Till now we knew him as a fiction writer , he stands witness with his nom-de-plume, has now come up with a collection of Urdu poems where moon stands witness. He is Gulam Nabi Bhat Shahid whose new title “Chand Gawah hai” is subject of discussion and release before this august gathering. And as I flip the pages I am introduced to a real life character to whom the book is dedicated. This character namely Gurmeet Singh is a porter at Wagah boarder railway station. This real character reminds a fictional character namely Juggut Singh in Khushwant Singh’s bestseller “Train to Pakistan” the coincidence subtly explains how literature is actually for understanding life.(Adab Baraie Zindagi)
Turning page after page brings forth the lament and wail in Imkaan, the poignance and acerbity in Safar Nasloon ka , the tragedies and catastrophe in Dhundh , the endurance and toleration in Mosaum that the poet has seen, visualized or perceived.
As the reader turns few pages it is obvious that the poet raises his hands towards the Almighty feeling desperate with the tragedies all around and now yearns to see a Hussain AS whose presence may remove the darkness of night bringing light of dawn .
Bitten by human is a lament on the mankind and a disgrace to the homo sapiens as good as a plaque outside the zoo in Lusaka Zambia which reads ‘The world’s most dangerous animal ‘ fixed to a cage and a mirror is placed to make people see their own image.
Showkat Shehri and Yaqoob Dilkash ,the renowned writers of Kashmir, are remembered through the tribute in the book. Shahid describes Showkat as someone who knew a lot , spoke about a lot ,went through the nuances of drama writing and then scripted with a complete hold and control over the characters who then moved lively over the stage ………..however showkat himself a character closes his eyes but he continues to live on through his various characters he created in the process.
Tribute to Yaqub Dilkash comes in the form of his power to talk which unfortunately is perceived by the friends in some other genre declaring that yaqub has stopped talking . But shahid has a different experience when he takes his friend’s hands in his own and both keep talking for a long time.
The moon stands witness
In this wheel of years
do include my rues too
I am its dying moment
this century does not
only belong to you,
in this century
I barely lived through
but died more
Ask the Moon,
it stands witness.
The nazm revolves around the memory column that has taken the burden of the poet’s past. In the wheel of years, which they call a century, time is not merely a count of days but a page of life depicting suffering, agony, and the sharing of grief. In this nazm, the poet is lamenting the loss of his pleasures, yet in the same breath, he constitutes a chronicle of his pain. The entire wheel of time in the poem is a leap of imagination, as the poet makes it clear that the timeline does not draw its boundaries alone but carries along millions of emotions, sensibilities, sufferings, sobs, pleasures, and pains. Above all, it carts along the conscious and subconscious of an ordinary man who fails to record the proceedings. The poet seems to be a part of the big wheel of time that has taken its death experience as a severe example of conscious effort. He believes that he is still pulsating with the last pulse of time that has barely spread its hem to bloom in his bosom but has repeated the action of death. The objective correlation in the poem is its powerful element, as it brings to the surface the moon, not as a decorative companion but as a witness. The moon is a natural object that undergoes frequent changes, altering its appearance from crescent to full moon, and the cycle is repeated. Thus, the moon, the changing agent chosen by the poet, stands calmly to record the sighs of the poet. The frequent change of the moon as a witness can only understand the agony of a changing person down at its feet, so the agony of the narrator is itself a movement, of which the movement of the moon stands witness. This poem, by its structure, is acceptable, but the poet hasn’t mentioned or dropped a clue about the dying moment, which would have been a serious observation to know the last wish of the narrator. This missing link between the observer and the sufferer in the poem has created a chasm that should have been filled with an experience of near-death rather than passing it as a statement. A poem can never be a statement for the reason that a verse and a statement vary in texture. A verse is a compact and detailed pack of imaginations, observations, and information blended in poetic devices, while a statement is a kind of instruction for the sake of it.
Elan ( A review)
Late last night
all of a sudden
the city
finally announced:
“I consciously
confess
that now nothing appears to me
except myself anymore.
Nothing I can hear,
nothing even to feel.
This “I” has made me significant
for I see myself for all sides.
It is possible
that tomorrow I won’t be visible,
I won’t be listened to
only….
that day someone might place a sigh board
on the high way.
My epitaph will be raised;
ahead lies the graveyard”
The poem is a severe biography of a personified city that makes a conscious confession. The confession is sudden because the narrator believes in the law of impermanence, which states that life is short, and such a confession, in that state of mind, can possibly be sudden and sharp. The narrator senses that life may leave him senseless, hard to feel, and even impossible to witness. The poem has two major themes: one of ego and the final submission. The ego, as presented in the poem, is short-lived, as sensed by the narrator. It is followed by the submission, for life ultimately ends with an epitaph reading the name on the stone, and the rest lies in the graveyard. The journey of life in the poem is both penetrating and realistic; the undercurrent of the reality of life in the poem moves like a thread that connects life and the hereafter. The poem is a fine presentation of a city that announces its fate; however, there is a concern regarding its punctuation marks. In Urdu nazms, it is an unwanted practice to use exclamation marks without need. Additionally, the first quotation mark, representing the direct speech of the city, has not been closed, but another direct quotation at the end has been used, which may confuse the reader. The poem is equipped with rich imagery and metaphors. Two major metaphors, “My epitaph will be raised” and “Ahead lies the graveyard,” quite match with symbols like graveyard, signboard, and highway.
Insha ,the little girl who lost her eyesight , prays that the gun wielding hands be offered her pen .
While going through the poems I firmly believe that the theme deserves a wider audience which only a translation can provide.
Congratulations Shahid Sahib.
ABOUT THE REVIEWER
Er. Shafi Ahmad is President Fiction Writers’ Guild and can be mailed at wanishafi999@gmail.com
