Fasting

Seems like I waste a day
when I am fasting
because I cant really do much
But maybe I am not really wasting
because I am supposed to pause
and appreciate the bounties from the Maker
Which I dont do because I am so busy.

Painless

To be underground
unreachable to family and others
never to be hurt again.

By Tasnim Jivaji

Thoughtful

Thoughtful
An e-less poem

Who knows what a thought is -
Why should a thought grow from this mind and not from this chin?

Who knows why it is that I think -
What would I think that would say it all, not want a word said past that fink?

Who knows how thoughts stop -
Is a man not a man should his thoughts halt for good. A flop?

What is this thing, a thought, anyway -
If a day is to dawn with half minds blank, would it blank out a portion - the ill in our world, say?

By Tasnim Jivaji.
December 6, 2006.

You Don't Sing

To my husband, Naju
after Ayub Ogada

You don’t sing.
No. You don’t. You know you don’t.
You don’t sing. Who is Ne-Yo?
In fact you can't sing and you don’t.

You don’t dance. No, you don’t.
Please don’t. No. No. Stop.
Fred Astaire, do not even try.
Please don’t. Just stop.

So I sing along alone
And you don’t moon, you don’t know
The words, the song, or even why
You can’t measure the moment in the tune.

And I dance alone
Galloping to the jam on the floor
And you might come but you
Don’t move, you squirm and you don’t get the tone.

Little sing and dance moments don’t a lifetime make
Adjustments to complications; strings tightened loosened
And you, you inspire me to be more than I could
You inspire me to be more like you, and I can.

Long walks, bike rides, reading, eating, aah silent pauses
You and I fluently do. Oh, and the three kids, just as easy too.
What I do alone is scary though. Overwhelming, but you know
I think of you and you inspire me to dare, and I can.

By: Tasnim Jivaji

Don't stab the machinegun-ist

There is a furor about the atrocities of the armies that are coming into our holy places and desecrating our pious zones. Their deeds are horrible indeed.

However, I don't see how they are to blame for what they are doing. These are youngsters who do not even know the names of the streets down their roads, if you ask them.

The question of religion and humble reverence is much too great for them to comprehend. They do not even bow in their own prayers and their places of worship are not in their comfort zone.

Just as in our families, no one would dare come into our homes where a couple is intimate and united, no lover, no fitna, no suspicions.

So it is in our lands, these imbeciles are the vultures who come when the elephants fight.

T-junctions lead to mid life crisis

There are a few days in a life that are memorable.
The day you were born,
The first day of school,
The first award... a graduation.
The first kiss...the first real orgasm,
The wedding day.
The day a loved one dies.
Sometimes no decisions lead to these days -
somethings happen because they are meant to be.

But the time we come to a T-junction in our lives,
The moment we cannot go ahead we can
go only left or right with a simple yes or no choice,
those days they come ever so often.
Your pick will either hold you up or bring you down.
One will haunt you forever

When you are in the midst of your life,
the part they call the crisis,
so called because your blunders are ripened,
your foot is decaying in your mouth.
and the T-junction decisions you made are
slapping you in your old face, spitting at you even.

T-junctions,
I hate them.
I see them everywhere,
people asking me what to do,
and I want to tell them but won't
I have my own yes or no to grind,
right or left,
only time will tell,
which one is right and which is wrong.

Oprah says, "Think BIG"
I say, yeah, why not, go ahead think, think all you like.
Thinking never killed anyone.
People who think big always make something of themselves.
Its almost as if they thought themselves into becoming something.
Something bigger than the thought, even bigger than the dream.

Dale Carnegie, well he said, "Hold that dream."
That's all one really needs to do, is to hold on, I guess.
Dreams come from somewhere, no one yet knows.
But those damn dreams they cause such a stir in the head,
that they whole being gets moved to do unbelieveable things.

You might think its a madness,
parents definitely dont know what it is,
what makes their children assend so high.
People cant think what it could be.
But from the gutters of life, sometimes.
Amazing greatness emerges....
and when it is questioned, it always says ...
it can't be true, can it? How could it be?

I don't know.
It's a wonder what we do with our lives,
We call ourselves the empowered human race,
Yet we are so weak.

Weak with our time,
our moment
weak with our self esteem

Human beings.
What a race.
How powerful.
what a farce.