Poem

I am not too happy with this one. There seems to be something lacking in this poem. Too many words, I think......
You decide.

Frozen in Time
by Zaina Anwar

The first time
he laid eyes on her,
she was sitting
all by herself
on the old stone steps
of the library.
\Her head was bent
over a thick aged volume,
balanced most precariously
across her burdened knees.
\Deeply absorbed she must have been
for she did not look up
-not even once-
while our young man
stood very still,
frozen in time like a marble statue.

\At last he,
stepped forward
as if pushed by the hands
of a fate
he could not foresee
and found himself,
a few moments ensuing
staring into the face
of destiny.
\He talked, she listened
all the while,
most attentively,
with her eyes wide open
and twirling round her finger
a strand of auburn tinted hair.

\For her he stole
from the archives of memory,
a deeply unsettling dream,
which had gnawed and wrenched
at the very roots
of his inward pubescent soul.
\A poetry of images,
-beautiful yet sad-
and consummated
by his softly flowing tears,
the dream dilated and slowly insinuated
itself
into the girl's arrested being.
\And when he was gone,
his back slowly receding
into the distance framed by concrete buildings,
with a wildly beating heart
and wide eyed wonder,
she sat very still,
frozen in time like a marble statue.

A bit of Native American wisdom

'Messenger' by Kirby Sattler

'What is life?. It is a flash of a firefly in the night. It is the breath of a buffalo in the wintertime. It is the little shadow which runs across the grass and loses itself in the sunset."
A Blackfoot Indian proverb.

White Black Red

Sometime back, I came across a blog called 'white black Red' and immediately fell in love with it. The creator, being fascinated with the above stated color combinations, decided to collect under one roof, art and design which illustrates or, is centered around this wonderful theme. I thought it was a brilliant idea and immediately submitted my work for consideration. I am happy to see that it has been kindly posted here.

Anatomy of her neck

Charcoal and pencil on paper.

Verse to ponder

Driving home at midnight.
Suddenly the car
screeches to a violent halt
and my man, looking up at the sky,
utters softly:
'Isn't the moon beautiful tonight?'.

The Beast within

This was a very spontaneous drawing arising out of frustration and anger which I sometimes feel when I am excessively thwarted in my decisions or plans...

An artist cries out...

O Beloved guardian of my imperfect soul,
Thou has blessed Thy ungrateful slave,
With an offering gilded with the purest gold,
To cherish till I lie in my earthy grave.

And yet this weak unworthy bearer,
Of Thy mercy and kindly favor,
Whines and moans in perpetual grief,
Laying waste her gift in frivolous dreams.

(This verse is a tribute to the poetical tradition of the Sufis).

Illustrating Rimbaud

Quartet

Poem

City a.m.
by Zaina Anwar


Most mornings
I
stand on my terrace
leaning over
the rusted iron rail.
\I stare
with an expert eye
and a crazy relish
at the hectic throng
of passersby.
\I see
a dull monotony
of greys and blues-
such a drab palette
of dreary hues.
\Thus dressed,
in 'official'
garb
so pervasive,
spare and sharp
\looking,
they advance
slowly,
scaling the streets
they cross and recross everyday.
\Vacant eyes
gape
from faces harried
by ten thousand
crippling worries
\as they push
and toil
against the tide
sweeping the oil
glittering streets.
\And at times when,
by chance a face
-or two-
lifts up to the patch
of empty sky,
\I catch a fleeting
glimpse
of a yearning
for open pastures
and simpler times.

Poem

A Silent Prayer
by Zaina Anwar
(the following poem is meant to be read slowly and deliberately).

I want

To find a nesting place
so I can rest my head
on the softest pillow
of exquisite feathers.

To find a secret cave
where amongst the rocks
water trickles silently
in an eternal flow.

To know that as I
close my weary eyes
the magpie will chant
its mystic ode.

To write as if
I cannot control
the frenzied gush of words
drenching my mind.

To wake to the sun
with life renewed
and a fresh wind
stroking the dew laden leaves.

To wonder every moment
at cosmic mystery-
the timeless frantic dance
of invisible atoms.

To look at a flower, everytime
a new encounter-
nature a treasure chest
overflowing delightful wonders.

Black, White and Red

Acrylic on canvas.

Voodoo Child

Graphite pencil on paper.

"I used to live in a room full of mirrors; all I could see was me. I take my spirit and crash my mirrors, now the whole world is here for me to see".
Jimi Hendrix

A verse forms itself

How sad,
that with every passing day,
he slowly drains her,
bit by bit,
drop by precious drop,
of Life.

