Kishwar Naheed" />
  • ABOUT
  • PRINT
  • PRAISE
  • SUBSCRIBE
  • OPENINGS
  • SUBMISSIONS
  • CONTACT
The Missing Slate - For the discerning reader
  • HOME
  • Magazine
  • In This Issue
  • Literature
    • Billy Luck
      Billy Luck
    • To the Depths
      To the Depths
    • Dearly Departed
      Dearly Departed
    • Fiction
    • Poetry
  • Arts AND Culture
    • Tramontane
      Tramontane
    • Blade Runner 2049
      Blade Runner 2049
    • Loving Vincent
      Loving Vincent
    • The Critics
      • FILM
      • BOOKS
      • TELEVISION
    • SPOTLIGHT
    • SPECIAL FEATURES
  • ESSAYS
    • A SHEvolution is Coming in Saudi Arabia
      A SHEvolution is Coming in Saudi Arabia
    • Paxi: A New Business Empowering Women in Pakistan
      Paxi: A New Business Empowering Women in Pakistan
    • Nature and Self
      Nature and Self
    • ARTICLES
    • COMMENTARY
    • Narrative Nonfiction
  • CONTESTS
    • Pushcart Prize 2017 Nominations
      Pushcart Prize 2017 Nominations
    • Pushcart Prize 2016 Nominations
      Pushcart Prize 2016 Nominations
    • Pushcart Prize 2015 Nominations
      Pushcart Prize 2015 Nominations
    • PUSHCART 2013
    • PUSHCART 2014
Literature, PoetryOctober 7, 2015

Working Hands / Zawal-e-Istihal


Warning: Illegal string offset 'size' in /home/customer/www/journal.themissingslate.com/public_html/wp-content/plugins/urdu-formatter-shamil/urdu-formatter-shamil.php on line 175

Warning: Illegal string offset 'size' in /home/customer/www/journal.themissingslate.com/public_html/wp-content/plugins/urdu-formatter-shamil/urdu-formatter-shamil.php on line 176

Warning: Illegal string offset 'align' in /home/customer/www/journal.themissingslate.com/public_html/wp-content/plugins/urdu-formatter-shamil/urdu-formatter-shamil.php on line 178

Warning: Illegal string offset 'size' in /home/customer/www/journal.themissingslate.com/public_html/wp-content/plugins/urdu-formatter-shamil/urdu-formatter-shamil.php on line 181
The Manifestation of Her Own Existence by Hamida Khatri. Image Courtesy ArtChowk Gallery

The Manifestation of Her Own Existence by Hamida Khatri. Image Courtesy ArtChowk Gallery

Once our hands moved with grace
like fish shoaling through water, flames
through air. Now they are creased
as un-ironed laundry, folded
many times, fidget in our laps
like leaves in the fall. They have served well.
Even though knuckles are pummeled, nails ridged
like limpet shells. These hands have never
been used to beg. So ignore the looks
on others’ faces when they catch sight
of our working tools. Don’t pocket your hands.
Let them speak, they have much more to say.
~ Kishwar Naheed, in an English version by Vicki Husband

زوالِ استحصال

یہ ہاتھ جن میں رگیں ابھرکے

خزاں کی آمد کا نامہ بر ہیں

رگیں، کبھی یوں تپش زدہ تھیں

کہ جیسے سیّال آگ

بے آب مچھلیوں کی طرح ہو بے کل

یہ ہاتھ اٹھے نہیں دُعا کو

یہ ہاتھ، دستِ طلب کی صورت

کہیں سبک سر نہیں ہوئے ہیں

یہ ہاتھ اپنی ہی آرزووٓں کے

قاتل و  ناخدا رہے ہیں

یہ ہاتھ کہ جن کی انگلیوں میں

مشقوں کے عزاب نے

ہر گرہ کو چپٹا بنا دیا ہے

ہر ایک ناخن، شکستہ ساحل کی شکل میں

بدنمائی کا آئینہ بنا ہے

یہ میرے اچھے دنوں کی تصویرِ ابتدا ہے۔

Vicki Husband lives in Glasgow and works for the NHS. Vicki’s poems have been published in literary magazines and in an anthology of new Scottish poetry: ‘Be The First To Like This’. She has won prizes in competitions, such as the Edwin Morgan International poetry prize. Vicki’s first collection will be published early in 2016.

Kishwar Naheed is a prolific feminist poet of national and international repute. She is a publicist, columnist, media personality, and has written scripts, documentaries, and poetry. She has been a recipient of numerous prestigious awards including the Government’s civil award, Sitara-e-Imtiaz in 2000, and was one of the 1000 women nominated world-wide for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2005.

This poem is a version of Kishwar Naheed’s ‘The End of Exploitation’, which was originally pulbished by Sang-e-Meel Publications. Vicki Husband’s version was written in conjunction with Kishwar Naheed with the help of highlightarts.org

Tags

Kishwar NaheedPakistani literaturePoem of the WeekpoetrytranslationsUrduVicki Husband

Share on

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Pinterest
  • Google +
  • LinkedIn
  • Email
Previous articlefor zainab
Next articleThe Bruners

You may also like

Billy Luck

To the Depths

Dearly Departed

Trackbacks

  1. from the Urdu… | Vicki Husband says:
    September 18, 2016 at 2:17 PM

    […] city-to-city project. Working Hands is my version of a poem by Kishwar Naheed and is published in The Missing Slate as poem of the week (the original poem in Urdu will be added to the site soon).  Hopefully soon […]

Ad

In the Magazine

A Word from the Editor

Don’t cry like a girl. Be a (wo)man.

Why holding up the women in our lives can help build a nation, in place of tearing it down.

Literature

This House is an African House

"This house is an African house./ This your body is an African woman’s body..." By Kadija Sesay.

Literature

Shoots

"Sapling legs bend smoothly, power foot in place,/ her back, parallel to solid ground,/ makes her torso a table of support..." By Kadija Sesay.

Literature

A Dry Season Doctor in West Africa

"She presses her toes together. I will never marry, she says. Jamais dans cette vie! Where can I find a man like you?" By...

In the Issue

Property of a Sorceress

"She died under mango trees, under kola nut/ and avocado trees, her nose pressed to their roots,/ her hands buried in dead leaves, her...

Literature

What Took Us to War

"What took us to war has again begun,/ and what took us to war/ has opened its wide mouth/ again to confuse us." By...

Literature

Sometimes, I Close My Eyes

"sometimes, this is the way of the world,/ the simple, ordinary world, where things are/ sometimes too ordinary to matter. Sometimes,/ I close my...

Literature

Quarter to War

"The footfalls fading from the streets/ The trees departing from the avenues/ The sweat evaporating from the skin..." By Jumoke Verissimo.

Literature

Transgendered

"Lagos is a chronicle of liquid geographies/ Swimming on every tongue..." By Jumoke Verissimo.

Fiction

Sketches of my Mother

"The mother of my memories was elegant. She would not step out of the house without her trademark red lipstick and perfect hair. She...

Fiction

The Way of Meat

"Every day—any day—any one of us could be picked out for any reason, and we would be... We’d part like hair, pushing into the...

Fiction

Between Two Worlds

"Ursula spotted the three black students immediately. Everyone did. They could not be missed because they kept to themselves and apart from the rest...."...

Essays

Talking Gender

"In fact it is often through the uninformed use of such words that language becomes a tool in perpetuating sexism and violence against women...

Essays

Unmasking Female Circumcision

"Though the origins of the practice are unknown, many medical historians believe that FGM dates back to at least 2,000 years." Gimel Samera looks...

Essays

Not Just A Phase

"...in the workplace, a person can practically be forced out of their job by discrimination, taking numerous days off for fear of their physical...

Essays

The Birth of Bigotry

"The psychology of prejudice demands that we are each our own moral police". Maria Amir on the roots of bigotry and intolerance.

Fiction

The Score

"The person on the floor was unmistakeably dead. It looked like a woman; she couldn’t be sure yet..." By Hawa Jande Golakai.

More Stories

Blade Runner 2049

Like its predecessor, “Blade Runner 2049” is a stylistic triumph that offers less than meets the eye. Matt Levine reviews the much-touted sequel.

Back to top
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.

Read previous post:
Poet of the Month: Thomas C. Dunn

"We don’t learn by judging; we learn by fighting to understand." Thomas C. Dunn, The Missing Slate's Poet of the...

Close