Wanting

By Najmus Saqib

Lately, I've been wanting,

Craving the key to a locked psalm—

A mist that my heart refuses to embalm.

Lately—God!—everything is daunting!

Hopelessly, I’m carved by need,

Of hungers that lick my heart,

Obsessions that tear me apart.

An altar where I feed

But I feed on embers of deodars,

Bled by the fires of the chinars—

Detonation of a soul beneath stars,

As the moon coughs up its scars

Life, the wreckage of a noble dream.

Narcissus crowned in glorious defeat—

The lake, a surface of deceit!

His face, a hollow looped meme

Now, eyes are glazed over and numb,

Feasting on the seventh circle of hell!

Evil seeping from faith’s Chernobyl—

Rats gnaw the perfidious drum.

By Najmus Saqib