Metamorphosis

Of all my paintings, this is the one closest to my heart. I almost wept when it was sold.

The Voiceless Woman

Drawings from my journal

On Freedom

To be free is to maintain your individuality even as you remain within the crowd instead of trying to escape to a place where no one or nothing can touch you. That is not freedom but cowardice.

A Tribute to Calliope

The Muse
by Zaina Anwar

Fair Calliope, do you not with your presence grace,

Hearths of desperate seekers of your patronage?

At times you hide or vanish without a trace,

Leaving half drunken poets trembling in silent rage.

You who rides so splendidly on high winds,

Casting your fiery glance over kingdom and beyond,

Know, though many have against your precepts sinned,

Others scrupulously to your bidding respond.

Mercifully noble you have been time and again,

To myriad suitors waiting with bated breaths,

Homer with epics great could his life regain,

Beyond the shadowy portals of timely death.

And through the hours of the darkest night,

As Goethe labored with his mighty quill,

You stood by benevolent through his plight,

Reviving Faust, as time stood courteously still.

And when gentle Keats knocked at your door,

Softly pleading for visions supreme,

Your splendour struck him to the core,

And blessed his sleep with Endymion dreams.

Boldly they offer their souls at your altar,

These lovers of rhymes and words and lore,

Even as they suffer they would never falter,

Weaving amaranthine tales, evermore.

Pen and Ink

Playing with letters...

Calligraphy in Italics.

This was an old Pringles box that I have decorated with calligraphy and use as a container for my collection of calligraphy pens.

A verse to ponder...

On Separation
by Zaina Anwar


How I languish these weary days,
like a spectre haunting empty hours,
Ever since we have parted ways,
the sweetest nectar tastes old and sour.
As frenzied clouds roll in upon the wind,
like sentinels guarding rain and doom,
My mind is arrested in a vision most grim,
of voiceless walls and empty rooms.

A Lamp, a Clay Pot and a Painting

I love drawing on lamp shades and am always happy with the result. I made this one for a friend of mine. Her 5 month old daughter is fascinated with it!.



I found this clay pot abandoned on the roof of my apartment building. The paint had almost disappeared and since it was such a beautiful, traditional design, I felt it my duty to restore it. So arming myself with a medium sized paint brush, I set to work...

Work in progress

Another short story...

The Davenport

It was the third day. Three days since that wretched moment when she had walked out the door. He was sitting with his head bent, shoulders slumped, in the middle of the large, overstuffed davenport. Even though it was a warm and sunny day, and the window was unshuttered, a huge fire blazed in the grate in front of him. His unusually short bathrobe-- as it was triumphantly raised from its very first sojourn in the washing machine, it was already half its original size-- was splayed rather ungracefully across his knees. On the table in front of him were scattered twelve crumpled cans of cheap beer, while in one corner, the big, old stone ashtray was overflowing with cigerette butts. A stale, smoky atmosphere, augmented by the raging hearth and the tightly shut window, pervaded the room.
At the moment, in addition to his predominant grief over his abandonment, he was feeling extremely irritated with his uncomfortable position on the sofa. The cushions were exceedingly soft; and his body was half-submerged in the feathery depths. How he had always hated it!.
“Blasted sofa!”, he cried, slapping his knee. With an ugly frown, he recalled all those times when he had, quite vocally (this brought a devilish smile to his face), expressed this loathing to his wife. But none of his complaints no matter how robust (here the smile suddenly disappeared), had stirred a single hair on her stubborn head!
“Oh, but you don't understand Peter. It's aesthetically perfect and that is what really matters”, he muttered bitterly, looking quite comical in this pathetic impersonation of his wife.
But the foul mood did not last long. It was knocked aside and urgently replaced by the horrifying vision of the long, empty days ahead, stretching without purpose into eternity. He saw himself— and for some curious reason, he was clad in the same uncouth bathrobe—as the sole animator of the perpetual, unbearably lingering evenings wasted by the fireside. For the moment—and we must forgive him this, considering the depth of his despair-- this vision included none of the ten thousand men and women whom he had befriended over the years and without whose company, he had always felt his life to be impossible. For the future now, was only a desert, and that too a desert full of prickly, thorny cacti, where only he, with his thin, hairy legs dangling beneath his robe, would scale the wide, barren expanses of infinity.
As he sat thus, thoroughly absorbed in this dystopian imagery, the doorbell rang suddenly, sending jarring echoes through the quiet house. He almost jumped out of his skin. The bell rang persistently; the visitor had obviously thrown all propriety to the winds. Peter was well aware of the identity of this rude perpetrator. Since the door connecting the sitting room to the hall was wide open, without vacating his post, he screamed at the top of his lungs:
'For God's sake Henry!. What is it?. What do you want?!'.
'Peter!. You're awake!. Finally, I get a response. Listen, I just came to check up on you. How are you?. Can I come in?', screamed the unexpectedly shrill voice from beyond.
'No , you certainly cannot come in. I am perfectly fine so leave me alone', he responded petulantly.
'Fine!. If that's how you feel, fine!', Henry, who was unusually sensitive, was very close to stamping his foot like a child, 'Martha warned me not to come here. She said this would'nt work. She was right. I must be incredibly stupid. You know, this is not the first time I've knocked on your door today. I've been coming here regularly over the past three days. You're incorrigible!'.
With this angry retort, he turned around and proceeded down the garden path. On the way out, he trampled on a flower bed and overturned the rubbish bin, upsetting in the process, a feline which was innocently rummaging through Peter's styrofoam waste.
'Fine then. Don't bother coming again', Peter screamed, but he knew it was no use; the footsteps had long receded into the unknown.
He resumed his lonely, fireside vigil which-- he had an intuition-- would soon come to an end. He was sick of mourning. Already, the stubble on his face had grown into a healthy beard; and the recent neglect of personal hygiene made him particularly uncomfortable. Besides, he had consummed every drop of beer there was in the house. By now, his ennui had become so unbearable, that he was reduced to counting the hair on his knees. There he sat, looking utterly ridiculous, counting meticulously, each and every strand-- the very picture of a demented lunatic.
At this point, my dear readers, you would be perfectly justified in asking why, our protaganist, despite the agonies of boredom, persists in his behaviour. As a matter of fact, from what you have read up till now, even the question of why he chooses to languish on a piece of furniture he absolutely detests, is entirely applicable. Fortunately for us, the answer can be easily ascertained. For you see, Peter has an ego. Under the present circumstances, this ego has become unusually hefty. Being the kind of person he is—superficial and self absorbed to the extreme—it is the insult meted out to his ego, that hurts him more than the actual desertion. Since he rarely questions himself, the thought that his behaviour might have, in some way, contributed to the eventual catastrophe, would never flash through his brain. As far as he is concerned, he would always remain a victim-- a poor, innocent victim, severely abused at the hands of the mighty Succubus.....

