Learning Grief – Kaisar Haq

Learning Grief

by Kaiser Haq

A study in contrast: at eight

I was dragged from bed

To hand a glass of water

To grandmother in deathbed.

She drank

I went back to sleep

And when I woke up

It was so the stillness

And stifled sobs

Of mourning.

Relations arrived

And religious professionals

Droning from scriptures

As essence smoke rose

In fragrant coils

Father was red-eyed

Withdrawn a sight

To be commented on

By my neighborhood friends

His mother has died, they said,

Clucking in sympathy

I remember feeling

Nothing except that the whole

Scene was novel. The clock

Of my life did not stop

As I did when I was ten

And a sister arrived like a silver

Of moonlight erased

Almost at once by a dark mop

Of cloud: winter pneumonia.

Mother’s gloom was long

As the night, and at school

Day after tasteless day

Under the austere miniature

Of the crucifixion

I went through lesions and exercises,

Sombre as any penitent monk.

Watching friends at play,

At their pranks, I thought:

I’ll never laugh or smile, I’ll never

Feel joy again. Everyone,

Bless them,left me alone

Until one day, like the earth

Feeling its contours change

As seeds detonate under rain

I felt the clock of my life begin

To tick again as a joke

Burst from my lips.

I can laugh again, I thought

Smiling. I had learned grief.

...The End...