Category: Fragments

If His Highness could relate to anyone, that would be Bahadur Shah Zafar. The last Mughal Emperor. Had Delhi Sultanate. Metaphorically. Was robbed of that too. Exiled. And died in Burma in 1862. Couldn’t even pay Ghalib enough.

But then, if Ghalib would have been paid enough, we wouldn’t have Deevan-e-Ghalib. His letters were all about pain, grief, poverty, and passing life on a day-to-day basis. With alcohol. Not without.

This reminds me of an actor who once said that you must become filthy rich before becoming a philosopher. That could be categorized as the most idiotic utterance of words. Socrates, Nietzsche Rousseau, Marx, and His Highness would be very offended.

Anyway. Deviation is an art.

Now here. From earning enough to managing life abroad easily to trying random restaurants randomly to driving around the city for hours without a reason to here. Now. Not day-to-day but month-to-month. By the end of each, its counting of days. To repeat the same.  

Now imagine your whole life like that. Your 20s and 30s being spent that way, where you enjoy the first 10 days of the month to moaning in the last 10. Passing 10 out of 30 days in an upper middle to poor class in a loop. Now calculate this. Its around 7 years out of 20 spent in waiting for the cycle to end.

There is another cycle. For the uncircumcised gender. That too is monthly. You can relate to it through this if you cannot relate to it otherwise.

Now imagine another scenario. You have both. Both cycles each month. Too sad. That would be the most miserable character of the novel that I didn’t write yet. But I did try. Once.

A meeting was called in the dark around the fire. All the words were called. They were taught to assemble. To make a point that was supposed to be delivered in a single sentence. Words couldn’t gather well. New words were invented but it didn’t work either. A single sentence assembled into a fragment and into an essay and into a novella. The meeting lasted for months, yet it produced a disaster. A novella couldn’t deliver a message. Couldn’t make a point.

If it had one reader, the reader would have been more offended than the writer. How dare you write such a crap? Clap! Clap!

That’s the whole point. From day to day, from month to month, from year to year, from word to word; there is no point. There is only the mockery of existence that was bestowed without consent, yet consent was made a rule to be followed for the rest of the existence, yet – another yet – it was not bestowed enough to end the existence at will.

Relax! That wasn’t philosophy. One must become filthy rich before becoming an idiot.

Those who condemn violence would have condemned Bhagat Singh too. Like Gandhi. He didn’t approve of the revolutionaries.

Without violence, French Revolution wouldn’t have been possible. That same Revolution gave Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity.

Napoleon too. But that’s deviation from the topic.

Maximilien Robespierre – known as the incorruptible – was known for his violence. Without his violence, French common people couldn’t have survived.

Che Guevara. Too cool. All his life was based on violent struggle. Apart from his motorcycle diaries.

And the list can go on and on.

Today, people condemn capital punishment. Even for mass murderers and rapists. I don’t. I’m too pro for capital punishment for murderers and rapists. The world is already overpopulated. Let’s get rid of the scums. At least.

A deviation. Again. No apologies.

But such are the scenarios that are too complicated to have an absolute answer. Because there is never an absolute answer.

Today, with social media stuff, and fragile activists with egos and their faces to be known as recipes for clickbait, and podcasts, and noise, and references to the outdated ideas as if they were the holy scriptures… too much…

Much ado about nothing. But their faces and feces that they spit from their mouths. For fame, name and the game.

These ones would have condemned Bhagat Singh, Che Guevara, and others. And we would have been deprived of the beautiful history of struggle of mankind that we have. At least something to cherish in the books. And nostalgia. For the places where we haven’t lived.

So, I can’t condemn. Can’t condemn everything. Because sometimes, when fires are flamed and bullets are fired, in the right direction, with the right aim, I love that. And that’s absolute.

It’s not Cillian as in Sicily. It’s Killian Murphy. As it’s Kylian Mbappe. That’s the pronunciation.

By the way it’s ‘pronounce’ as it is. But when it’s ‘pronunciation’, it’s proNUNciation. Not proNOUNciation. Because it’s not noun. It’s unnoun.

Like in desi ‘fees’ it’s already plural. ‘Feeses’ is not a word. It’s feces. But that’s another world altogether.

That’s the best His Highness could do. Thank goodness he’s not a teacher. Would be His Lowness.

Still want to learn English from the one who doesn’t even know the definitions of adverb and adsense? Or the types of tenses and the tensions they amass?

A story could be written on that particular lighter. A story could be written on each cigarette lit up by that lighter. Then on all the lighters. And all the cigarettes.

