Gustavo Santaolalla ♫ Iguazu

As the sun began to sink on the skyline,

we drove ourselves to the shore and

dug our feet into cold sand.

The warm winds kissed

our faces and reminded us

the lips long forgotten.

We may never have spoken

to each other this way before,

we may never speak this way again.

Spoke to each other in silence.

Spoke in song of these waves

rising and rolling.

This sea feels alive.

A creature,

breathing,

in the inky darkness.

Inhaling and exhaling as

tide rises and falls.

The breath of this cold night down my back,

I hold still and do not shiver

so as not to ruin the poetry of this moment.

In the shades of the setting sun,

playing games and hiding

behind statues and trees.

We hid ourselves so

we could find each other.

In the shades of sunset & night,

In the shades of trees and statues,

we found each other.

we found peace.

if only for the moment.

And we spoke in silence.

Pretty Lights ♫ Last Passenger

God-given.

"Obey the impulse,"
he said.
& now impulse

   now, it pulse

              pulse

              pulses through me.

They tell me I have a gift.

God gave me a box, 

wrapped it in obedience

& when I opened it,

there lay a pen.

my emblem of impulse.

Alien Ant Farm ♫ Attitude

The seasons must be women. Winter doesn’t want anything to live, refuses beauty and contradicts herself with snow and crystals the next morning. She must have loved someone and turned bitter. Seasons have a short lifespan so Spring says to herself, “I will be as beautiful as I can while I can.” She is the beauty everyone wants, but a short lived pinnacle. Autumn is a down-tempered winter. She is a wounded maiden. Leaves fall instead of water. There is no difference. Summer drags her feet and lets the heat do crazy things to youth. She is a tired mother. Making people work and sweat as she does.

It’s February and it’s warm outside. I feel spring yearning to free herself. Today felt like rain. But when I walked out the door I felt the most beautiful, most tender wind brushing my cheeks. Like God taking my face in his hands and saying everything was fine. So, I let it be. It’s funny how the weather can play with a person’s mind. Clouds change color and so do people.

In all honesty, though. I love rain. I don’t understand it and I love it. I don’t understand most things that I love actually. My family included. We just are. We exist together. We don’t coexist, we inter-exist. I don’t understand why most people don’t find the rain beautiful, just depressing. I find it powerful.

This balcony is my sanctuary. I folded my arms to rest them on the ledge before me. I let myself rest there, let go of everything, let the wind hold me and all my cares. I actually let myself rest and watched the ripples in the pond before me. It’s still maddening how much everything about my own neighborhood reminds me of you. It’s not right. This should be my place. And then I think, it is, because this is the only place I can actually relax. But then, that’s how it used to be with you too. I don’t know if I was ever able to fulfill the same role for you. But, it was hard for me to lose my comfort zone.

I remember when we climbed over the fence by the pond. It’s the little things that clear my mind. It’s the little things that fill it up again. The little ripples the wind makes make me feel like I’m in a different year. I remember when we tore down the ‘no trespassing sign’ and took the little boat for a spin. It’s supposed to be for show and there it is. Still. Even the ripples reminded me of you. Reminded me of the boat on water.

One breeze I can handle. One ripple is okay. So I think as I turn and make my way to the door. Then I remember summer and I remember us under the deck by the pool. I remember these things. I remember what you wore. I remember everything and I wonder does the wind touch you as deeply as it does me. Does it remove you from the setting and force you into the arms of summer?

Humans have instinct bound to nature. They must because otherwise the unreality of a raindrop on my arm is striking me as inevitable. I touch my face to make sure it’s not a tear. It’s not mine. But, it might as well be. It belongs to a new sky. One that I did not know with you. The world has turned and brought me a piece of the sky that understands me. It belongs to a sky heavy with anticipation and emotion. This is her release.

& Now I remember what I told you underneath and umbrella of rain, “Nothing can grow without release.”

(a revised oldie)

Clint Mansell ♫ Stay With Me

“Let the ash bear witness”

It never bothered me that you smoke.

I just hated that you were slowly suffocating yourself.

It could be our fear-filled bond,

You breathe it out,

I breathe it in.

Hints of tainted innocence.

This smoke.

Let it hang like a cobweb,

Let it spread like a blanket over us,

Let it rain with out tears,

Let it intertwine with our secrets.

Let it smother you with our dreams. 

Don Caballero ♫ Railroad Cancellation

When I whisper,

feel the calm before the storm.

When I close my eyes,

feel the waves surging against my eyelids.

