Ziaul Moid Khan grew-up in North India countryside named, Johri. He is the youngest among his six siblings. His father A.M. Khan (d. 1990) was an Urdu writer and a sensational human being while his mother, Ansar Fatima is a homely lady. He is a speculative fiction writer and romantic poet. Zia is the author of short stories: ‘The Gold Research’,‘A Country Singer’ and ‘The Farmers in the Fields’. His work has featured in Fiction Southeast, Impspired Magazine, Artifact Nouveau, Literary Orphans, PLJ, Smoky Blue Literary & Arts Magazine and elsewhere. He teaches English at Gudha International School, Jhunjhunu and resides in Rajasthan with his beautiful wife, Khushboo Khan and a cute three-year-old son, Brahamand. You can email him: ziamoidkhan.b@gmail.com.

The Kitchen

Thus she spends her whole life,
Preparing lunches and dinners;
Brunches and refreshments;
My own mother is one of those,
So tragic are their tales,
That they wake up and sleep,
With washing utensils bleak;
Preparing tea for guests, family;
Surfs and detergents spoil their
Whole palmistry, aside they coil                                                                                      
In a corner with weeping eyes,
Cursing the fateful day of ties;
Thus they spend their lives
Chopping onions and frying
Cauliflowers, she’s faintly crying.
Marriage opens the life mystery,
Then everything is just a history.
Ever complaining and repenting,
Still to husbands just favoring;
With grey hair and wrinkled cheeks,
My mother sits in the kitchen,
And prepares for family, a chicken…       

Death in the Summer Heat     

Playing is a big game,
I came to know;
Murdering is a big game,
I came to know.                                                                                                          
 
Love deepens your cries,
I feel today;
Pain too gives you relief,
I feel today.                                                                                                     
 
Something done cannot be undone,
I kneel now;
What is written cannot be rewritten,
I deal now.                                                                                                                  
 
They leave you,
When you need them the most;
They kill you,
When you believe them the most…                                                                            
 
Then smiled I,
Now her turn to do so,
My eyes are full of the waters of Arabia,
My corpse, full of the wounds of Amphibia;                                                                          
Suicide is a better option
But it shall deepen their smiles.
My worries are familiar to those of Christ,
And my love, to that of Keats;                                                                        
 
I ponder! Why she nailed me?
I wonder! Why she killed me?
I wail my death in the summer heat,
While, I was ready for her poison feast!