In the blanks of muddy moonlight

A walkway through the crystal-clear lies

Review of 'Shamim Reza: Selected Poems' (ULAB Press, 2023)

Surely, it’s madness / it’s insanity—that he walked on

You've ignited a tempest, / a crimson anger, / A defiance burning brighter than the summer's sun

the way there was complete silence when you lied for the first time. You opened your eyes

But talks of harmony flood your nose. / Harmony, harmony, harmony—you want it so bad, / and so you put words in our mouths

“Attention passengers. The next train arriving is a B train traveling westbound towards Boston College.  Please stand clear of the closing doors."

a man walks into a bar but he looks like a little boy

the bullet hole/ in my brother's chest/ unfolds like a pandora's box

My father speaks in a dismantled language that goes up in  smoke. 

justice—where is justice?

Where voices unite, a chorus strong, / Demanding justice, righting wrong

‘You must bury / yourself / Every three days’ / She said, / ‘Corpses are of / No use

Your grief rots the decades old paint and the lakhri no one bothered to replace. Even across the road, it reeks of death.

I inhale the luxurious scent / of squelched earth / smoking under the sodden leaves

Echoes of your voice ring in my ears / As the world turns scarlet in front of my eyes

I feel my rage, ma, a living thing;/ A beast, caged, like me

All that I’d despicably known / Things I wish I didn’t know–

Skin sticky with perspiration from a long month of June