There is a strange beauty in the way memory flickers — like a candle trembling in the wind, glowing one moment and dimming the next. Urdu poets have long romanticised forgetfulness: not as decay, but as relief. When the burden of remembrance becomes unbearable, a quiet yearning arises to let go of the past. Who has not whispered, like the poet, yaad-e-maazi azaab hai ya Rab/chheen le mujh se haafiza mera.
In youth, such verses felt like exquisite escapes from the tyranny of love. But as twilight descends and age gently enters the mind’s private corridors, memory loss reveals its true face — not poetic, but poignant. Not liberation, but a tender erosion of self.
To others, the face may remain familiar, the greetings well-timed. But behind the eyes, a quiet disquiet grows. One moment, you are revisiting your first crush; the next, you are unsure why you opened the drawer.
And yet, within this mental mist, feelings remain defiantly alive. A forgotten name does not erase a remembered emotion. The scent of a loved one’s shawl, the echo of an old song entrenched in your heart, the warmth of a familiar hand — these linger long after logic departs. Perhaps that is why Faiz wrote: raat youn dil mai teri khoi huee yaad ayee/ jaisay viranay mai chupke sai bahar ajai/ jaisay sehrao mai holai se chalay baad e nasim/ jaisay beemar ko be wajha qarar ajai.
Those entering this phase become silent poets of their own decline. They may not voice the terror of forgetting a child’s face, but it trembles in their gaze. They may not speak of the shame in repeating a tale, but their pause mid-sentence says it all.
Dementia is not merely a disease. It is a slow erasure — vanishing ink on the scroll of the soul. And yet, within this flickering flame, one last truth remains: the soul remembers what the mind forgets. John Elia’s these two verses capture the essence of poetic brilliance in describing the fading memory.
Kya sitam hai kai ab teri surat/ ghaur karnay peh yaad aati hai; kaun is ghar ki dekh baal karay/ rooz ek cheez toot jaati hai.
Haroon Rashid Siddiqi
Karachi
