, i
> assure you.
>
>
> ``Why do you want me to lose self respect, vegetate and whither away? This
> will never happen. Your resolve not to be my Kevorkian oddly gives me
> strength.`` I wonder why that is? May be to know one still lives and has a
> choice to live well despite not possessing and being possessed by their true
> love. That the world doesn`t stop…and survival of self is beyond any
> external control.
>

> When your companions are hallucinations and machines, chemicals making you sick in the stomach, sick in the brain, the unimaginably hollow are the days. Unbearably long.
> ``...the night passes by somehow -- but the day drags on interminably.`` Mind you, I do not feel sorry that she was sick. I feel pity for her that after all the people she brought close, no one was there beside her..and even he…the shit, did not have the courtesy to be
> there. He clears his concscience with just a few letters. Could he not hear what she was
> saying?…her anger, her submission to him, ultimately the wishes of a dying
> woman? To come clean. But then again I forget `E` yes that complicated constant
> in his life. But all he gave back were words…and even I can be called
> blasphemous for saying words mean nothing. They are merely foam on the
> surface of a stream. BUBBLES BURSTING INTO NOTHINGNESS...

``…and I feel so close to the Ultimate Force`` to know it is time…and look
> back at life brings ``God`` in the picture big time!!!!then the spiritual
> pyari, the peaceful pyari, the saved pyari, the pyari who has forgiven
> emerges out of her anger. ``but I still do believe in goodness -- your new
> world order be good -- no prophets, no rituals, no dogmas -- just
> individual`s conscience as the guide.`` I hope you are right pyari.
>
> My favourite bit!!!!!!``you really think I would ask you to intercede? Hah --
> I have to pay my dues -- we all do -- inescapable --and you know very well
> that I have never deliberately hurt anyone -- only myself -- and of course
> my loved ones -- we all have a right to do so -- I have a right to do so…``
> Really paayaari? Or have you justified this to feel lighter and somewhat
> relinquish the apologies you owe?

>Pyari loved to love and leave...even in the end she did the same...because
> that is all she expereinced in the past...being loved and being left!``I was
> lulled by love induced stupor -- classic euphoric blindness -- and when I
> returned to reality he was gone`` We can be so stupid at times, and till now
> we romanticize this swept away emotion, we wait for the serotonins to kick
> in and then fly with holl``o``wood imaginings of what being in love is. Blindly accepting, ``falling`` into a self induced hypnosis…a cancer of the heart…attacking itself…then swimming into the ocean in delirium, when the opium wears off... when the aching limbs go limp you find
> your self miles away from the shore, miles away from the horizon…in the
> deep. No return.

> Love conquers all. That is what i see in the story. As Pyari completed her suicide notes in instalments she came to terms with her first love being her eternal love…and all the twists
> and turns she took her on her journey away from him brought her right back to him. With him is where she eventually reached. Why did she still love him when he left her to become what she became…incomplete, bitter, disillusioned, vulnerable, poisonous?
> Why did she still love him so intenesely, that her last words ever, were to him? Because
> love conquers all, even pain of betrayal and the ache of rejection. Imagine
> temporal, the words she wrote, the swearing, the cussing, was part of a long last
> exhale, uninhibited, honest yet ending with love…
>
`put me next to the Ghalib books on your shelf, promise...`

Even dead she wanted to remain close to him…the important word to not above is not Ghalib…it is YOUR! She was not a bitch, she was just still in love with him. Dead and still in
> love.

> What I am confused about is do I like pyari…or not. I don`t know, let me
> wait to find an urn next to some Ghalib books on a shelf and make that
> decision. Facinating..To be dead and still in love...

Wordly feelings

Between You and Your Love

Harris Khalique

Published by Fazleesons (Pvt) Ltd, Karachi

Price: Rs 150

Pages: 68

By Mohsin S Jaffri

Economics, engineering and community service; mix all them up and what do you get as a result is a sensitive, observant and imaginative poet, named Harris Khalique. One may ask what these faculties/disciplines have to do with the making of a poet. Well, apparently not much but when one is looking for the source(s) of a poet`s inspiration then suddenly a lot of things become relevant and important. For instance, studying economics may enable one make a sense of wealth and poverty; engineering may bring one closer to the aesthetics of art and architecture; and community service may create feelings for one`s socio-cultural environs and fellow human beings. All this may help readers develop an understanding of Harris Khalique`s poetry and a number of human issues he has written about in the book under review.

