Poems

Neighborhood

Look out the house’s many windows
and see crows swinging on wires,
soldiers commanding zones of our life.

In this neighbourhood the streets run backwards,
questioning themselves. Rumours pass between walls.
Whispers of longing connect men and women.

Every house along the lane has eyes
that speak, doors of red paper,
sunlit facades hungry for innuendoes.

In the window of one house a woman stands,
her back to the road.  Lamplight burns on her body.
Her room smells of cooking and soap.

Strangers pass through the streets.
They hear music from balconies,
and the strange, magnetic laughter of dogs.

At sunset invisible mosques call to prayer.
Living rooms ignite in a blue fluorescence.
Women light incense
as birds announce the day’s passing.

Moeen Faruqi
First published by the Pakistan Academy of Letters