Mostly I thought about the past,
The old days, when so much happened to me,
Happened in me and around me.
The unexpected turned, the madness of that year pushed me toward the life I wound up living, for both good and bad.
I had a groundless anticipation that a talk with my young and fresh students would give me a kick I need.
Beyond my ordinary life, I knew
There would be the tremendous pleasure of
Seeing them again.
Loneliness stalked me as I returned to my desk
In the office room, and I sat down wondering if there wasn’t something seriously wrong with me.
When I decided that I have never been lonelier, it turned out to be I was the loneliest creature in the world.
I thought I might head for a crack-up.
My partner and I were having a conversation,
We had these conversations helping to keep our sanity,
Lighten the despair I carried around inside me.
On the other hand,
The fact that we were together had consequences
Which we did not foresee.
Anger sparked whenever we jointly tried to do something,
And not belonging to the same family,
Therefore, was it only natural
To bluntly remark about each other’s parents,
References to the past, bitter memories
Of small details from the life
We did not share as children?
Because these subjects had been unearthed
So often during the past weeks we spent together.
I found myself thinking about them even when I was alone.
I didn’t want to think about them, but I did.
I concluded, after my partner went to India,
Leaving me in the dark lands for the last three months of the year,
When I went off to uni myself for teaching,
I felt as if I had broken out of prison.
It was not that I prided myself for feeling the way I did.
In fact, I was revolted by it, appalled by his coldness and lack of compassion.
I immersed myself in studying to teach the students.
And crime thrillers gave me my secret pleasures.
Flashlights illuminated my path through the trees.
I continued to write holding each other’s hands.
Over those three months, the uni life gave
Me a breath of unpolluted breeze.
Gradually my steps became less heavy.
I started to create a welcoming joke or
Exchanging pleasantries with the students
And strangers on the campus.
I could cope with the winter in Scotland
In my hooded raincoat.
Before the classes, I regularly had my university breakfast
With my favourite croissants and cupcakes,
Or hash-browns and fried eggs.
I waited for them in the misty mornings,
Two footsteps, three and four,
Waiting for them,
Their giggles, chats and gossips.
Today’s classroom will echo the speedy discussion on
Belonging, non-belonging, time and space.
Blue jeans were absent, boots went missing.
Salwar-kameez in jackets darted.
I was surprised.
Called their names,
They looked at me.
Possible and impossible!
Within ten minutes
Started our interaction in Urdu.
Glasgow spoke across.
Giggles and laughter were marooned.
Edinburgh housing crisis
Influenced them to move to Glasgow.
They said,
They belonged to their hearths, kitchen,
Utensils, pans and pots
Brought from their home country.
Continued in Urdu,
I was amused, a bit stressed.
How would they pass their exams in this obscure language?
I understood, realised their pain,
Wash line, giving birth inside the NHS scheme.
Made them walk in the nearby parks.
They belonged to each other.
They spent time crossing the waves of language barriers
In their saheli’s (friend’s) homes.
Their sweet faces created a kind of kinship
Which took me to my childhood memories.
I guessed I rightly taught them about the invisible spaces of the kitchen,
Homes, bedrooms, toilets, NHS’s obstetric mystic wards,
Prayer-rooms, chapels.
Of course, the hardcore theories I tried to explain to them
In English, and they blurred the communication boundaries
Amalgamating through Urdu and English.
I felt this was my real entertainment in the dark winter.
These young kids never mentioned about the cyber-spaces.
They told me how they were confused about the seasons, weathers,
The lunar light and solar diffusion.
Their festival didn’t lose its distinct colours
As they also belong to their country of origin,
Cultures and humours, jokes and friendly winking
After every ritual.
I could have found the whole process
In this class as absurd and ridiculous
And might consider them that they were climbing up my shoulders and neck
Like prowling tigresses.
Or were they invading my private space and my first language?
They were crushing my pocket of air surrounding my mind.
Instead, I loved to explore the lunar calendar,
Their close breaths gave me comfort.
I could understand when
They luxuriously spoke about their leisure time
And gave me a vivid description of their rooms
Where they could belong to their meals with their families.
They and I wished to be the camels crossing through the continents
Without having to show the passport.
They gave me the opportunity to be a global citizen.
Should I question my existence and stand for internationalism?
I connected with their festivities, nothing in contradiction.
Should I call it harmony, or was I in a trance?
Didn’t face any conflict keeping my concept of vastness.
The class became a puzzle of infinity.
It was a capsule which absorbed or gave me
My Belonging.
Perhaps!
In the end of the winter, I started climbing down the Scottish mountain, was less of a challenge than climbing up had been.
I broke into a sweat, of course,
Though confronted by the midges and mosquitoes.
To avoid any fall,
I moved at a moderate pace, neither too slow,
Nor too rushed,
Pausing now and then to enjoy the wildflowers by the side of the road –
Bright, beautiful things whose names were unknown to me.
Burning red. Burning blue. Burning yellow!