Afshan Amin

Biography

Explorer: Looking at the familiar from an unfamiliar perspective

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She was intimidated by him but he also made her heart flutter every time he caught her looking at him. She fell for his courage and sincerity, and even if the world didn't believe him, she wanted him, she loved him for what he was, and that was all there was to it.

Botany Lessons

Today, he taught me the science behind why love is a verb. This was without haste, This was without inhibitions. This was tender, like a healer's hand. This was a need for my survival. A practice test, a viva, a demonstration of the dissection, a prerequisite for labelling the diagram. He handed me the flower, looking straight into my eyes. It used to be a bud, that blossomed into a prunus persica, peachtree flower. Its nectar, so sweet. I felt the petals, with my fingertips, a gentle rub, caressing its softness against my cheek. This is the stamen, the pollen sac. These are the masculine features of the flower. To distract him from the lesson, I began to peel the petals: “He loves me, He loves me, knot.” He quickly pinpointed, That is you. This is the ovary, the most treasured part, that bears the fruit. How the garden outside the window, turned the barren land into fertile soil. Just us two are enough. Within us, the philosophy of botany. Try the peach, Sink your teeth into the flesh, now suck the nectar. I gazed at the wonder of how simple the act is and yet amazed at the signs for those who contemplate.

Young Love

It was only when I saw you after years, I realised that time could not age love. Was it you sensing my nervousness around you, or the confidence you wore so easily around me? The coincidence of our eye contact, or our innocence of still pretending to look away?

The Other Side

Walking down the street, my hands in my pockets. It's better this way. Alone. Unlike the half-hearted hand-holding you offered. A simpleton could reason, this was not love’s path. Yet I walked on with conviction, and you doubted me in silence. Each time our hands clasped together, they drifted apart in the midst of c r o s s i n g the road. I would wave to you on the other side. Go on, this time I have decided to stay back.

Camouflaged

If this mirror could reflect our deep-seated scars in our withered souls, we’d understand why do these emotions always manifest in tears, whether we cry or laugh the hardest. afshan amin mohammad

Sinner

I’m too sinful to enter the mosque. I broke the fast, savoring the amber drink, and spent from what I set aside for alms. Tell me a place to hide, for I knocked on my heart’s door and still found God within. --afshan amin mohammad

My Lover's Equation

Why do you count your prayer beads? Do you believe how much is uttered > how it is uttered? If God calculates every deed in the hereafter, Let me × my sins by meeting your green gaze. And find the probability — your virtues ÷ your sin? Would you go to hell or heaven? Even the Algebricians fall silent when it comes to which of your X & Y chromosomes will mingle with my X tonight. Answer key: values may vary depending on working. --afshan amin mohammad

Dear Thoughts

Dear Thoughts, I’m slowly sipping on insanity while they try to make sense of it from afar. I’m giving you a form, materialising you into a language a flavour to be tasted, a voice to be heard. Let them judge as they try to read between the lines, but do not be shy. You are a distorted gift from the multitude of neurons sparkling in my brain. Why do you only make sense to them once your tangible, quite a shame to human existence.

Children

How proud are those who call it their "plan" and for some it simply becomes "a mistake”. What about those who can't have them, or who had them. She watches them play outside: Who was she without them? "They're mine, They're not mine, They're mine, They're not mine. They're mine"

Barakah

I read your name in Quran-e-Karim. An Arabic word, attribute of God Himself. When I say your name, perhaps I am atoning for my sins, remembering God unknowingly. So, I pray that when you spend in His way, you do so generously. You do not know His secretive ways, for He will return to you the meaning of your name multiplied by infinity. Afshan Amin Mohammad

Character Sketch

Your name is upon my lips, just two syllables, breathe in, breathe out. Its meaning, one of the attributes of God. Sometimes I chant it to practise faith, and sometimes I moan, to remind myself that you and I are just humans. You're worse than the first, He was logic, You're my lust. He was a spark, You're the flame. He was a companion, You're my soulmate. He was a wish, You're my prayer. He was spendthrift, You're Generous. Afshan Amin Mohammad

