tumhare bagair

Tumhare bagair is a poem by Pash; literal translation, Without you.
It's beautiful poem of loss and longing - whimsical, even funny and yet always with Pash's sense of savage, cruel irony.
I can't remember the poem, off hand, i can't find it on the net, (and Taha - it's been two years now, can I have the book back?) but I remember the sense the poem gave me -

...Without you, Einstein and Lenin come to meet me every night in my dreams
Without you, Nazis parade on the barren fields in the picture i carry in my wallet...

or lines to that effect

so, in the tradition of Pash -

Without you, the street dogs come for parties
And spend the night with vodka, beer and the blue floor cushion.
(seriously,
Loper - our semi-adpopted local stray, has started coming up three floors of steep stairs to our flat, and spending the cold winter nights in our living room, on the blue floor cushion.
he has also given me company in at least three drinking sessions...)

Without you, Begum Samru, her Security Guards and various real estate developers
try to build multiplexes in our bedroom
And 'the bed's too big without you'
so i've let them 'develop the space'.
(Which is to explain why a three foot hight mound of paper and dirty clothes is all over the bed, as i struggle to finish a paper on cinema distribution and the city...)

Tumhare bagair Avtaar Singh Sandhu sirf Pash hai
Or Paash ke siva kuch nahin...
Without you Avtaar Singh Sandhu is only Pash (his poetic nom de plume)
And nothing except Pash...

Without you, AVT isn't even radio free altair...

Come home soon...