Sunday 11 February 2024

11th February 2024

The gunfire has receded
From intense to sporadic,
A sign of rebel withdrawal
From the city streets and alleyways
Back to their lairs and hideouts
In the jungles and the forests
Of tropical Malaysia
Until the next round of festivities 
When the next Emperor God 
Takes his rightful place 
In the sky
And everyone rejoices
With shell bursts way up high
From howitzers and mortars
And an RPG or two
And sometimes multiple blasts
From an MLRS too.


Tuesday 14 November 2023

12th November 2023

 

Weep not, O Palestine, 
For your children are not dead
Nor are your women dead
Nor your men,
Slaughtered in the name of jihad
By the thousands,
For they are martyrs,
Martyred in the name of Allah
Who will be welcoming them in paradise
And crowning them with dignity and honor,
The highest that can be attained
 In all of Islam.

Rejoice, O Islam, 
Rejoice, O Muhammad,
For ten thousand new martyrs 
Are on their way to join you 
In paradise,
On board the train which bears the souls of martyrs
And transports them to heaven
Where eternal bliss and the highest of honors,
And in the case of the men,
Sexual delights in the arms of seventy-two virgins,
Awaits them.

Bless him, 
The ticket inspector who punched your tickets
As you waited to board the train,
O Palestine,
And thank him
Instead of cursing him,
He who displayed on his ticket inspector's uniform
The star of David,
For it was he who has helped your martyrs,
All ten thousand of them,
Attain the highest of honors 
In all of Islam.

God bless martyrdom! 
God bless the Shaheed who is martyred in the way of Istishhad!
Allah-u-Akbar!
Allah-u-Akbar!
Allah-u-Akbar!


Saturday 11 November 2023

11th November 2023

I gave you a whole room where you could be all by yourself,
For you and your babies,
And how do you thank me?
By spitting in my face
And taking your precious babies elsewhere,
Not once but twice.

The neighbors have complained,
Not once but twice.
"Are these your kittens?" they said.
"Take them away," they said. 
"We know not what to do with them," they said.
Not once but twice,
And now you have done it again.

I gave you a whole room where you could be all by yourself,
For you and your babies,
And how do you thank me?
By spitting in my face
And taking your precious babies elsewhere,
For the third time now.

Enough!
Henceforth, you will no longer be welcome in this house
Whose open doors and welcome mat you have spat upon
For the third time now.

You will be shooed away on sight.
If within reach, you will be caned on sight.
If out of reach but within air soft pellet range,
You will be shot on sight.

Until the day you submit to me,
The Hand That Feeds You,
And bring your babies back.
No longer will I be the hand that feeds you.

Not as I have decided
But as you have chosen,
Thou fool of a mama pussycat.





Friday 27 October 2023

27th October 2023

Just look at you.
God must've been so pleased with himself the day he made you,
He would've declared that day a holiday.

Just look at you.
God must've been so pleased with himself the day he made you,
The look of satisfaction on his face would've lasted from sunrise until sunset.

Just look at you.
God must've been so pleased with himself the day he made you,
He would've summoned everyone from the four corners of his kingdom
For a day of feasting and merriment.




Tuesday 22 August 2023

22nd August 2023

I could watch you read the news

Every day for the rest of my life,

Observing the movement of your lips 

As you spoke in sync 

With the movement of your eyes

And I would not be bothered 

If the outside world was burning

And mountain slopes were crumbling

While people dazed and stumbling

Were wailing with their voices

Reaching to the skies

For I would feel so blessed

To be watching you

In paradise.





Monday 14 August 2023

14th August 2023

 Tea. 

Piping hot.

Cooled by blowing gently before each sip.

No other way to drink it.

Just made myself a cuppa with boiling water fresh off the stove.

A piping hot cuppa tea and the morning newspaper.

No other way to start the day.

Whoops!

Cats' water bowl waiting to be refilled?

Whoops!

Cats' groundsheets waiting to be changed?

Whoops!

Cats' rice waiting to be cooked?

Tell you what.

To hell with everything.

Too many times, too many times.

Lukewarm tea after getting everything else outta the way?

Again?

For the millionth time?

Not this time.

To hell with everything.

This time it's me first, everything else afterwards.

OKAY?!?

Now where's that piping hot cuppa tea?

What?

Got distracted again?

Damn!!!

Saturday 22 April 2023

22nd April 2023

 


A wise man once said,
We are the product of our environment,
And so it was,
As here you lie at Death's doorstep
And here I am,
Writing about it.

You did not choose to be born
Only to die forty-two days later,
Yet here you were,
Fulfilling your destiny
Just as I was fulfilling mine
As a writer
Born with the inherent gift of writing
And shaped by the nature of my environment
According to whether a sandstorm was blowing in my face
On the parched and arid sands of the Rajasthani desert
Or whether it was pouring cats and dogs
In the tropical and dense concrete jungles of Malaysia.

Rest easy, 
Little One,
For soon your earthly troubles will be over.