Last Signature—a Ghazal for Agha Shahid Ali
Our wounds are labeled forgettable, ShahidOur life before death is imperceptible, Shahid Billboards proclaim, Kashmir is ParadiseGod has a reason to be chimerical, Shahid Memory threads tied to wooden roses at KhankahEven simple prayers are incomprehensible, Shahid At Naseem Bagh, your presence was ephemeralNow, your absence is a spectacle, Shahid Our laments are lost, our yearnings […]
I’m A Kashmiri. This Is What I Thought When Kanhaiya Said Kashmir Is Integral To India
After the sedition fracas, Kanhaiya Kumar, president of the JNU student union, finally reclaimed his patriot status by reiterating that Kashmir is an integral part of India. This statement is the mother of all gold standards for proving one’s patriotism in India. In addition to its shorthand use, this statement also becomes an analytic for many […]
Wither Kashmir: Short-Term Glory or Long-Term Solution
The mere mention of Kashmir, brings about an inevitable gush of emotions, a slew of stanched resolutions, sterile accords and pacts, impulsive wars and the incessant violence. In the recent years, where the relation between India and Pakistan is thawing in many regards, and the movement in Kashmir has been wallowing amidst different narratives emerging […]
Kashmir’s Stone Pelter
You ask about his birth? No, no he was not born today. No not at the time you see him, frozen in the frames of countless magazines and screens, aggressive and intent on throwing the stone at the well armed and armored Indian trooper whose finger stands alert on the trigger. He was born before […]
Kashmir: From Orient to the State of Exception
Historically the global imagination has often reflected on Kashmir, the erstwhile Himalayan kingdom, through scenes of colonial idyll, wilderness, and romance. This imagery was fine tuned through works like “Lalla Rookh: An Oriental Romance” a poem written in 1817 by the English poet Thomas Moore. Photographs from the bygone era are replete with soft verdant […]
Being Of Faith
Ather Zia’s #poem about the #Muslim registry i hearwe will be in the Muslim registryour faces will be pixelizedirises digitized,each finger, andthe opposable thumbthat all homo-sapienspossibly evolved together,will be memorized i hear,my young cello playing sonparents,who finally remember directions to Safeway,daughter whose singing never stopsdead friend’s soft-spoken wife, a master at making apple pies,husband who […]
Gula of Kashmir: Tales from the Spring of Verinag
Gula is a young fish who lives in the Verinag spring, also known as the Neel-nag (Blue Spring) in Kashmir. He lives there with his Mother, Sheer, and his other fish friends, Nika, Nitch, and Kaakh. The Neel-nag spring is significant since the river Jehlum flows from here into the valley. Neel-nag is surrounded by […]
‘They want us to write. In blood.’ Four poems on Kashmir
Poetry makes one a witness rather than just an archivist. One’s life-blood, all that is political, emotional and ethical; lived, remaining, and forgotten coagulates into a poem. Yet at many junctures the verses are only despair; mourning a beleaguered homeland. And sometimes the poems cannot help but disparage the act of writing itself, which under […]
‘I gift you a rugged map carved from cracks between divorced nations’: Five poems from Kashmir
In this curated collection, five poets from Kashmir write about their homeland, variously chronicling the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits, the communications blockade, the experience of childhood in militarised zones and the difficulty of bequeathing a brutal history to one’s children. Organising the narrative of their struggle requires acts of imagination: Letters to those who haven’t […]
Arrest of activist Khurram Parvez shows a new hostility towards civil society in Kashmir.
On November 22, 2021, Khurram Parvez, a globally acclaimed Kashmiri human rights defender and civil society activist was arrested by the Indian government. Charged under the much-criticized Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) for “terror-funding” and “conspiracy,” Khurram’s internationally acclaimed body of work is being tarnished by allegations of terrorism. His arrest has caused global outrage, and the United Nations and other human rights […]