School Days

I was passing through St Patrick’s the other day when quite out of nowhere memories of my time spent in that gentle and noble place came flooding in.

The Reflection In My Window

As he twisted her wrist, the little girl writhed in pain, tears welling in her eyes as she struggled to free her self. Her brother, pulled at the man’s other arm ...

Building a Dream House

This Saturday was a very pleasant day . It rained in the afternoon, and as usual, Islamabad after a rain on a summer afternoon, was the perfect place to just drive around.

Purani Gali

A glimpse of life in the mid-sixties Islamabad. How madrasas have changed in Pakistan in the last forty years.

The Gardens

I was mostly quiet as we made small talk. Salima was giving me time to reminisce and absorb that day’s memories for when I would need them most. In America.

From Kerala to Islamabad (A Journey of Nine Decades)

Memories of a life which they can only recount to their children with the hope that they will keep alive traditions they brought with them, but which are now dying away slowly

My memories-

. I wanted to write on stuff I miss about Szabist, stuff that has made me smile, laugh, frown, cry and at times raging mad.

Memory Lane

Reflections and other poems

looking down ourselves look back
likenesses wrinkled by the wind
then lips to mirrored lips we drink
till no water’s there
nor images, nor we.

So Long Farewell

It was her mother’s funeral. The woman residing within her had cast a demonic, necromantic spell upon her. Like Mephistopheles having lost his soul, she, the daughter, sat frozen and immobile bereft of any sense of loss or grief – one insurmou

A Paean to my Family

Chachijan -- one of my earliest memories is one of those spool tapes on which my father invites her to sing with the words “Azra Apa, ub aap” – and she sang the Ghalib ghazal “Nukta cheen hai” for she had a melodious voice an

Kahan Se Aap Zamaney Ke Bad Aye Hain

When I first saw her she was about fifteen. I was in Senior Cambridge. We lived in a Catholic hostel where it was compulsory to attend the morning Mass at dawn, six days a week...

Amnesia

Preparing for flight he stretched his arms before him, ending them with two strong fists suitably accompanied by a tightening of his smile.

The Realm

I am a self. That’s the only way to describe what I am. I used to inhabit a human body a long time ago. More precisely, a human nervous system

Forty Winks

Where do you draw the line between fantasy and reality?

Shammo’s Curse

falling out of love is easy if the foundations are weak

The Music Of The Song Of Life

Everyone knew there was something seriously wrong with it

Sohail Rana: Musings on music

His adorers are surrounded by a lifetime of numerous memories of his immortal compositions.

Nasreen

Translated from Urdu, a story by Shafiq-ur-Rehman

San Salvador

The lander stood like a giant gleaming egg against the orange sky.

The Red Dress

With the mountainous weight of forty-three years

Baajoo Kee Gulley (The Side Lane)

is not only one of the more well-known phrases Manto uttered and wrote,it also described a trait in his personality

The Shah of Chicago II

the place was thick with smugglers and heroin factories

A Little Death

Money we protect

Nothing’s Forever

An ’epic’ poem on life, love, relationships etc.

Her Other Self

Why did she wake up in nightmarish sweats chased by dark fears?

Full Moon on the Ganges

Night time on a cremation ground, among the bones and the spirits.

Madame Noor Jehan and Urdu’s Best Song Ever

A tribute to the Malikah-e-Tarannum.

Leaving so soon?

You want to soar free and I will let you go.

The Life Hereafter

And just when we shelter under death, life comes at us sideways

Awakening

His sleep is restless. Faces stare at him through the mists of memory

Climate Controlled

The stench of poverty, was real,unfiltered, emanating from the open sewers, over which, now, a dark, naked child smiles, squats.

Me and My Creator

We have a strange relationship, my creator and I.

Akbar Mai

Ramzan had offered to have her as his second wife but Akbar Mai had refused.

On the Costs of Self-Reliance

and we can’t build in brick because we keep stealing each other’s bricks. There’s a little twist to this tale. The wolves aren’t at the door. The werewolves walk among us...

Sahara Cup: A Preview

However much the authorities in the sub-continent try to kill the whole bribery affair, the fact is that it will not die...

Reminisce

Our first entry in The Leafy Glade Inn’s Victorian Study, is one in which the author softly remembers people in a place far, far away in the past.