Chemical Imbalance

An element in the periodic table. Its symbol, your initial, in a chain around my neck. Within each of its atoms, I, a negative electron, orbit around you, a positive proton. An electric force just before being kissed, a pull between the the two opposite charges. I'm not ashamed. This is attraction, the very chemistry of human nature. Afshan Amin Mohammad

Interpretations

You're her favourite hard cover, published in 1978, long lasting and durable. Undressing her with your eyes in a crowded space, admiring her like naked piece of non-fiction art, patent for you since 1988. The way you look at her, hard and close, she feels she might drown. And when your confidence is low, and her oxytocin too high, she loses all her morals, and takes the lead. Afshan Amin Mohammad

London Light

She was obsessed with the idea of you. You hurled a cupid’s dart like a sport. a missed shot. Maddening anger, Soul ripping sorrow, Swallowing loneliness . A girl of twenty-four to you a mystery, her future now turned into a medical history. How she cursed you all this time. Mercy, You're a ghost now. How to forgive herself Lingering onto what she could not resist? Release her from this need, Help her set her thoughts free.

Sinderella

Sinderella's glass slippers are crushed, and this time she won't be hushed. The prince has not played fair, and to be honest, she doesn't even care. However innocent she used to be, she chooses another, as she has broken free. He's neither a prince nor her saviour, rather a friend who understands her demanding demeanour. At midnight, she discards her wedding dress. An epiphany, there's no point in saving the best. Nonchalant, she lies awake on her side. Like a crescent moon, Sinderella waits to be spooned. When the sweetness of her perfume mixes with warm notes of his cologne, Sinderella calls out his name, knowing quite well that he won't be able to tame. So now Sinderella once again believes in magic knowing exactly who to choose, the one who got her dainty glass slippers or a pair of Jimmy Choo? -- Afshan Amin Mohammad

Mr Think Thankful

Mr. Bank-full quite a handful, flashes his Goldman sackful. He reads tragic stories from Guardian and stays up all night for liquid assets. In bed, quite an expensive affair, We exchange stocks, beware. He hides one in his briefcase and hands me the other, “baby, just in case”. Each of his muscle flexes with division of labour. When the market emerges, he rolls me over: "I can defy the theory of diminishing returns!" I know her flavour. He flaunts his purchasing power by buying me presents in £ and $. "you're the peak of inflation" This economy will never recover. When I question is that how we roll? He opens his wallet, Debit, Credit, Savings and Off-set, you can have them all. Begging for consumer satisfaction, he demands, but I do not supply. Leaving him blue. But when he gently bargains, I give in. Soul-shattering prices for toe-curling thrices! Afshan Amin Mohammad

Mr Think Thankful II

Mr Think Thankful so conceited and bold, flaunts the Cambridge degree he holds. He flies only in first class, sipping Yamazaki in his crystal glass. Radiating in his Versaci silk lined blazers, He knows how to turn the tables. When he returns home to me, all I want him is to be free of all his concerns about these turbulent times of recession, that makes him forget about our dinner reservation. But when he scans me dolled up with my hair down, he admires the places where I've gained a few pounds. “Perhaps I can profit from your goods of surplus value” Oh what more can I tell you, this is when Mr Think thankful shows me the true potential of his ‘labour power’ Wrapped in our silk sheets, he grows like a massive tower. Under clear and bright jet of dazzling moonlight, in all his glory he reads to me, Das Kapital, A Karl Marx’s bedtime story. He suggests the role of power play. Him, the dominant bourgeoisie, Me, the submissive proletariat. At times our love is platonic, and at times, just like raw and dirty ‘fetishism of commodities’. When he commands me what to do, we get caught up in our “class struggle”, working to please me is something he can't juggle. Its quite a contention of love and lust and before I even know it Mr Think Thankful's "means of production” has finally burst. Afshan Amin Mohammad

Draft 1

Draft 1: He looked at her while taking a long drag and flicked the cigarette stub. She looked back at him and crushed it beneath her high heels. It is now as it was then. He was not going to listen; he never listened. He had won with his words again. Yet, she tried again, this time without words. Caressing the crease on his forehead, maybe she could break down the walls around him that he had so proudly erected to conceal his vulnerabilities and fool the world.

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