There is so much to say that I am

overcome

and

overtaken

by emotion.

Swept into silence.

It is all in what I don’t say.

Just for tonight,

don’t assign meanings.

Let the silence speak for itself.

The Fray ♫ Unsaid

so the saying goes,
let sleeping babies lie.

or is it let sleeping babies lie?

so if men are to be emotional infants for-ever-long,
shouldn't it be,
let sleeping boys lie?

or is it, to let sleeping boys lie?

sleepless ♫ kate havenik

remember that time?
we created verses
out of thin afternoon air.

when we sat on the jungle gym
confused by the fact that our
bodies and souls
spoke in different tongues;
never able to understand one another.

remember the sun,
it watched intently
with eyes as golden as our skin?
remember that time?
i remember.

Lydia ♫ This is Twice Now

& we pretend that war is natural. To believe that it's okay, yet it drives men insane. The roles we play in each other's lives all of a sudden erased. Can you tell me what the reporters actually know? They can see but they cannot know, nor can I, know the mind of the soldier that accepts death or the one that defies it.

An ant. I feel sick killing an ant. But that's all these soldiers are to you. On land, on ships, ants are all they seem from your altitude. Just remember, even that high up, you are not God. Didn't you feel anything? Didn't you feel America beneath the vibrations of your guns? Didn't you recognize the lives you were taking, these soldiers who do and don't decide their fates. 

Thou shalt not kill. & "If you take one life you have taken the life of all mankind." Is it all a joke God played on us? Or did we forget, we do know how to love, fear, cry. But all we do is fight. 

So,
Are we all soldiers?
Dying together sounds so much nicer
than dying alone.
Is that why we do it;
sacrifice ourselves so we won't be lonesome?
Natural human instinct,
"I'll do it, if you do it."

I'll die if you die with me.
Come out, come forth,
onto a battlefield that makes no sense
and maybe I won't be paralyzed
by fear
if you're there.

Minus the Bear ♫ Pachuca Sunrise

todo por dentro.
no mas.
no puedo contener todo.
no puedo controlar eso.

cada vez 
que me tocas, 
me siento un fuego debajo de tu piel. 
cada vez 
me dejas quemada. 

quemada por ti.
quemando para ti. 

fracasos
de calmar ese fuego.
intentos
de callar ese fuego.
todo sin exito.
cada vez.

quemada por ti.
quemando para ti.

Snow Patrol ♫ Set Fire to the Third Bar

i smell like you,

you smell like me.

finding ourselves

in each other

constantly.

i can't get you out of my head

can't wash you off my skin.

can't wash away my most recent sin.

tried to wash off the x's on the back of my hands

but the sins that my heart and my hands

conspired to commit together

would not come off.

no matter how hard i scraped and scrubbed.

i could not learn to regret the sins i loved.

the swell season ♫ the moon

a haven.
a heaven.
an extension of her apartment into the sky.
balconies, porches, front yard, back yard.
always been patches of paradise to me.
that's where i met you.
paradise.

where i loved you,
for a number of hours.
hours colorful enough to taint me for a lifetime.
colorful enough to paint me colors i couldn't hide,
not from everyone else,
not from myself.
in those hours unseen,
under the watchful eye of the sky
and only the most high
we made love with our words.
refusing to sleep,
refusing to stop.

our thoughts
our glances
our grins
crashing into one another
and landing upon our bodies
crashing on to shores that were
unexpectedly &
coincidentally familiar.
[but you should know i don't believe
in coincidence.
i don't believe, i feel.
& this doesn't feel like a coincidence,
you feel like fate.
you felt like a dream.]

our thoughts
our grins
our glances
making their way over to each other
interlocking and lacing through one another
like our minds.

our hearts matching,
unintentionally sick for one another.
maybe you only felt it that night, maybe you never felt it at all.
but i felt it every time thereafter.
i felt that memory carve in to me even deeper every time thereafter.
i felt your words sink deeper into my skin every time thereafter.
i felt your arms wrap around my waist as the sun rose
every
time
thereafter.
 
i felt my body pause for a sudden intake of breath
i felt my mind stop for a sudden intake of a pleasure
that looked more like pain.
every time thereafter,
i come out here
and make new memories,
i am already thinking of the one.

the root of all roots.
the memory within a memory.
this dream within a dream,
it must have been,
because it felt real but
it was perfect.
you were just too perfect.

aftermath of ecstasy

lights out.
blinds closed.
But the flashing blue lights
from police cars
still stream through
and flicker across my ceiling
celebrating a murder.

as tempted as i am, i refuse to go near the window.
the ordeal that made my heart stop is over.
the ten gun shots that grazed the
worlds of my loved ones have ceased
the ten gun shots that crazed my mind
for your lives, have seized
the safety of a stranger.

so everyone has dispersed,
sleeping off the trauma
of an overwhelming fear
that gripped us so tight
we couldn't breathe.

but i'm still up,
remembering involuntarily
the last time i was so afraid.
the last time being when i feared
for my own life.
i fear for you, the way i fear for me.

but even as the blue lights
continue to dance
their way into the night
i don't dare
move the blinds and peek.
i don't dare
witness a tragedy
that came too close to being mine.