Writing in blank verse, Harris Khalique has shown deep understanding of human relationships and their linkages with life`s many facets. The poet has an urge to speak about the subjects ranging from the dream world of romance, innocence and exalted pleasure to the burden of living everyday life. While feel the pain of deprived humanity, what he says reflects his grasp and understanding of the good and the bad in society. At times, he revels in the sweetness of solitude, at others he combats with inner turmoil. But he sees beauty, which ordinary eye cannot see. The poet appears to be waging a continuous struggle within himself -- for defining his own self, for understanding and admitting truth.

In a poem entitled Taking it on...,he says:

I never fall in love

I rise to it.

I love and love again.

Passionately.

Faithfully, faithlessly.

Poetry is literature at it best. But the ingredients needed to produce this `best` are simple to describe -- express your feelings in the language you know best. First feel and then dress those feelings in the most suitable words. This is how poets shape their poetry. An incident, a happening or an occasion, no matter how meaningful or meaningless for an ordinary observer, may arouse in poets feelings which others don`t feel or can`t express. Poets have the ability not only to feel differently but also invest their feelings with different meanings through the style of their expression.

A few bomb blasts in Karachi, innocent people dying in Kashmir, death, disruption and destruction elsewhere, are some of the incidents that trigger Harris Khalique`s poetic imagination. He writes:

With gunpowder

Srinagar and Karachi are

cleansed.

We are not given time to

burry the dead.

We carry them,

They are heavy.

We are always tired, always

thirsty.

But we fail to choose a water

tap

and drink tears --

What Harris writes is deeply entwined with social and cultural realities. He observes life from close quarters. In fact, he first experiences and then analyses the ritual of various relationships. This ritual is so easy to question but so difficult to understand and so complicated to examine. It is the subtleness in presenting a complex idea that Harris excels in. It is this ability of his that renders the common into sublime.

In his poem In the vehicle of life, Harris reflects:



There comes a time in

relationships,

when your partner becomes a

glove compartment

where you put the registration

and insurance paper,

license to drive and tax

receipts.

All very important documents

but needed only when

someone asks for them,

at a check-post on a highway,

after midnight.

He travels from the present to the past and comes back again to reveal a startling insight. What is more interesting is that he comes out with an idea which is present in most poetry but the style that Harris chooses makes it much more effective. In Hope, he says:

Just before the sunset

when the sun looks tired,

withdrawn,

approachable,

and does not mind us staring

at it,

a middle-aged farmer,

with his two boys and a girl,

appears on the road that goes

straight to the sun,

cutting across the fields of

grass.

He waves at every vehicle

passing by

Asking for a ride.

Harris is a multifaceted writer and poet, writing both in English and Urdu, and showing concern and understanding.

dost-mittar: I actually know one desi woman who not only uses exactly the same language, but seem to be the exact character of this piece! apart from the dying bit. But strangely enough she dies after every episode of her life and then learns to live with whatever there is.

Temporal: bravely done! I like the realistic touch.

two thanks are in order …first, a heartfelt thank you to the elusive chowkstaff for their show of faith and courage…

second, similar feelings for those who read this work of fiction

individual replies will come shortly

t

this was a really well written and absorbing read.

aside from the meanings, it was the free flowing style of the author that did great justice with this piece.

.......... i would have liked to know piyari

Actually, dost mittar I would disagree with you on a few things.

I was actually pleased that the character sounded so female...including her language. True to her character which seems blunt and irreverent and non conformist. Obviously she is not a shy, wallflower type of woman so her words rang true for me.

I beleive in writing as it comes to the writer. I don`t agree with editing fiction just to suit some imagiend audience. I also liked the switching to urdu/hindi and back because that`s how so many people talk in real life. However, even if you don`t know hindi/urdu u still get the piece. You mihgt lose something but not too much.

I liked this t. Sorry that it`s the last one

Read all your four installments at one go. You have captured very well the feelings of the dying character but the words are definitely yours. While I am not a prude in matters of language, I think that the language used is probably more typical of desi men than women.
Just a minor point: are the audience all desis? If so, no problem; if not, there are too many urdu sentences for a non-desi. In the third installment, you switch from english to urdu and then translate it back to english. Yeh kuchh ajeeb sa lagta hai.

Enjoyed reading it.

t - this one followed so quickly on III that I`m still a bit wobbly.

let me start with the last one then. right in the middle when she starts quoting that poem I was a bit taken aback because it somehow didnt fit into who I thought she was. Not that I didnt expect her to know any poetry but that she seemed a person who would rather use her own words than someone else`s to portray her feelings. But then I thought perhaps it was because she was weakening so fast, she had to lean on another`s spirit when her own was working overtime. I was mulling that when...

she was back! It fit in so much better when she used the Saqi example because that seemed like her. I won`t ask you if she is real or not (although I`m fairly itching to) but it`s been wonderful reading her.

-- am :)