Heart, let no memory enter tonight. Body, don’t trash with thunder, for with time Everything will recede to a proper distance. Pain will slowly drift into tonight’s rain.

Friend, be still at least in my dreams even as You recede into a landscape veiled with smoke, Blockading all the mud-slick roads behind.

God will be called from minarets in The coming dawn. But I shall stay silent Behind the windows of this unmapped alley. I won’t pray for a cure to this insomnia.

Borrowing words I shall ask, will you permit me Voyage into your angular hands some night?

(from Faiz Ahmed Faiz)

Desolation's desert. I'm here with shadows
of your voice, your lips as mirage, now trembling. Grass and dust of distance have let this desert bloom with your roses.

Near me breathes the air that's your kiss. It smoulders,
slowly-slowly, musk of itself. And farther,
drop by drop, beyond the horizon, shines the
dew of your lit face.

Memory's placed its hand so on Time's face, touched it
so caressingly that although it's still our
parting's morning, it's as if night's come, bringing
you to my bare arms.