Pakistaniaat: A Journal of Pakistan Studies

Abbas, Qaisar

Review, Translating a Poetic Discourse: Modern Poetry of Pakistan

Munadi (Ù…Ù†Ø§Ø¯ÛŒ)

Akhtar, Rizwan

Pakistaniaat: A Journal of Pakistan Studies Vol. 3, No. 1 (2011) 
	  
	  
 
Pakistani story 
(from real to comic) 
By Rizwan Akhtar 
 
I 
 
When they call me Paki 
they do not know that back home 
the word means ‘pure’. 
 
I cover eight thousands miles 
leave behind droning afternoons of Lahore; 
a patched & dust-friendly sky; 
a book of history shoved into a wrong shelf; 
and a map burned at edges. 
 
Oil slick and grease of the English waters 
sits on my postcode and cheekbones, 
the tongue is heavier than ever 
the eyes are blurring than ever 
but the nose is sharper than ever. 
 
Oui ! paki-hairs, paki-drag,  
Paki wife, paki kiddos,  
smelling basmati*and lamb’s fats 
lovely! your flab and flaps! 
 
My mother stitches a white cap,  
embroidered kurta and shalwar  
I wear it on Fridays 
but the English winters 
108
Rizwan Akhtar 
	  
shape me for jackets and corduroys. 
 
With a Paki flourish  
I slip into a white butcher’s coat 
chop the grammar, skin the verbs 
mince the personal pronouns 
separate bones  
from the fleshy sounds 
hook broths with a gruff 
thump the gurgling till 
with the English huff. 
 
II 
 
My wife fries Paki puris 
a touch fluffy than the Indian 
for the sake of name 
sava, suji or semolina 
the desserts are same 
borders merge in cuisines  
but Paki shops are decked 
in green Paki hopes 
the land of pure  
and pennies  
are in their orbs— 
invested in fat boys 
ganging around  
desi clubs 
girls gyrating in jeans 
tiptoeing to their jobs 
inside Hijabs 
a wink of uncertainty 
stuck in their eyes 
heaving mascara 
contact lenses 
and jilted ties. 
109
Pakistaniaat: A Journal of Pakistan Studies Vol. 3, No. 1 (2011) 
	  
	  
 
 
III 
 
Paki women lag behind 
curled in yards of clothes 
they simper in mimes 
make babies  
scrub grimes 
herd dole-nourished children  
whine for extra wages and time. 
 
On Eids  their dreams 
return with vermichilli  
sprinkled with nuts and tears 
women release from etched duppatas 
their wages of domesticity  
but men stay in namaz*caps, 
yell and curse at the western sins 
flatter their dyed beards with a grin. 
 
  
IV 
 
After years of travelling  
in the underground 
the seat next to me has a ghost 
I hug it and it follows me 
to the gas stations and roads 
speaks nothing but asks for more— 
the passport is punched  
Home office is in my abode 
I speak for the Queen but  
bathe in the local streams.  
110
Rizwan Akhtar 
	  
 
 
Scrubbing, scarping, counting quids 
end up buying a cheap day travel pass 
never take a day off  
and cab around  
the Trafalgar Square  
watch pigeons 
picking grains and seeds, 
feel for my licence and deeds 
what if I am baled and dumped 
in Thames and left to bleed. 
 
I turn on a nazam* 
Hum Ka thehere ajnabi 
itni Mulaqaton ka bad* 
the cab halts abruptly   
the Tower bridge folds 
the Paki cab becomes 
a dream toad 
hops over the bridge 
the eyes go wide 
the English search me  
in their data base and tides. 
 
 
 
*prayer cap 
 
*The literary meaning of Nazm is Poetry. Nazm is a poem fully dealing with a 
single subject or thought. 
* ‘after so many meetings, we are still strangers ’;  Matla (The opening 
She’r/couplet of a Ghazal or a poem) of Faiz Ahamd Faiz’ ghazal. 
 
 
 
111


English

Pakistani Story

Waterman, David

Book Review of To Live or to Perish Forever...

Afzal-Khan, Fawzia

Lahore With Love by Fawzia Afzal-Khan, Syracuse UP

Bawa, Riffat

Hashmi, Waqar Haider

A Brief History of Labor Unionization in Pakistan (Ù¾Ø§ÙƒØ³ØªØ§Ù† Ù…ÛŒÚº Ù…Ø²Ø¯ÙˆØ± ØªØ­Ø±ÛŒÙƒ ÙƒÛŒ Ù…Ø®ØªØµØ± ØªØ§Ø±ÛŒØ®)

Young, Tatiana Zelenetskaya

Review, Side Effects: Portrait of a Young Artist in Lahore

Turner, Mehnaz

Pakistaniaat: A Journal of Pakistan Studies Vol. 2, No. 2 (2010)
Punjabi, a rhapsody in my heart,
flounders on the tongue an out of tune
instrument.  Yet a sip of a string 
of words, and the weaker side of me 
becomes a lute of iron.  The Muslim 
in me becomes Hindu, and the Hindu 
in me becomes Sikh.  The woman in me 
becomes man, and the man in me becomes animal.
Partitions dissolve into the heat of mixed melodies.
The body a lit match, the effect of a cause.
Scrambled syllables of a language 
I will never speak echoing in my chest,
and suddenly the miles between Los Angeles 
and Lahore seem yellowed with snatches:
fragments of songs, memories of voices.
Here in America my thoughts open in English,
but the unfinished sentences make me think 
of the biology of language, the Punjabi 
in my blood, prior to English in all respects,
so that even as I write this poem, I am translating.
Punjabi
By Mehnaz Turner
87


Punjabi

Review, The Wish Maker by Ali Seth

Raja, Masood Ashraf

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