But that lighter was purple. Like the book: the color purple. Only one cigarette has been flames by that one. No. Two. Two cigarettes. At the same time with a small interval of time that was passing through the black hole.

And that’s that. No story could be written on that lighter. No more cigarettes to be ignited by this one. It’s going in the archives without any spark. Or flame. Or shadow. Or anyone to blame.

There’s no story.
No touch.
No tip.
No spark.
No tobacco.
Hence, no ash.
Nothing for this lighter.

Only history of an untold story.

Sadness is saddening. But lucky are those sad women on whom men write words and pages and books and poems of sadness.

For a sad man, there’s no one. Just like there are words and pages and books and poems on motherhood, but almost nothing on fatherhood.

He would be eating a sandwich on a lone bench in a lone park and someone would take his picture that would make some rounds on social media and that’s all.

Unlucky sad men. They have to write sad words and pages and books and poems for themselves; as well as for women.

No one’s going to write on him except himself. And that’s how, men become a tragedy. Either for themselves or the entire society surrounding them.

میں بھی بہت عجیب ہوں اتنا عجیب ہوں کہ بس
خود کو تباہ کر لیا اور ملال بھی نہیں

Then comes crime. And punishment. And abusiveness. And suicide. And harm. And chaos. And a death. Of a filthy man.

Ideally, everyone should have a manuscript written by someone else. A manuscript written individually for each person by the opposite gender. A manuscript of sadness.

For instance, His Highness writing Marla’s sadness in his words for her in her scenario. Giving his words a voice of hers. Marla would be happy with this sadness. Isn’t it? No. She may not. She may not like a certain chapter of the manuscript and that’s how it would go in vain.

But then, someone would find that manuscript after years or decades and that discarded piece would become a classic piece of literature. With that same chapter to be considered as a magnum opus.

However, the reality of the two remained sad regardless of the millions that publishing houses are going to make on their suffering. Because they… got nothing.

And perhaps you got nothing as well.

Being a man is a tragedy. Either for himself or for the society around him.

Being a woman is also a tragedy.

Being a non-binary is another kind of a tragedy.

In fact, being is a tragedy. To be is a tragedy. Only not-to-be is not a tragedy.

Singles are unhappy.

Doubles are also unhappy.

Triples are happy though, but that’s not a long-term setting. Why did I mention that?

Anyway, married ones are definitely unhappy. Everyone’s unhappy. So, everyone is relatable. Socially.

And with that, nothing. I forgot the eulogy. Sorry, epiphany. I forgot the epiphany I had at Jumma. What a miss!

Every summer, I imagined tilting the earth. Like spinning the earth a little – like you off spin in cricket – shifting the southern countries more towards the equator. Resulting in north and south poles – both – moving closer towards the line of equator.

A little more into this and there will be heavenly weathers here. Longer summers in Scandinavia and Europe – imagine beaches of those races, jeez – and people here suiting themselves more into abayas.

The tragedy of insanely hairy people in hotter countries would also be over with this off spin. For heavens! All genders have moustaches here. Duh!

Then I imagine a little more… but comes back to the basics. What is stopping the earth from a little off spin? No one. I’m not.

This was supposed to be the plot of my book. With a little off spin, the whole dystopia was transformed into utopia. It was going to be His Highness’s 2084 after Orwell’s 1984.

But then, who would like to waste words over a herd?

And what if the earth is going to have a little off spin someday; without a plot and a book?

There are 2 scenarios:

1 : Why didn’t you say anything?

2 : Why did you say that?

And in case 1 and 2 don’t apply;

3 : It’s not what you said. It’s how you said.

A lot of facilities – tangible and intangible – that you have today, were once prayed for madly.

You have a handful of things today that you begged for secretly a decade back.

Since, we grow by forgetting us and our previous surroundings, we keep on asking for more. Without being thankful. Without being happy. And without being at peace.

But then, there are those who have nothing. They are on the greenbelts. Getting injected. Snorting. Snoozing. Haven’t had a bath for months. Totally in a mess. Have you ever seen them sleeping?

They sleep like babies. Even in cold and scorching weather. In sunlight in summers.

Some questions and doubts rise. Are they better or us? Are they having a better sleep than us? Are they at a higher level of peace? Are their dreams as nightmarish as ours?

And now I am wondering not what I am writing, but why.

How ironic are the cases when people die in stampedes for free food or zakat? A classic yet sad tragedy of dying while struggling to live.

Dying in the process to survive a couple of days more.

It’s so ironic. It’s so sad. As sad as rains consistently falling on wheat crops so that suffering may sustain another season.