Foreigner in Exile (Ghazal)

We live to drink our patria's wine, all those sired in exile,
Chicken Tikka Masala and English ghazals we claim in the style of exile.


The ink of the story still bleeds past the partition of the page,
The lines tightly drawn, my union thwarted by a father’s files of exile.


But who to blame? The terrorist or the Government Babu? Their cloth and shackles same. The smoke led to my door, and Churchill’s men recline in exile.


My passport was once the global key, our righteous moral badge,
The eagle plucked, its talons clipped, it soared high in exile.


The birth cord's been unraveled, why must they burn the map and ship?
This daughter's hopeful welcome, without a smile they did exile.


Yasmeen, why weep for a place not home, to you as yet unknown?
Go and flash your dollars in a stranger place, from yourself again find exile.



Yasmeen Najmi

The Flamenco of Seasons

In Spring, love bursts in noisy bulerias,
a pale, downy blur that ripens to a bare skin,
petal lip alegria,
oh fermented eyes of the sugar drunk harvest
the adagio of a hammock
under swaying fruit
but true love resides in winter's silencio,
when we must lean in, whisper
and be still to hear the heart's yearnings,
glimpse the veins of hope that stream beneath
the glazed layers of seasons.


Yasmeen Najmi