Tricks and Treats
Trick or treat, hear my heartbeat
Speeding, but I’ll be discreet.
When you’re near, you commandeer
My breath til I’m in disrepair.
Treat or trick, my heart you flick,
To the beat of your drumsticks.
At me you’ll glance, I’ll be entranced,
And daydream our entire romance.
Trick or treat, hit the streets,
If my fondness for you will make you retreat.
When you leave, I’ll clutch at air,
But I’ll know we’re not to be a pair.
– Irnin Khan
Candy
I don’t wish to be the candied apple of your eye,
It’s too high a pedestal for your affections to climb.
Instead, carve my nose with the tips of your fingers,
Shape my eyes with a gaze that lingers.
You can trace the scars and ridges of my shell,
As long you’ll have me, I’ll sit under your porch bell.
Wearing nothing but my widest grin,
I’ll be your pumpkin.
– Irnin Khan
Masks
Every time I begin to think I see you, in your eyes so blue,
I find myself suddenly hurled down the slopes of Kathmandu.
Even when it turns my world askew,
I remain waiting in this endless queue. For you.
How many times must I unmask you until I reach your core?
I have to tell you that my hands and my heart are starting to feel sore,
From engaging in this dance of yours.
After it all, when you find yourself swaying alone on the dance floor,
Know that you won’t ever find me forlorn.
– Irnin Khan
As we end the month some refer to as ‘Sextember’, I wanted to reflect on what it currently means to me to be a single girl. Various books, articles and Instagram feed scrolls later, I began to collate words of affirmation for myself, and this is what eventually came of it.
the birds and the bees are pleased as peas,
as they spy fields of daisies, swaying with ease.
tees and frisbees, floating through the spring breeze,
out with the onesies, in with the posies,
tis the season of follies, whimsies and that springtime chemise.
*image credits (clockwise from top left)
Image 1, Image 2, Image 3, Image 4, Image 5, Image 6
My father has forever been known as the funny man. He’s a treasure trove of stories, jokes and hearty laughs. I know he thinks it’s his sense of humour and jokes (most of them borrowed from his hero, my uncle) that everybody loves, but I know it’s much more than that. You can meet him once and be infected by the joyous, unadulterated spirit he exudes. It’s easy to miss the nuances that make up the rest of his character because his charm is so loud. When the words on a page are scrawled in a bright orange marker, you don’t glance between the lines.
I’ve heard stories from my mother about what he was like when they first married. There are things about the man she describes that I don’t recognise as traits of my father. Not because he was awful or anything like that. He was just different. What I hear not in her words but in the melodic tones of her voice, is that after my sister was born, my dad was a changed man. Maybe that’s part of the reason why I don’t recognise him from before- because I’ve only ever known him as a doting and overprotective father. Not as a “bachelor”, or as a bachelor who is adjusting to suddenly married life. For as long as I can remember, my mother, my sister and I have been at the epicentre of his universe. There is nothing he wouldn’t do for any of us.
I was a very sick child. Not the conventional cold and flu kind of sick either, but scaring my family into thinking I was dying every other week kind. I don’t know if this is why, for someone with crazy levels of memory retention, I can’t remember very much from my earliest years. One of the few memories I’ve preserved is resting my head on my father’s shoulder as he carried my fever-ridden body, marching around the flat and reciting poetry from Bangladesh’s greats. If you ever had the honour to listen to one of his recitations, you’d understand my lifelong love of poetry and language.
My father is also a man who is dedicated to his career. His ambition to constantly better himself and achieve greatness as a teacher, has no doubt rubbed off on both my sister and I, as we nurture bordering-on-unhealthy relationships with our work. Sometimes I will meet him in the kitchen in the middle of the night, and ask what he’s doing up. He’ll tell me he’s looking into a great job opportunity in Kazakhstan or California. I’ll reply that I’m putting together an application package for a job in Johannesburg. He’ll tell me not to move so far away and ask if I’ve given any more thought to teaching, reminding me of his notebook full of contacts and friends who are apparently just waiting to make a lecturer out of me. He will insist that if I just say the word, he’ll do all the legwork to make it happen. Anyone could tell you that my father was made to be a father. He’s funny, an entertainer and full of warmth. But he’s also a person of great value and character. I adore him and I thank him. Because I turned out to be a dreamer, just like my father.
*image generated using Type to Design
I recently came across the term “Flawgust”, coined by columnist Caitlin Moran in this article, where she ties together the embracing of flaws with August or something? It’s actually a fun read offering a host of strange and hilarious month concepts. Whilst charities have not yet jumped on board with Flawgust, as in the case of Movember or Dry July, I think it’s definitely got potential, both from an angle of hilarity and one of wellness.
Feeling a bit inspired, I’ve decided to go ahead and publicly own a flaw of mine: incessant web-stalking. For a long time I’ve been hesitant to claim it as a flaw, as I have to admit I’m good enough at it to dually claim it in my top 5 of life skills. “It’s research!”, I’ve told myself, “I’m a thorough researcher just flexing the muscle and staying on top of research methodology”. How can research be a bad thing? Having recently reflected upon the negative impacts that social media stalking and general rabbit hole tunnelling can have (including anxiety, lack of productivity, low self-value and being in a state of constantly seeking the instant gratification to which we’ve become accustomed) I’m officially placing myself on a stalk-lite diet. I can’t make grandiose promises of quitting, because I’m a realist and know that one day I’ll surely be required to use my powers for the greater good. But so far, cutting back on my 360 degrees stalking has been calming, clarifying.
Who else is keen on owning some flaws for Flawgust?
Irninology 