Khalid Mukhtar

Word, like wind, cuts through you / Withers all but true you

2014 Chaining Project Unveiled at Madame Zuzu’s, And Another Open-mic

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Last night was the unveiling of the 2014 Chaining Project conducted by the Highland Park Poetry Chain Gang. I was at the event held  at Madame Zuzu’s Tea shop and Art Studio in Highland Park.

It was enjoyable to hear the chain begin with Arthur Rimbaud’s Time Without End, navigate through verse describing a hike in the woods along a polluted stream, and culminate in defeat at a ball game :-).

The open-mic that followed was more interesting than usual. I performed Take Heart, Cabbage Wisdom, and One-Dream Child. 
Also it turns out Madame Zuzu’s is owned by Billy Corgan, once frontman for the Smashing Pumpkins. I read some excerpts from his anthology titled Blinking with Fists. Not bad at all.
About the tea served at Madame Zuzu’s… well, the water was certainly hot.

Thursday Riddle (April 10, 2014)

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Although true and faithful I ever remain,
My colors I change again and again;
Berate me and hate me and slight, even spite me,
Think twice fore you fight me: a battle with time;
Your failure to sight me: unfortunate crime.

I seldom inspire a word,

And often the former imply,
I’m ever tween where the two of you fare
And where stands one questioning why.

Thursday Riddle (April 3, 2014)

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The purest of heart my service employs
To make a sweet calm to descend;
But when we are parted, the innocent noise
Brings all of the sweetness to end;
A part of me sounds like it burns and destroys,
Yet all of me is a good friend
To mother and father and brother and sister,
Who on me can come to depend.

Published in the Society of Classical Poets Annual Journal 2014, Volume 2

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Earlier this year, I learned that my entries were selected for publication in the 2014 Annual Journal of the Society of Classical Poets, Volume 2.

In this latest issue, the journal features the works of the top fifteen poets judged in the last competition held by the society. So this is an honor for me, having been published in the previous issue of the journal as well. I recently got my copy and was very impressed with the quality of all the poetic works. I feel honored to be counted among those who were recognized.

Get your copy on Amazon, and please support the society for the good work it does in reviving and promoting classical poetry. My thanks and admiration go to Evan Mantyk, President of the society, for his efforts to this end.

-KM

Thursday Riddle (March 27, 2014)

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Its yours and it flows where you deem
It useful in matters of learning;
For some, like a brook; for others a stream;
A river for those more discerning.
It knows where you are, it can find you
And float you to places so far,
Beware its reflections may blind you
And make you forget who you are.
Although through the meadows it goes,
To Paradise never it bends,
For heaven starts where the sum of what flows
From all of humanity ends.

Beacon

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You’re lost, but only lost until you find
Your place before the One who’s ever found,
So cling to hope, and leave despair behind
And be for paradise forever bound.
 
As does the sailor high upon the sea
See through the blast of consternating waves
And fix his eye on beacon distantly
Though what it stands upon be what he craves,
So does the slave that seeks by night or day
See through the blast of consternating life
And fix his eye on him who shows the way
No matter the intensity of strife.
You have to take the means to reach the end,
So seek with sweet remembrance, weary friend.

Grandlove

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I fuss over children whose grandfather once
Did dote on my mother, and uncles and aunts;
It maybe that one day my grandson will see
The face of his cousin remembering me,
A cousin whose parents and uncles and aunts 
Will have been who I will have doted on once.

Thursday Riddle (March 20, 2014)

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Can never be lost, not easy to share,
It fills empty spaces (and I don’t mean air),
Preceding the first, succeeding the last,
Delaying your death, returning your past;
By darkness or light, in silence it lies
Where, hidden from sight of all-seeing eyes,
Just anything might compel its demise.

Song of the Despondent Slave

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Wherever you might be: shun the darkness of despair, and walk in the light of hope.


I wish I could smoke it away,
This hurt that I feel everyday,
No substance may burn the demons that turn
My grief into idols of clay.


Don’t judge me, you don’t know my pain,
I’ve lost what I love once again,
Forgotten to smile, the tears run wild,
And drain every cell in my brain.


I know the despair in my voice
Invites the accursed to rejoice
For he did attest that he wouldn’t rest
Till grief be my singular choice;


O Allah, I need to embrace
The reason I am in this place,
You gave me this pain, again and again
That I may now turn to Your face.


My hope lies in sabrun jameel,
There’s nothing else I need to feel,
For Jannah is where my heart will repair
And all of my injury heal.


So bless my each moment, command
My heart to a peace that is grand,
You know that my lips are longing for sips
To quench all my thirst at the hand


Of blessed Rasul al-Kareem,
O Allah, make everything seem
So easy for me, oh please let me see
The Truth, for this life is a dream.


Make easy for me that I may now see
The Truth, for this life is a dream.

O Allah! Enable me to see the Truth as Truth and give me the ability to follow it. And enable me to see falsehood as false and give me the ability to refrain from it.

Thursday Riddle (March 13, 2014)

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There is no escape from the lair,
This slave cannot flee anywhere,
Submitting and peaceful when held in his cage,
But out, Is his spear good reason for fear,
The harder the combat, the greater his rage;
The maddening slaughter he craves, it comes faster,
The lair becomes hotter when slave becomes master.