Intezaar

The verse

There is no English word for intezaar

not really.

Waiting is too impatient,

longing too loud.

Intezaar is the breath held between

a question and its answer.

It is the window checked

one more time before sleeping.

The door listened to.

The phone held, not opened.

Intezaar does not demand.

It simply remains

faithful, quiet, undefeated,

in love with what it waits for.

The vignette

She had become very good at waiting. Not the restless kind, tapping fingers, checking the clock. The other kind. The kind of her elders had with whom she lived with, a settled, rooted patience that seemed to come from knowing that what it meant to arrive, will.

Intezaar, her time called it. Not worry. Not hope. exactly. Something between the two, but calmer than either.

She sat with it now, the way she sat with chai slowly, with both hands, not rushing the warmth.