Ode to my Almost
Poet: Shahid Fayaz.
Dated: 13 March, 2026
Beneath the quiet sky of Lal Ded’s dreaming hills
I sit with a weary guitar whose wounded silence spills
Its strings are old travellers from forgotten days
Yet they tremble with longing when your beauty plays
I wish to die while singing beneath the patient night
Where the moon pours mercy in rivers of silver light
My fingers wander softly on each fragile wire
As if touching the pulse of an ancient desire
Is it you before me in the lantern glow
Like a Spanish melody from centuries ago
Your beauty moves gently like wine in a song
A sweetness remembered though time has been long
The wind holds its breath as your presence appears
Like a prayer whispered softly through centuries of years
And my heart grows restless like waves on the sea
For the song in my blood now awakens for thee
My soul needs you deeply like roots need the rain
My body seeks warmth like the earth seeks the grain
My blood sings your name like a crimson refrain
My mind builds a temple where only you remain
O mysterious spirit with eyes full of dawn
Where sorrow grows tender and loneliness gone
You walk through my silence with footsteps so mild
Like spring visiting gently a lost wandering child
Is it you who flows like a quiet canal
Where green banks are bending in harmony’s call
Your laughter runs softly through valleys of air
Like water discovering a song everywhere
The grasses lean closer to hear what you say
Even the sunlight forgets where to stay
For beauty like yours is a wandering fire
That teaches the coldest of hearts to aspire
When you breathe the world grows suddenly wide
Like a river discovering its infinite tide
And the stars write your name in their trembling art
As if heaven itself has borrowed your heart
If I perish tonight with this guitar in my hand
Let the last trembling chord cross the listening land
For dying while singing beneath your gaze
Would be life made eternal in musical praise
Let my voice fall softly like dew on the plain
Where lovers and prophets have wandered in pain
And the echo shall carry through valley and sea
That my final song was a prayer made for thee
For love is a pilgrim that walks without rest
Through the deserts of doubt and the mountains of quest
And when it finds beauty that mirrors the soul
It drinks from that wonder and suddenly grows whole
O flowing beloved with luminous grace
You are time turned gentle in one human face
And my guitar remembers what angels once knew
That every true song was created for you
So remain for a moment beside this old string
While the quiet night listens to everything
And if dawn takes my breath while the melody runs
Then I shall sleep smiling beneath rising suns
For the heart that has loved with a fearless delight
Needs no other heaven beyond this night
Where a soul met a soul by a silent decree
And eternity whispered that you were for me.