Please allow me the liberty of skipping over the next few days. For Peter, still clad in his abominable bathrobe, has done nothing but drag himself, without any specific purpose, from one end of the house to the other. Eventually—thank God!—one Wednesday afternoon, he woke up, muttering to himself as usual, but this time, with a faint echo of a firm resolution, made earlier in the night, tossing about in his head. He jumped off the bed, and stretching his arms wide, thought:
'From this day onwards, I shall begin my life anew'.
Feeling a bit like a wandering little chick freshly emerged from its egg, he rapidly scanned in his mind, the new and improved list of priorities. As far as work was concerned, he had obtained an extended leave of absence. His boss, on hearing of his wife's untimely death had been awfully generous...
An exquisite vista of slow, leisurely days unhampered by horrible deadlines and even more horrible matrimonial errands, unwound itself majestically before his mind's eye. The way he saw it, he had emerged victorious from his tribulation in Hades a few days ago, and was now being welcomed into the wide, warm embrace of the benevolent, bearded fathers of Heaven...
He was a free man now. His time was his own. He was not obliged to wash the dishes or take the car out for its weekly wash. He could roam around all day in his robe. His wife had always insisted that he turn off the lamp as soon as they got into bed. Now, he could read late into the night. He was not answerable to anyone. His earlier nightmarish vision of a sad, lonely life shuddered itself to pieces....
A pitiful growl from somewhere deep within his bowels cut the reverie short. He thought of the hearty, scrumptious lunch which was probably being served at that hour in the warm, little cafe down the street. Flinging his ear-muffs aside, he hurriedly shuffled to the bathroom. About an hour later, he emerged, fresh and glistening, clapping his hands gleefully and looking exactly like a sea lion. Wrapping himself in a towel, he walked over to the staid, mahogany bureau and slid open the top drawer. He shrieked. The container was empty.
'Where in God's hell are all my socks', he sreamed in an agony of frustration.
For a moment he stood still, completely at a loss as to what to do. For the last ten years of their married life, his wife had arranged the socks in neat little rows in that top drawer for his convenience. And in all those years, he had never wondered, not even once, where those socks came from, or where they went after he had recklessly discarded them, everyday, on the floor, by the side of the bed. Well, what now?. In his blissful meditations of an hour ago, he had never even thought of taking such domestic exigencies into consideration..
He sat at the edge of the bed, completely non-plussed. And then, slowly, amazingly, a tear escaped his eye, which was followed by another, and then yet another, until a steady stream was rushing down his face. Eventually, throwing all caution to the winds—for God's sake, there was no one else in the house!--he threw himself on the floor, and clutching his hair in his hands, began to bawl uncontrollably....

