Rakhshan Rizwan" />
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Literature, PoetrySeptember 2, 2015

Lahore

Untitled by Anuje Farhung. Image Courtesy the Artist

Untitled by Anuje Farhung. Image Courtesy the Artist

The balloon man’s balloons will burst in the heat,
The ice hawker’s cart will seep water,
Streetside fruit will rot in a matter of hours,
Flies will feast on slices of coconut,
Maggots will devour luscious mangoes,
Wreathes of jasmine will wilt by midday,
Papur will become soggy and lose its crispiness,
Spicy corn will start to split from the cob,
Bottles of perfumed oils will evaporate in the heat,
Today’s newspaper will become yesterday’s paper,
Samosas will become coal if fried for a second more,
Jalebis will hiss and contort and become unverifiable
Cars will hurtle forward even before
soapy liquid is applied onto their windscreens,
by a pair of bone-thin hands, the pregnant woman at the wheel
may lose interest in the whispered duas of a hijra,
Schoolchildren may settle for popsicles,
if the salted peanuts take too long to roast,
the woman applying henna may
botch the elegant paisley motif, while imprinting it
onto a child’s palm, the rangrez
may soak a duppata a second too long—
and make it — neela — instead of — ferozi,

on Lakshmi Chowk, the sharp
quiver of the minute hand,
is the difference
between reprieve and ruin,

So hurry, dye those duppatas, dot those elegant paisleys,
So place those fraying jasmine wreathes
round delicate wrists, so kiss your children—
and hold them close, remember the scent of their skin,
the lilt of their voice, commit to memory,
the colour of their eyes,

A bullet in a loaded gun may go off, the landlord’s temper may go off,
A bomb may go off, fruit may go off,
Jasmine may go off, the dye may go off,

So, quickly, kiss your children, hold them close,
and work, work yourself to dust—
and hurry.

~ Rakhshan Rizwan

Rakhshan Rizwan was born in Lahore, Pakistan and then moved to Germany where she studied Literature and New Media. She is currently a PhD candidate at Utrecht University in the Netherlands. As well as previously appearing in The Missing Slate, her poems have appeared in Papercuts, Cerebration, Muse India, Postcolonial Text and elsewhere.

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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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