Guilty

I guess,
I have no choice
Only to be dictated
By my moral fabric
And its composition

You can pronounce
Me guilty, I am yours
The verdict in the open
My loss, gains for the masses!

Asim Khan(kashkin)

Section 144

Nothing remained in view
Of those draconian measures
The apparatus of the state
And the will of the few,
Glued onto the old disease
Of greed and power

From the avenues of power
Deployed they section 144,
To stop and to arrest,
The human conscience
And will of millions
As the roads were blocked
The conscience in cage,
But still enough remained
To carry those words,
To proclaim, to shout
“We are not dead”
“We are not dead”

Surfaced now,
The moments of truth
Walk we will, to restore,
Our pride and self esteem
Ours it is, this time and place
The historical process and our part
Glory you may take in the name
Of past and of your deliberations
But it is us, the history we made,
The people, the forgotten nation

Cannot you imprison or impose
The media and the voice of the nation
Cannot we remain in fear and in weakness
The drops of our blood now the marks
Of revolution, of change and progression!

Asim Khan (Kashkin)

Only The Light…

Absent and not in view
The golden words of our past
Still there, an old craving to explore
Only in view, the shackles of time
The separation of days from its demise
As I write, to form a soul
Of once that was, now a dream

As I labor to turn,
The old wheels of fortune
In the land of my ancestors and poets
Only the words I have
At my disposal and at my service
As I rotate with the earth and its burdens
Through labyrinth of time and space
Not guilty my conscience and my soul
Of all my crimes, still there some peace
Always in debt to serve, in tattered clothes
The land up in smoke and in fury of hatred

When will you awake, from this slumber?
Of mayhem and of shames,
What will you do to these traditions of past
The murderous routines and ghastly crimes
The future is yours, belongs it to you
Only the steps, you need to take
Silence is a crime if you chose to remain
In surrender to the desires of the world
The glory will come, only if you refrain
From these acts of crime, to your land
Plenty of enemies in view but it’s within
Distinguish it well, as there it remains
The clues to your success and dreams

Hold it well and keep it close
The memories of your past
The promise of the future
Shine, my friends, shine …..
As it is in there you will find
The story of your being and its land
Do not wait or hope for others to come
Summon your souls and bodies to perform
The miracles of change, the miracle of unity
It’s time for you to form a soul
Still there, an old craving to explore
In shackles of time and despair of days
Only the light, only the light, in your fate

Kashkin

(ASIM KHAN)

Nightingale of Pukhtoonwala (Rehman Baba)

Here he rests
The old nightingale
In its peace and grave,
From the descendants
Of an old tribe and its code
The old settlers, at the outskirts
Through years of travel
The poet, in mausoleum of words

The old Pushtu poet
Carried in his words,
The echoes of peace and music
The Old Sufi
Carried in his soul,
The echoes of unity and humility
From the old rivers to its tribes
The imagination that were to capture
For centuries across the time
The old love affair,
With land and its descendants
Now lies in ruins, his words,
The resting place, in holes

Call they themselves
The proponents of change
By destruction and rope,
By death and by smoke
The old echoes still there,
In those fallen grounds
Live I not in the mausoleum
But in those hearts
Of millions that came,
And millions that are now
Never will you succeed,
I am them and they are me,
Bounded by the music
And the legends of this place
Mountains are my witness
And my words, the echo
Of distant past and now yours,

What is it you gained, if gain it is you say,
Maimed you have the old past and its land
The brutality of invaders to the heart that is stone
Inside you, as you have killed yourself
Worry not for me, but for the future ahead
I will always be there in my words
See you must with your own soul
Those moments of peace
As I hear your footsteps in my awake
I am already dead, what more can you do
Killed you have yourself, as I cry for you
In my words, in my land, of distant times
Now the playground, for devil to claim
The imaginary stakes and the real crimes
Remember, it’s in you, the old music
Claim it, the nightingales of time!

ASIM KHAN

The New Beginnings

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) is becoming the torch bearer within the society. The amount of change and its impact is tremendous through efforts of PTI chairman and all the teams that have contributed to the success. But we need to do more. In order to reach to the perceptions of a common Pakistani, we need to ensure that we have all the mechanisms in place at all levels to promote this message of self-esteem, freedom and justice. We are to be seen to be carrying that message in all corners and quarters.

The roles and responsibilities to make this happen are challenging and huge but it can be done. It is this responsibility we all as individuals, all as cohesive teams as one unit and all as a nation have to share. It is our responsibility. We need to feel this change as we feel thirst and hunger. We need to feel this change and contribute as we contribute in our daily lives in all we do; from the moment we wake up to the moment we fall asleep. There is a purpose in our existence to see what’s happening around us and we can bring that change.

We will be asked these questions how we as individuals contributed towards betterment of our society- It will be our conscience where these questions will come from and we need to make sure our conscience is alive and feels the need and the hour of importance. It is in our hands to make that difference as we cannot rely on outsiders. We cannot rely on IMFs and all the other institutions of the world and the governments. It is us who will have to change and be those proponents of clarity, tolerance and understanding.

We have to become like Quaid-e-Azam and Iqbal, and all those people who contributed towards creation of Pakistan and those millions of sacrifices by all those people for whom the purpose was so great and essential. We have to become like Jinnah and Iqbal. We need to find them inside us. Once we have found them, then there will be no stopping.

