Written by Osman Khalid Butt is a twenty-seven year old actor, director, choreographer, writer and video-blogger based in Islamabad, and is also a self-professed struggling-artist stereotype. A journalism graduate, he is the co-founder of Desi Writers’ Lounge, as well as poetry editor and creative consultant for Papercuts. He has also remained a freelance writer for Instep, The News, as well as the Editor of the web-zine Text Teen, and wrote his first screenplay for the indie-horror movie ‘Siyaah’, which released nationwide in 2013. Though he has dabbled in television, TVCs and film, theatre remains his first love; he has directed four productions under the banner of his company, ‘The Living Picture Productions’, one of which he wrote himself. He has also collaborated with the Lahore Grammar School, Islamabad, directing three plays with its student body, and regularly gives theatre workshops across the country. He says he juggles all of this by drinking too much Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster for his own good. Read more by this writer |
White, UndoneRing a ring o’ rosies! ‘The Virgin looks beautiful’ he speaks, softly caressing his thigh. I do not know whether he talks of me or the figure set in stone. ‘The light falls on her, poetically, bathing her in radiance.’ And though he speaks of purity I imagine a stroke of malice Hidden contempt and (lust?), like a streak of red in Pastel soaked countryside. His eyes promenade my flesh, and the silken sheathe I adorn Dissipates. The man, the messiah, he whose gaze defiles All thoughts celestial, his lips part Perhaps to question his personal Madonna Whether she belongs in holy servitude, or is soiled. My eyes meet his, conveying my steely response in a blazing fury of ember and he holds his tongue.
A pocket full of posies! He takes me by the arm, Up a flight of stairs (heavenwards) To a room where even the omnipresent god Treads not, for fear of desecrating his holy cloth. And as I lay on a rusty mattress Imagining those who lay before me Consorts of false gods, He enters me.
Ah-tishoo! I think of the Mother, and the child Ah-tishoo! Our lips part; the messiah and mine We both utter the single word, (In climax!) in unison ‘Mary!’ ‘Mary.’ He stares at me, and I stare back. He looks at me differently, perhaps. For now I am ‘For now you are’ ‘Soiled.’ Soiled.
We all fall down. |
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