Ashksymphony

  17th October 1988 ‘Of evenings that smell of you’ Often times I have written about heavy clouds in an evening sky  and many a times of winter or summer evenings  all coming with their own character of restlessness, calm or anger but there have been only a few instances when I have written of a casual evening one that is uncharacterized by anything unusual, rather is surprisingly plain As I remember now, such evenings belonged to you, beautiful in it’s own serene ways And such evenings were divided in two phases in my life one was the phase when I spent those evenings with you  whether you were physically present around me  or we were separated by distance, yet connected by spirit and the other phase is one with memories  of you, of a distant me and of us  of reminiscence and stories and letters on the balcony But most of all I remember the evenings when I felt restless  and you getting out of your evening bath would come to sit besides me and my chai and the fact that your smell made

  07th April 1988 ‘A commentary on struggles and injustice’ this was the pamphlet in my hand  as I entered the market place in Toulouse on this Sunday afternoon I was out to buy some croissant and wine for an evening of recluse in my immaculately neatly kept apartment  a fetish I had developed recently and was slowly developing great pride in It was supposed to be a dialogue followed by a rendition of Warsaw concerto  and the orations would focus on the themes of ‘human spirit and resilience’, ‘the fundamental nature of the oppressor” and  ‘the anatomy of a revolt’ to my Sunday slumbered mind these sounded quite grand  but then the name of one of the speakers stood out to me  We had dated for sometime during my stay at Marseille  and I realized how organically had we drifted apart  The fact that the passage of time between us was so vivid in my head  was a revelation for me – I had barely thought about her for the last 5 months and it had been only 5 months since we bid our farewells t

If tomorrow never comes, Know that I tried, with all my might I may not have been broken, but I was tired And you must know I did not go away, without a fight The epic battle of my life, ironic   If tomorrow never comes, Know that I tried, to forget and forgive, all trivial, in this state of mind of all promises made and silences broken all mistakes made and paths not trodden   If tomorrow never comes, Know that I tried, to leave behind all my insecurities Of troubles nights and anxious days Of social pressures and self-imposed pains Of words you couldn’t understand or fears I could not speak   If tomorrow never comes, Know that I tried, to be ok with not being ok But then the hashtags disappeared And photo ops died, it was another cause they were rallying While I sat forgotten in my bed still nervous to be called mental   If tomorrow never comes, Know that I tried, to speak up and not bottle down my emotions Of the million times I ha

When I am sad I go back to those sheets  in a forsaken hotel in a forsaken town on a forgetful morning  and to the sunshine through the broken window  When I am sad I go back to your habit of sharing dreams of nightmares of violence or dreamy weddings on a misty morning  and to the last drops of morning rain on the window pane When I am sad I go back to empty words scribbled along the edges of many a notepads  on a sleepless night and to the silence between those faded inkblots When I am sad I go back to that empty house on a shiny street, with facades and mirrors on a moonlit night and to the echoes of thunders, of peaceful sleeps ~ Ashk