POETIC DELIGHTS BY NASIR AIJAZ-PAKISTAN

 

1-The Wars Within

I am fighting wars

Not marked by gunpowder or graves,

But by the silence between thoughts,

By the noise that never speaks aloud.

There are no casualties you can count,

No blood on my hands —

Only the weight of choices,

Heavy on my heart.

I wrestle with the cynic inside me,

Who whispers,

“Why bother?”

But I still dream —

Of change,

Of a world made better

Not by the loudest voice,

But by quiet acts of courage.

Some nights,

I battle desire —

Not for power or wealth,

But for things I cannot name

Without losing pieces of myself.

Emotions rise like tides,

Sometimes flooding,

Sometimes retreating,

But never calm.

And values —

Those old, dusty truths

I swore to live by —

They still shine,

Though time tries to wear them down.

These battles leave no scars

That the world can see,

But I feel them.

In every breath I take

Not to scream,

In every smile I force

To keep going.

I am not broken.

Just weary.

But I march on

In hope —

Not of victory,

But of peace

Within.

2-Hope in Ruins

In Gaza where the sky

Is always bruised with smoke,

And the ground remembers

Every footstep of grief,

A father made a decision

No soul should ever face.

The thunder of bombs had gone quiet

Just long enough to hear

The breath of his son,

Soft as the dust

Settling on broken walls.

He turned to his brother,

Eyes full of ‘what-ifs’ and ‘never-agains’.

Without a word,

He handed over his child,

Small and blinking,

Clutching a toy already covered in ash.

And in return,

He took his brother’s son—

Held him close

As if bloodlines didn’t matter anymore,

Only survival.

If a bomb falls,

Let one of them live.

That was the logic.

That was the prayer.

That was what love looked like

Under siege.

He kissed the wrong forehead goodnight,

Wrapped unfamiliar arms around a child

He now had to believe was his own.

He didn’t sleep.

He watched the shadows shift.

Each rumble in the distance

A coin toss with God.

And somewhere in the dark,

Two children dreamed

Of sunflowers

And schoolbags,

Not knowing

They had been divided by hope.

Not knowing

They had become

Each other’s lifeline.

(According to Amnesty International, a man in Gaza exchanged his son with his brother, in a hope that in

case of Israeli bombing, his son or nephew might survive)

3-Light in the Darkness

One day, there will be light in the darkness,

A dawn to break this endless night.

Though shadows stretch without a mercy,

I walk alone, yet hold on tight.

A tunnel deep, so cold and hollow,

No stars above, no signs ahead,

Yet every step, though faint and faltered,

Is guided by the hope I’ve fed.

The walls may whisper doubt and sorrow,

The silence press upon my chest,

But still I move, with dreams unbroken,

A quiet fire within my breast.

No map, no voice, no hand to lead me,

No promise written in the sky,

And yet, I trust the dark is fleeting,

And light will come — by and by.

For faith is not in what we witness,

But in what we choose to see:

A distant spark, a gleam of purpose,

A truth that sets the spirit free.

One day, there will be light in the darkness,

And all this pain will turn to peace.

I’ll step into that warm horizon—

And find the place where burdens cease.

AUTHOR:

NASIR AIJAZ-PAKISTAN

Nasir Aijaz, based in Karachi, the capital of Sindh province of Pakistan, is a senior award-winning and

Gold Medalist journalist having served in the field of journalism for half a century in senior positions like

editor and managing editor. He also worked as a TV Anchor for over a decade and conducted some 400

programs besides appearing as analyst in several current affairs programs on TV and Radio channels. He

is award-winner author of ten books on history, language, literature, travelogue, translations from

English literature, and biography. One of his books, translation of poetry of an Egyptian poet, has been

published in Cairo. Some of his other books are unpublished. Besides, he has written over 500 articles in

English, Urdu and Sindhi, the native language of Sindh. He is editor of Sindh Courier, an online magazine

and Chief Editor of Sindhi Edition of represents The AsiaN, an online news service of South Korea.

Dozens of his articles have been published in South Korea while many of his articles have also been

translated in Arabic and Korean languages. Many of his English articles have been published in

Singapore, Egypt, India and Nigeria. His poems have been translated and published in over a dozen

languages including Chinese, Hindi, Bengali, Tamil, and Malayalam, Albanian, Italian, Greek and Arabic

language published in UK, USA, Algeria, Egypt, Abu Dhabi, Iraq, Bangladesh, India, Kosovo, Albania,

Tajikistan, Greece, Italy, Germany, China, Italy and some other countries.