In the heart of Amritsar, not far from the border that divided more than just land, lived Ayaan, a quiet poet whose verses never saw the light beyond his old leather-bound notebook. He wrote in silence, for a love he hadn’t yet met, but believed existed somewhere beyond the barbed wires and the burden of history.
Across that same line, in Lahore, there lived Zara, a painter of silken shawls and dreams. She painted in colours she couldn’t name—sometimes saffron, sometimes green, and sometimes the deep, aching blue of longing. Her art whispered of winds she had never felt and cities she had only heard of in stories spoken in hushed tones.
Their lives ran parallel like train tracks destined never to meet—untings. She left her work in quiet corners of old bookstores and cafés, hoping it might travel the same invisible path.
Unbeknownst to her, Ayaan’s cousin had moved to Lahore, carrying Ayaan’s books with him—books where the poet hid his heart, and now, Zara’s paintings began to appear like answers to long-forgotten prayers.
Their silent correspondence continued—his verses, her colours. Slowly, others began to notice. A chaiwala in Lahore pinned one of Zara’s painted shawls beside the verse in his stall. A bookseller in Amritsar placed a copy of Gulzar’s poetry next to Ayaan’s latest note. The cities began to breathe a little softer, with fragments of love passing through hands, sketched to read a poem.
When he stepped up to the microphone, Zara froze. The voice—it carried the same tremor as the verse she had found.
He read:
“I wrote to you before I knew your name. Now, knowing it would only limit the poem. But still, if you are here—let me say, at the touch of your unseen love, I became a poet.”
Zara walked up silently, holding out a shawl, painted in deep indigo and laced with poetry.
No declarations were made. No borders were broken. But that day, love flowed like ink and paint—quietly crossing lines that politics could never understand.
And the world, for a moment, became a poem.
Rituparna Khan
Rituparna Khanby profession, is an academic. She is an Assistant Professor, teaching Geography and posted at Chandernagore College, Hugli, West Bengal. By passion, she is an author drowned in her own world of dream-weaving. She believes in depth of quality rather than extravaganza of quantity. She loves to experiment with her literary works that has resulted her in authoring one short story collection titled ‘Tales Told and Untold’ and another, a book of poetry titled ‘Melting Thoughts Emotion in Motion’ published by Virasat Art Publication, Kolkata and Authorspress, Delhi respectively. ‘Homecoming’ is her third work and debut novella published in December 2022 by Virasat Art Publication. ‘Her Story: Beyond Dimension’ is her fourth publication.