Adele ♫ Hometown Glory

dont want to sleep in order to dream.
so let me dream with my eyes wide
dont want to dream for fear i will wake when i finally find you.
and the only witness would be my mind's eye.

oh, all the dreams i have dreamed
just to catch a glimpse of you.
but be warned of my eyes,
beware of what you might fall in to;
sea, what i see.
look out through my eyes,
see what i see.

let my eyes be your mirrors,
my gaze your beholder.
look in,
see your soft, loving face.
let my eyes be your crystal ball.
change your fortune, change your fate.

let our eyes be mirrors.
i see myself in thee.
you see yourself in me.
see all the things we could be.

Kaskade ♫ 4am

& though my lips might say one thing,
"i can't be with you."
these marks, this body,
speaks for itself.

i am yours.

though these lips,
couldn't help but lie
when they spoke.
these lips,
couldn't help but
tell truth
when they kissed.

i am yours.

The XX ♫ Intro

tus palabras dulces,
nacieron sobre labios de miel,
cayeron contra mi piel.
y me hirieron,
me dañaron.
amarte duele.

generation gaps.
i spoke to you in English,
you didn't understand.
so, i speak to you in Urdu,
& you don't understand.
i get it now,
no matter what language i use,
you will never understand.

Explosions in the Sky ♫ Your Hand in Mine

Brother, I stand beneath any sky for you.
No, it was not a dream.
No, it is not just a dream.

Sister, I stand beneath any sky for you.
No, it was not a dream.
No, it is not just a dream.

Sometimes, the wheels don't turn,
&my mind is perpetually stuck on strength.

Then, I miss you.
When, every time I inhale.
Then, I love you.
When, every time I exhale.

You, the only home I have ever known.
Love, the only home I now know.
(Home, always found in people rather than places.)

I stand beneath every sky for you,
my brother, my sister, my home.
I stand on golden sands,
life in our hands.

It is a wonder how
only we seem to
notice.
Only we witness.
The sky & the ocean
run together.

Death Cab ♫ Your Heart Is An Empty Room

Oppa. Bhaijan. Hermano. Athelphos. Berader. Uror. Akhi.

You have a name, but i have only ever known you as Bhaijan and that is how I choose to remember you.

I never thought I would feel the sensation of losing you again. You have been lost for a long time. A lost cause.

As we drove home from Khala's house I watched the streetlights pass on the highway, like man made stars they guide us home. I wondered if you might still be there when we arrived. Gone you are. What a coincidence of a day. Celebrating God in the fact that Abraham was willing to sacrifice his son to the Glory. Ill consider this a sacrifice we are all making and let you go. Out of sight, out of mind my brother. I imagined hugging you, telling you I love you. But I only have the strength to do these things in my mind. That will never change. Gone you are before I have the chance to try. That will never change. I miss you before your departure. That never changed either.

I have said so many times that you live like a ghost in this house. Why does it feel different now? Your things are gone. Your room is as empty as your heart. Why does the emptiness that fills your room feel so wrong even though you were never there? You were never here. Maybe physically. But you were never here. Having your things there somehow pacified me into thinking that you would be here, with us, one day. But, with your possessions out of their place, the belief that I hadn’t lost you yet died.

Purging this place of your presence. What is missing now? The apparition, the hollow vision of you passing me in the corridor every now and then. There will be no more of that. There will be no more sliding notes under your door to tell you things I have not the nerve to say. There will be no more going through your things when you are gone to know you, understand you. No more listening to you play the guitar outside your door, holding my breath so you would not hear me eavesdropping on your only form of speech.

Phantom pain. Believing in a brother that never called himself my own. Phantom. The hurt that houses itself in a corner of my mind that continues to believe you are my blood. Even if you will not.

