Dr. Aju Aravind, Dhanbad

A recollection of broken dreams, memories, and lost love invigorates the imagination of this young poet from Pakistan. Hamza Hassan Sheikh’s Museum of Reminiscence, dedicated to the Indian Poet R.K Singh, lures on love petrified with time and the emotions of a young wannabe poet.  

The collection brings together 60 poems that can be grouped into six segments, and each segment¸ except the last, ends with a Quatrain, that encapsulates the main theme of the poem.  While the first segment of twelve poems, mostly on the theme of passionate love, lust, and despair, begins with a Requiem on the death of his beloved/lover “Who left him alone in a time so brief” (14),  the second segment, consisting of thirteen poems, closes with a Madrigal in a pensive mood. The twelve poems in the third segment recollect the various moments of life and the changing faces of love. In the fourth segment, consisting of nine poems, we see the poet wandering in search of solitude. He echoes: “Shadows are my companion” (76). His “heart soliloquizes/And becomes serene” and he tries to be at peace with himself. The fifth segment, comprising of  five poems, traces the growth of “An infant in cradle” to “The lad into youth” and the maturing of “The youth into man” and “Then man into old man.” This segment also includes a poem on Valentine’s Day, bewailing : “Love which took birth/ Last valentine/ Withered and betrayed” (93). The last segment consisting of four poems expresses dismay at the sight of the ‘Future Generation’ “With long teeth” and where “humanity danced nakedly/On the reddish land.”  This segment also includes a Rondeux poem.

The Quatrains at the end of each segment encapsulate the changing faces of love. In the first quatrain, suggesting optimism and hope, the elated with the newly discovered love, echoes, “Her face is like an open book/ You understand all, once you look” (31). On the other hand, the quatrain at the end of the second segment shows a dejected poet who laments: “Leaves have dropped, autumn has come, / Didn’t she come for a moment or so” (51). The third quatrain shows a precarious poet. The quatrains at the end of the fourth and the fifth segment show a discouraged poet who shelters himself in solitude and reconciles, “But it’s all matter of the bad fate” (99).

The paradox between joys passing away and its results will enlighten the readers of Hassan Sheikh’s Ghazals.  The quatrain/maqta at the end of each segment stirs the poetic emotion and illuminates even the ordinary reader.

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Hassan Sheikh effectively uses couplets to talk of shaking relations.  While moon, and eyes --“Home of emotions” (27) are the recurring images in the first segment, desert, torn and muddy clothes, gloomy grave-yard, and fog instill the poetic emotion in  other parts.

Hamza Hassan Sheikh’s Museum of Reminiscence is a realization that the path of love is full of thorns and difficulties, and recalls the saga of failures, the plight of “The man just defeated by irony of fate” (38). He  also pens a poem on Alexander who loved to conquer the world, and another to Hawks of Air who “dance around death, with a roar,/ Also the guardian of the shore. In yet another  poem,  PEACE  is postulated as an entity that conceives in contented hearts.  Museum of Reminiscence will interest and convey the message that love beckons “every moment” but life has “to pass with sighs and cry” (102), to all sections of the society.

Influenced by contemporary Urdu poetry, Hassan Sheikh experiments and composes Ghazals (in English) with  ash’aar  in which  each couplet is independent of the other.  The poet demonstrates the typical romantic mood and temperament of love poetry, which is understandable, given his young age. The multiple layers of meaning, the social and political milieu that underlie his verses  are not  difficult to comprehend, but his ghazals are easy on the ear and mind. He demonstrates a strong sense of rhythm and  honesty of feeling, despite occasional sense of disappointment:

On that day                                                                            

 For the first time                                                                

  I hated a person                                                                             Who was I.                                                      (26).

Hamza Hassan Sheikh is a strong emerging voice in poetry from Pakistan and we should expect more matured verses from him in days to come. 

Dr. Aju Aravind                                                                                                              

    Assistant Professor,  Department of Humanities and Social Sciences,  Indian School of Mines,  Dhanbad 826004.