A poem by Baudelaire...

Benediction
By Charles Baudelaire

When, after a decree of the supreme powers,
The Poet is brought forth in this wearisome world,
His mother terrified and full of blasphemies
Raises her clenched fist to God, who pities her:

— "Ah! would that I had spawned a whole knot of vipers
Rather than to have fed this derisive object!
Accursed be the night of ephemeral joy
When my belly conceived this, my expiation!

Since of all women You have chosen me
To be repugnant to my sorry spouse,
And since I cannot cast this misshapen monster
Into the flames, like an old love letter,

I shall spew the hatred with which you crush me down
On the cursed instrument of your malevolence,
And twist so hard this wretched tree
That it cannot put forth its pestilential buds!"

Thus she gulps down the froth of her hatred,
And not understanding the eternal designs,
Herself prepares deep down in Gehenna
The pyre reserved for a mother's crimes.

However, protected by an unseen Angel,
The outcast child is enrapt by the sun,
And in all that he eats, in everything he drinks,
He finds sweet ambrosia and rubiate nectar.

He cavorts with the wind, converses with the clouds,
And singing, transported, goes the way of the cross;
And the Angel who follows him on pilgrimage
Weeps to see him as carefree as a bird.

All those whom he would love watch him with fear,
Or, emboldened by his tranquility,
Emulously attempt to wring a groan from him
And test on him their inhumanity.

With the bread and the wine intended for his mouth
They mix ashes and foul spittle,
And, hypocrites, cast away what he touches
And feel guilty if they have trod in his footprints.

His wife goes about the market-places
Crying: "Since he finds me fair enough to adore,
I shall imitate the idols of old,
And like them I want to be regilded;

I shall get drunk with spikenard, incense, myrrh,
And with genuflections, viands and wine,
To see if laughingly I can usurp
In an admiring heart the homage due to God!

And when I tire of these impious jokes,
I shall lay upon him my strong, my dainty hand;
And my nails, like harpies' talons,
Will cut a path straight to his heart.

That heart which flutters like a fledgling bird
I'll tear, all bloody, from his breast,
And scornfully I'll throw it in the dust
To sate the hunger of my favorite hound!"

To Heav'n, where his eye sees a radiant throne,
Piously, the Poet, serene, raises his arms,
And the dazzling brightness of his illumined mind
Hides from his sight the raging mob:

— "Praise be to You, O God, who send us suffering
As a divine remedy for our impurities
And as the best and the purest essence
To prepare the strong for holy ecstasies!

I know that you reserve a place for the Poet
Within the blessed ranks of the holy Legions,
And that you invite him to the eternal feast
Of the Thrones, the Virtues, and the Dominations.

I know that suffering is the sole nobility
Which earth and hell shall never mar,
And that to weave my mystic crown,
You must tax every age and every universe.

But the lost jewels of ancient Palmyra,
The unfound metals, the pearls of the sea,
Set by Your own hand, would not be adequate
For that diadem of dazzling splendor,

For that crown will be made of nothing but pure light
Drawn from the holy source of primal rays,
Whereof our mortal eyes, in their fullest brightness,
Are no more than tarnished, mournful mirrors!"

— Translated by William Aggeler, The Flowers of Evil (Fresno, CA: Academy Library Guild, 1954)

Africa...

Panelled paintings

Things around my house....

A family of cacti perched on my kitchen window sill....

Plants and stones....

My red chair where I dream of stories and faces and strange creatures (I have even painted the door!)....

Paints and boxes....

My little corner where magical things happen....

In the clouds...

I see things in the clouds, abstract and transient, freely floating and full of dynamic energy. The above painting is from a series I made about a year ago all following more or less the same theme.

More from my sketch book...

A play of ideas....

On Insects...

As an artist, I am fascinated by insects. Their anatomy is challenging, sometimes bordering on the fantastique. The skeleton, instead of being inside, lies outside the body. These little creatures have developed armies based on a discipline that is simply astonishing. They scurry around, indefatigable in their mission, carried out silently in partial or complete anonymity. Their world rarely impinges on ours, and when it does, it leads to an encounter so alienating that it leaves us paralysed with fear...

Reviving old boxes....

I had some old boxes lying around that I decided to redesign and reform. I finished these just yesterday.....