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Pakistan Bans Blogspot

I don’t know what appalls me more: the sheer idiocy of such a blanket ban; the horror that someone thinks they’ve just struck a blow for Islam; or this insidious thought that, in Pakistan, we have no rights, only privileges

Muslim Profanities

I look at pictures of the ravaged Al-Askariyya dome, and I want to know: what is the religion of a mosque-destroyer? Does a bomber say Fatiha over the people he’s killed?

To Hold Up the Floor

How gently you knock when your blood
courses underneath, can you teach me that?

Falling In

Did you bring a lamb? An apron?
A scythe? Something to cut out
life with, something to smooth
the corners of your ditheistic crime?

History of the World

See, I always wanted to save my boys
from ending, from breathing, from stifling themselves.
But they don’t last – that’s what I’ve found –

Guide

Where are you going?
It’s too gray for blood here
and you are far,
far too quiet.

Ashura: Atonement, Mourning and Return

Someone’s holy work is death, I register. And someone else’s is reporting that 150-word story for the AP. And someone else’s yet again is that bold typeface. This is it. This is grief for the electronic age.

Yom Kippur 5764/Flight

I am surrounded.
I have no wings and no claws
to fly and dig my way
out of you.

Kyla Pasha

• Articles on Chowk: 8
• First article: Feb 21, 2004
• Latest article: Mar 5, 2006
• Times read on Chowk: 50999