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Literature, PoetryMarch 16, 2016

My Weakness

Awakened by Mohsin Shafi. Image Courtesy the Artist.

Awakened, by Mohsin Shafi. Image courtesy of the artist.

is my weakness; God makes this easy
to understand. Like the king’s boyhood friend
who grew to tend a small farm and curse his ox nightly,
I can’t help but feel I’m underachieving. I’m not deceived
by this life, by the certainty of need, but consider
the prophet who gave away his water bowl
when he saw a woman drinking from her hands—
today an entire river surrounds his tomb. The desire
to help others is a kind of symmetry. As a boy I gave a hateful teacher
a list of one hundred quotes on compassion from the Quran.
He hung a poster of George Bush by the blackboard
and started purposely mispronouncing my name.
I can’t say it enough: God will not send us more
than we can waste. Lately it’s seemed the old rainwhipper’s
been sleeping or maybe just gone, and I’m still here
saddled with thirst and brittle skin that yields
to whatever bites. I shall not grieve the absence
of miracles. I shall not grieve absence at all: not winter jasmine
blooming only at night or my mother’s lazy eye or
the kudzu’s path from one tree to another. It’s ridiculous
to think I could keep any of it. Before long,
the earth will swallow even my sound.

~ Kaveh Akbar

Kaveh Akbar is the founder and editor of Divedapper. His poems are forthcoming in The Boston Review, Narrative, Iowa Review, Poetry Northwest, and elsewhere. Kaveh is a Ph.D. candidate at Florida State University, where he teaches and serves as Book Reviews Editor for the Southeast Review. His chapbook, ‘Portrait of the Alcoholic’, will be out with Sibling Rivalry Press in January 2017. 

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One last love letter...

April 24, 2021

It has taken us some time and patience to come to this decision. TMS would not have seen the success that it did without our readers and the tireless team that ran the magazine for the better part of eight years.

But… all good things must come to an end, especially when we look at the ever-expanding art and literary landscape in Pakistan, the country of the magazine’s birth.

We are amazed and proud of what the next generation of creators are working with, the themes they are featuring, and their inclusivity in the diversity of voices they are publishing. When TMS began, this was the world we envisioned…

Though the magazine has closed and our submissions shuttered, this website will remain open for the foreseeable future as an archive of the great work we published and the astounding collection of diverse voices we were privileged to feature.

If, however, someone is interested in picking up the baton, please email Maryam Piracha, the editor, at maryamp@themissingslate.com.

Farewell, fam! It’s been quite a ride.

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