1 and 3/4 cups of sugar, 2 cups of i-love-you

When moon fades into dawn and when I pass away with it / Will you think of all that I was?

It was actually a bit of a relief to sit on the terrace of the Gezira Pension and have a quiet breakfast before plunging back once more into the traffic of Cairo in search of a carriage to the museum.

Maa, you are an endless exhibition / of sweet-sour happiness

“The roads are too clean. The sun is too bright,” she thought.

Sumedha replied with annoyance, "I will make him say the words. It's so simple, 'Apni kemon achhen, bhalo?' Why can't he say it?"

A walkway through the crystal-clear lies

justice—where is justice?

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

This is a garden, these are my petals; this is my armoring plant

I've seen love/ Rolling down from a mother's eyes/ As she picks her lean child, bathed in innocent blood

go further than/ what the hills have seen/ through their ice pick scars

The yard in this noontime is buzzing with/ The white aroma of the guava flower

I'm tired of living with this nagging thought that we'll cross paths someday, /You and I

Do you want my hands / Will they be enough to keep you warm

You have made ice out of my heart;/ we were once nothing–you brutalise me

“Stop mocking me, Atif! I am telling you there is something here.” 

Words were never my greatest strength/ But the arsonist's child will read them

The only way they chose to do this was probably written or imprinted in our genes–a wild frenzy of carnal expressions filled their faces.

Years later, when I would no longer live in my parents' room and grow to have my own,/ I would disregard all the hours I had spent by the window staring at beetles hiding.