Sunday, May 03, 2009

Notes on echo

After Me

repeat
peter
terra
peat
rep
eat
err

***

The artist's dilemma: To become an echo, one must first find a voice.

***

For never was a story of more woe
Than this of Narcissus and his Echo-o.

***

And what of Ripple? Who took the beauty of her beloved and bore it, in fragments, to the edge of every sea?

***

The sound of emptiness clearing its throat.

***

What do you know of loss, whose cries come back to you? There are greater abysses. Frightful, sheer, no man-fathomed.

The deepest feeling always shows itself in silence
.

Nor is it insincere to say: Ask and you shall be answered. All answers are coincidences.

***

Qaasid ke aate aate khat ek aur likh rakhoon
Main jaanta hoon jo voh likhenge jawaab main

Ghalib at the tavern, waiting to judge the depth of her feelings not by the content of her message, but the speed of her reply.

Hamne maana ki tagaphul na karoge lekin
Khaak ho jayenge ham tumko khabar hone tak.

Ghazals like sonar, symmetric with anticipation. The plumbed echoes of language stirring ghosts from long ago.

***

What did Echo say when she realized she'd made a mistake?

Oh-uh

***

Je t'aime
Tame
Aim
I'm
Mmm.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

"hum tumko khabar hone tak" i am told is the right misra

Falstaff said...

anon: Sorry, my bad. All fixed now.

Anonymous said...

Mujh tak kab unki bazm mein, aata tha duar-e-jaam
saaqi ne kuch mila na diya ho sharaab mein

Anonymous said...

“The deepest feeling always shows itself in silence; not in silence, but restraint”~Marianne Moore

Falstaff said...

anon3: Ummm...yes, very good. So you DO see the obvious.