Pakistan is one of the most fertile places on this planet earth: It carries huge natural resources; the land is beautiful as no other. But the mistakes of the past cannot be repeated. We need to look at our past to learn from it but not live, and move forward. It is this responsibility which carries its burden upon our souls and we must carry that with dignity and pride. Change will happen. Progression to freedom and justice is in sight and for that we must unite and whatever we can do in our powers to spread this message.

We must not treat Pakistan and all that it encompasses – the people, the land, the resources and our heritage as a charity but as a gift. The hours of darkness will disappear into the warmth of the sun for all of us when we find ourselves and purpose.

Asim Khan

The Pyramid Makers

the story, of her legend, contain no words
like those passing dreams, devoid of life.
in colour,like shadows drifting away, unheard,
empty in their existence, searching her slaves,
her victims, blinded by her fury and passions.

slowly, descends life, upon those rocks
built to last, lover’s tribute to perfection;
oppression the tool, hands their enemy,
sacrificed. strange price for immortality;
demanded she, war to win, in madness.

past their interest and civilisations their living;
slaves they were then and now orphans; the
artists of form and symmetry; and sand
seek justice, denied when alive, from time
as they fell to earth, like november rain.

strange battle it was and made no sense
to mind and heart, and their loss immense;
strange rules, virtues of politics and religion,
hands their saviour, hands their enemy, to
create palace of bricks and have no graves!

Hate, heavy as those stones,carried,
they once, for generations, for those Pharos,
as colour, idea and words are to the artist.
noticed they never, the Gods, revenge of those
hands, letting them free, and Pharos hostages!

Kashkin

Hands Up

As the days go by
At home or in distance
Watching and listening
In anguish and pain
The story of Kenya
Slips into this darkness
Lives, streets and violence
Remain at large, free
Power and greed
Starting to choke
The will to survive
Upside down,
This place
Talk of peace,
Talk of compromises

Knows no one,
On the streets
When will this end?
As the hatred burns
As these diamonds
Begins to melt
Begins to fade,
In rivers of blood

The humans
These elements
Of compositions
Spread apart
Like oceans and lands
As they watch,
Removals of diamonds
Of peace and comfort
Only wars
We see now
Only wars
Please us now

Standing in the corner,
Ignored and forgotten
The human plight, hands up!

ASIM KHAN

THE EVIL AGREEMENTS

Agreement they have reached
In places exotic and distant
In places of comfort
Surrounded by men of evil
Far from reality and far from people
You kill and so will I,
Let’s see who gets there
First on the podiums built
From atrocities and oppression

Use we will all the available means,
The state and its machinery
As they prepare to unleash
With conscience bleached
As the planet gets torched,
For all their frivolous acts
Become we will all, that is evil
Appears this curse in darkness
On nations and its people
Fruits of their mutilated minds

Friends we are to each other,
In separate lands, in separate ways
Break we will all, rules and regulations
Constitution and judiciary,
The people and their hopes, with one strike
Out there to perform, as we gather more friends
Wherever we are, in East or West

Time will come my friends when
You and this power you have gathered
With pride and distaste, to its end,
Rot you will in hell, for all you have done
With your words and actions
These evil agreements
Will disappear with appearance of light
Not far away those moments
Fade away you will in this roar of silence!

ASIM KHAN

My Last Posession

In presence,
These facts and figures
Of changes they claim
Pile up they evidence
In absence and in mystery
Of all those things
Happened in the past
Sits there a simple human
In despair and pain,
With these numbers
Out in the open,
But hidden inside
The remaining components
Of his existence and dignity
Where from I start,
My needs are simple
My needs are universal
Far removed from this understanding
The elite that creates these claims
Hollow in its nature, empty in action
Spend my time here for better days
With hope and faith
For this nation, I have already lost
All that I had, all that remained
Now stand here I in queues
For grain and water,
Gone my last possessions
My dignity and resolve
The only thoughts
Of suicide and of rage!

ASIM KHAN

Progression to Freedom

Progression to freedom and justice cannot be achieved just through words – it requires an action and willingness to sacrifice. And “Protest” is one of the best available human expressions to raise awareness and to also serve a warning to those who support oppression and all the related ills tied into the concept of keeping nations at distance from the developing worlds and yet at the same time interfering, manipulating, abusing and supporting those puppet regimes in all corners of the world. It is this mutilated mind of oppression that one has to deal with. And this mutilated mind of oppression at times turns out to be our very own democratic leaders, supposed to be serving their people and upholding finest human values and yet at times in the name of democracy, self interest they end up supporting the very leaders who have done nothing but to oppress their nations at the highest level. Pakistan is no exception and Musharuf is the friend they have chosen to serve their interest. But is President Musharuf serving the interest of his own nation? The answer is NO. So my friends if Jemima Khan has chosen to serve the interests of the people of Pakistan through raising awareness and voicing her opinions in front of Downing Street, there is no crime in this. It is with this spirit of protest and hunger to bring justice to people of Pakistan no matter what it takes. At the end of the day, freedom of speech and action is the right of every human and Jemima is only exercising her right and listening to her conscience. Why is it that we have to doubt everything because she is not lived perhaps all her life in Pakistan but enough to at least have a visibility what goes on there? Pakistan and its people need friends from all over the world. She is our friend and we respect her courage to write and to protest against this mutilated mind of oppression that exists both in Pakistan and also in the West.

ASIM KHAN