"Whispers Beneath Eidgah" and "In the Leak, a Lament" — Two Poems by Sahiba Showkat

Whispers Beneath Eidgah

At the edge of memory, where silence trembles—
I will speak.
Speak before the lump in my throat chokes me,
before a memory from the past strangles me,
before grief liquefies.

I will speak of the sunshine I glimpsed at
in the middle of the tunnel,
of poppies that bloom in the graveyard.
I will speak of the times I gasped for air
after diving into the abyss for ages—
oh, the will to breathe again!

Why couldn't the glint in my eyes
see the mirage?
That mirage called time.
What does it remind you of when I speak of time?
Do you think of the two ticking hands
constantly wiring your brain?

How ironic that this ticking motion
constricts all that was born to flow.
It does not speak—yet demands obedience.
I will speak of the tales,
of how these hands became the edges of razors.

To speak, I must silence
the pointing fingers that never rest,
pointing forward—always forward!

I wish I had known of Bergson,
who would tell me time isn’t real,
who would speak to me of la durée.

“I have measured out my life in coffee spoons”—
I, too, made failed attempts
to try what Eliot did.

Bergson unearthed a memory from the past
and said:
You cannot measure
or break into discrete units
that which exists here—and nowhere else.

Still, I will speak—of the truth I know:
Everything dances on borrowed breath.
Wait—
to see what lies at the end of the tunnel.

And in the mazars of Eidgah,
poppies blow between
unfulfilled dreams
and the hearts that still tick beneath the ground.

In the Leak, a Lament

Grief, I told someone moments ago,
is a silent prayer whispered into the night.
We make it to the mornings, I am sure—
not always to tables laid with breakfast,
but sometimes to ones laden with misery
that gnaws at our insides.

The sink, leaking for ages,
has clogged for the umpteenth time.
Moss clings to the corners,
rot blooms in silence,
and the jarring stench makes me forget
the grief I held last night.

Filthy water spills over—
swirling with scraps,
leftovers,
and something far older.
In its dull reflection, I see myself:
empty eyes staring into
what could have been.

I take the mop—
not because the grief has passed,
but because the world doesn’t pause for sorrow.
Even pain must wait its turn
while survival is scrubbed
from the kitchen floor.

Still, in that small act—
the wringing of water,
the wiping of decay—
a quiet defiance lives.
To clean is to care,
to continue.
And maybe,
that too is a kind of prayer.