VERSE | HEALING

She looks down at the empty page 
Something is on her mind
A plot, a verse for better or worse
For the rest, a pithy line

But nothing stirs into rank and file
For her to string together
The words and phrases spin like crazy
She just can’t find the tether

“I looked at him in puzzlement…”
No today she couldn’t go there
“She sat serene and beautiful
With a magnolia in her hair…”

She felt herself choke a little
She couldn’t walk there either
In sepia-toned dreams is where
She felt happiest seeing her

A cup of tea, a pastry
That sublime combination
Surely she could muster up
Something for that occasion

But her thoughts were far away
They were looking at something else
The woman poised upon her page
Needed healing herself

So they had set up a little storm
In the space of her tearing mind
Whirling, swirling round and round
Until the pain was left behind

Then to her blue-stung heart they went
To gently numb the precious space
Odes to life’s ripple and swell
Could wait for another day.

NOW AVAILABLE IN PAKISTAN! “The Girl with the Paisley Dupatta and Other Stories”

Dear friends and family,

“The Girl with the Paisley Dupatta and other Stories” and “Curious Animals…” are NOW AVAILABLE IN PAKISTAN at the following locations:

LIBERTY BOOKS at all their locations in KARACHI and LAHORE

PARAMOUNT BOOKS in KARACHI (Main bookstore at PECHS and the Agha Khan bookstore)
Paramount Books in FAISALABAD and in ISLAMABAD

ORDER YOUR BOOKS ONLINE AT:

http://libertybooks.com and

https://paramountbooks.com.pk/

Do get your copies; and do let me know what you think 🤓

Here’s to Reading, Dreaming and Becoming 🌸

https://vm.tiktok.com/ZSdSbbFuA/

VERSE | THE ACCIDENTAL WORDSMITH

I’m an accidental wordsmith 
I solder little things
Nouns and verbs and adjectives
Some calming, some with a sting

Some say they like my poetry
When words I synchronise
Like Paler than a Tundra Jailer
Eyes Turquoise like Southern Skies


Others they are fonder of
The short stories that I weave
Of everyday folks, who beat all the odds
Tales of strength and tales of grief

Still others declare, that they swear
By my pithy, four line squiggles
Proverbs with a caustic twist
Metaphors to make you giggle

There are also those that have held on
To their childhood innocence
My fairy tales and creature lore
Are their thimbles full of gin

So I carry on being a wordsmith
Hugging hearts and moving minds
With truth and grit, drollery and bliss
Sharing a few moments out of time.

VERSE | THE QUINTESSENTIAL INTROVERT

I am the quintessential introvert
There was a time I had my social spurts
But all that seems like a lifetime ago
The Corona has given our spacetime a blow.

I absolutely love my solitude
When I say ‘Leave me be’ I’m not being rude
It’s just the way I’m internally wired
Too much nodding and smiling just makes me tired

That’s not to say that I spurn the cliche
Of the Island that No Man Is
I’m just more prone to proverbs that sweep
Through Still Waters that tend to Run Deep.

And now I’m on the back foot yet again
By that adage I didn’t mean I’m a Brain
An Einstein, a Galileo or an Edison
(Well .. maybe a tad like A. Tennyson).

Dear reader I’m the embodiment of reserve
I don’t seek adulation that is undeserved
But even as I spin this meter and rhyme
I think every enterprising poet doth have her time

In the shining confluence of our universe
Of writers, and scribblers, masters of verse
But since I’m the quintessential introvert
I’ll tell my tales from my quiet corner on earth

Still, if by some providential twist of fate
Some of you think that my writing’s first rate
Know that I still love my solitude
I’ll thank ye kindly and then I’ll respectfully brood.