My brother. You will never know what you mean to me. You have left so many times, why does this feel so final, so menacing? Maybe because I don’t know if or when you will be back, and I wasn’t even this worried when you were in the army. Maybe because as you leave this time, I will never have known you or what I am to you. I may worry that you will come back different. But my greater worry is that you will come back unchanged.

I always thought DC was a breathable city. Not too many skyscrapers, not too many telephone lines crowding the sky. Not much blocking the sky from your senses, not so much contaminating the breaths we take. But maybe it wasn't the city that suffocated you, my brother.

Thievery Corporation ♫ Who Needs Forever

Insomnia.
let the tiring overtake me.
Now i can sleep.
finally. as the sun rises, my own night falls.
let the darkness within prevail
not a restful sleep, but
an exhausted slumber accompanied by
exhausted dreams.


let the weight of the world
shut my eyelids.

Amaral ♫ Estrella Del Mar

writer's block/mediocrity/call it what you want.

Nothing tastes as sweet

in your absence.

Your presence may be distracting.

But, your absence is even more distracting.

This is the crossroads,

Where I mix pleasure with pain.

This mixing of souls,

May as well be a mixing of drinks,

This tequila

shot

love.

It burns,

and churns

my insides.

intoxicates me.

evades me.

Your touch can not truly

contain all the power I prescribe it.

But absence makes the heart grow fonder.

Absence makes this intoxication stronger.

Anna Nalick ♫ Wreck of the day

(this was my initial reaction to the death of Benazir Bhutto in December 2007)


To see bodies lining streets. Those streets.

What kind of cause is this; politics? Bhutto, breed of corruption.

That’s not a cause to die for. A cause of death, maybe.

Blood and bodies. My mind is on turbo, what street is that? Shahr-e-faisal? The street where the races happened? The back roads where we ate ice cream in the middle of the night?

Today, arresting prominence.  Where yesterday we flew kites. How can one city support such multi faceted memories?  The unreality and the reality are sinking in through my eyes at the same rate my tears sink in to my shirt and my cheeks. I’m glad no one in the living room is looking around. Slip away into the corners of this tiny apartment. Steal away a moment to breathe and heave out a sobbing sigh as it rises in her throat.

No. no. no.

That’s my city.

Those are my streets.

That’s my home.

“It hurts. My heart actually hurts.” She cries amid angry tears mixing with hysterical laughter. As she paces madly the expanse of her room, in the dark. Stumbling over her own feet, raising her voice, “Have I ever even mourned for anything in my life like this?”[ever mourned a life like this? when i realize the city is living, alive inside me and outside me] And finally she buckles down to her knees and rests her head in her hands. Pushing curls back as they roll over her shoulders, she incessantly rubs her forehead against her hands as if to try and generate an answer to this riddle of the future through friction. Physics. No, this cause is not physical. It’s chemical, irreversible. Chemicals; burning cars on the streets and corners. Burning validity of all emotion to ash through violence.

Karachi is known for its wind. Close to the sea, a relieving breeze. A reliving breeze. One that I missed for a whole decade. But, now that I know it, I know that breeze again. It taught me how to open my heart again. Those winds entered my soul. I know that breeze. It fans flames of the heart, not the ones I see on the Television.

My country. My city. My family. Scattered to no end in this scheme. Sing me an anthem that will tell me not to come. Let your sands soak the blood. Let your sands know no vengeance. Let them learn forgiveness, as they forgave me for being absent for so long.

Karachi. Tell me you’ll make it through. Tell me you’ll be the same one day. Tell me you will lull my heart to sleep once more with the rhythm of your winds Karachi. Not with the ricochet of bullets. Speak to me, like your streets did when I walked them. Speak to me in silence. Hush hush, I know traitors tread your faithful streets.

Hush hush. I’m coming.

Hush hush the tears. There are many more to come.

Zeb & Haniya and Javed Bashir ♫ Chal Diyay

earth spins slow,

slower everyday.

it has only survived the penetrating darkness for its pace.

otherwise it would have corroded, corrupted and been consumed.

faster, faster, to gone.

slower, slower, to last.

then why are we so so keen to connect so quickly?

faster than light our eyes lock,

like some radar of chemistry

that we cannot define,

that cannot be confined.

so let us spin slowly, like earth,

let us spin slow with her,

so that this love can last.

so it doesnt become a thing of the past.

The Thrillseekers ♫ Waiting Here For You

i dont ask much.

i dont say much.
why
corrupt chemistry
with words?

give me your body.
your heart and mind,
will come, with time.

give me your body,
and once i take hold,
there's no other world.

give me you body,
i'll take your soul.