"I see Kashmir from Delhi at Midnight"

~ Agha Shahid Ali

My First Best Friend was Kashmiri.

“This song was shot in Kashmere.”

I stare at the screen standing on my five-year-old feet,

“Tulips grow there”, Pappa said,

“it's beautiful.”

My father’s army friend is drinking tea,

he’s going to Kashmere.

I hear him while I teach my dolls EVS-

civilians, terrorists, and armies fight there.

“Meghna Dhar”

a teacher calls out your name,

my head turns to see- short brown hair

framing a fair face.

You sit next to me every day.

“I’m Kashmiri,” you say.

“Simran.” I refer to your cousin.

“Simran nahi, Sumran.

It’s a Kashmiri name.”

“I went up to Pahalgam on a horseback and it snowed in Srinagar

and I made a snowman. I ate gaanth-gobi and mutton Yakhni and-“

“You went to Kashmere,

which is my hometown and I have never been there.

Don’t talk to me about Kashmere.”

Your mother talks to me and tells tales

about going to school in Shikaras,

I wonder if drowning scares her, but I don’t ask.

You say your Kashmiri isn’t as good as hers.

There’s another Kashmiri boy in our class,

whose friends tease him-

“Dekh! Teri Kashmiri seb.”

I turn to you in horrific rage,

but you just blush.

It's 2019,

and they have shut down the internet in your home state.

You sent me screenshots of an argument with a friend

who supports the government. You’re upset.

I see you sitting with books of Habba Khatun, Arnimal

and Lalded. You show me the Urdu you’ve been practicing,

in unused school notebooks.

Last year I bought a book of Kashmiri poetry

to read and learn about you more.

Last month you called to tell me

you didn’t want to be my friend anymore.

That book will sit unread till I

make a new Kashmiri friend.

You used to see Kashmir from Delhi all the time,

and I was always delighted to hear

what you thought about it.

I see Kashmir from Delhi, at any time,

losing you is a bitter syrup I swallow

before coughing into these stories like a hanky I

always keep in my pocket.

(for Meghna Dhar)