Two Poems by Ramsha Ashraf

 

I’ve cried a few times in my sleep

 

I’ve cried a few times in my sleep
not out of helplessness
but out of sheer spite.

The facade of your love
is the noose
I feel around my neck.

You can still be my lover
but not my killer
the time is over.

Think not that you can lick away
the nectar flowing out of my body
and still can be the possessor.

Think not that you can implant
your seed at the hour of need
and still can be the oppressor.

I defy your words of worship
I bow not to your lordship
your reign won’t terrify me.

The poison you have in your words
since the time of my birth
won’t kill me.

The power you have in your slaps
this time, I am sure,
won’t hurt me.

I’ve cried a few times in my sleep
not out of helplessness
but out of sheer spite

____________

 

Love Poems are Hard to Write

We have played with echoes in the dark—
our voices hit the death of silence
imbued in cemented walls.

We speak of our surrealist dreams woven around Dali’s demons, the last polaroid nudes, ink and acrylics on skin, Passolini’s Accattone, pomegranates in colors other than red and white, homely homelessness, honey pitching out of life that is body, for us—

A mosquito hums Dracula-lullaby,
you say it’s like the god’s voice-annoying and constant– i reach out to crush the god’s voice between my palms, you giggle and hide your lost eyes behind the shadows of my forearms—

Forgetfulness is bliss—
i carve the names of your hundred gods
one on each fold of your skin,
you cry-empty sobs filled with hope,
you say ‘these all are dead,’-the ones on your skin-i think about creating others. Small gods on your skin would look fine. You aren’t a big guy either.

Love poems are hard to write—
during bewildered nights like these they shine
and fade out through the cracks
as the day breaks & light gets in.

After all it’s a mosquito’s lullaby—
god’s voice, your song, my dream,
all awaiting to get crushed within the palms of time.

 

 

Ramsha Ashraf is a poet and playwright who lives in Pakistan. She has published a collection of poetry, Enmeshed (2015), and she was a 2017 resident at the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa.

 

Two Poems by Ramsha Ashraf

Having Sex with the Author of the Hindoo

The dream of the nazi-Muslim woman died
Of welcoming you to the kingdom of peace
In the club when you asked:
“I know you get a lot of hits by other men but
I’d sing the Smiths to you in your eternal moments of darkness”
That night I didn’t stumble-walk to your place from the club
Night would’ve longed a little more
Only if it was not our parting night
The winter-town sulked over the fact
That your religion won’t be welcomed in my country
You were left alone after we explored
the protagonist’s indecisive shifts
from Seattle riots to Lahore’s Shahi Mohallah
After when you read the Hindoo and covered the Rafi’s vocals
Now I look back and curse the moment
I should’ve loved you and not the author of the Hindoo.
The nazi-Muslim woman who killed herself
for a minute hadn’t died and when I see you come back
in my dreams, I gasp.
I could be more loyal to your body
but you see you had read from the manuscript
the title of which my inner self loathes.
Such a perfect hypocrite I am.
Iqbal Bano’s record still plays
in the backdrop but in my dreams
I can have sex,
not with you but,
with the author of the Hindoo.

———————————-

 

Oblivion is the Word

Can I shake you a little
before sleep lulls you
and you hide your lips
in my breath.

Oblivion is destructive
it kills the peace
and sleep too at times.

I’ve held you against myself
in small square hotel room
with bright transcendence
that bridged mahogany light
with the gloomed darkness.

I have wondered so far
what ecstasy looks like
if it is not our lips
tracing the brackets
of distorted shadows,
our hands anxious
at the spontaneity,
our feet embracing
the enigmatic silence
dissolved within curves
of flesh, joints & bones.

Oblivion is the word,
and may be a woe too,
hard to recognise
yet easy to love.

I have left pieces of you
wandering alone
in the spilt and aroma
of those sheets
where once I have stayed
with you.

____________

 

Ramsha Ashraf is a poet and playwright who lives in Pakistan. She has published a collection of poetry, Enmeshed (2015), and she was a 2017 resident at the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa.