The House of Forgotten Flowers

Altamash Zehri

Zehri shares a cadenced, melancholic poem of separation.

Artwork by Mian Ijaz ul Hassan

I don't quarrel with the moon

that goes round your city

and reaches me at four in the night

I am lost in the awful torrent of things

Forgetting slowly the sweet lilt of your

laughter and your unasked kindness

that came like rain    graces of spring

in endless winter

I would rather not pluck primroses

from the green fields anymore

Their petals will eventually bow

like half asleep old men at the bus station

with stems—those quiet necks of desire—

slumping at last, not dying at once

just slowly forgetting how to live

withered blooms, my dear friend

You always forget to water the vases

Once my house was a nest

I can't trail the spoor of the old birds

now flown away—at first light

swiftly through the silvery threads

without sound or fury

unlacing the gossamer of dreams

Took me a long time to weave

the patient nights my enduring companion

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Altamash Zehri is a writer from Baluchistan whose work maps the intersections of place, memory, and estrangement. He writes both poetry and short fiction, drawing on the rhythms of city life and the silences of the frontier. His short fiction and poetry often address themes of longing, mental health, and belonging.

Mian Ijaz ul Hassan is a renowned Pakistani artist, teacher, art critic and writer. Born in 1940, he studied art at Saint Martin’s School of Art in London and literature at Cambridge. He was associated with the National College of Arts, Lahore, from 1966 to 1975 where he was mentored by the famous artist Shakir Ali. His work has been displayed around the world and has written regularly on art, painting and culture. He has also written a book on Pakistani art.