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Graffiti and Placards; the voice of silence:

 


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Early mornings in Lahore nowadays are quite. Silence speaks volumes amidst fear and death.
Yet the whispers of the morning breeze kindle hope and life anew. Change a dimension of nature. So natural!
So true!
I love my morning walks. There is so much to learn from the voices we cannot hear inside our insulated houses, apartments and offices while making decisions about how to control and how to change. Nature shows us daily how its done. Change occurs outside control. We tend to take control. Nature teaches us to let go. Those who let go become a part of the whole. The whole will always have more power than the part.
The flower beds, the rows and rows of green bushes opposite Jinnah Hospital, the big and small trees running along the length of the canal, the stagnated muddy water. The crows and eagles, the birds and squirrels. Everyone and everything has a voice and their conversations, a message.
Its the message in these conversations that soften the heart. A bit of nature placed inside human body like an insulated magnet attracting truth, nature. It understands the language of life. It holds in it the ability to recognise. To recognise the message. The message of autumn in the fallen leaf. The message of hope in the budding flower. The message of perseverance in the sturdy bark.
But there are those who are yet only a part and long to become whole. The red bricked walls along the PU boundaries opposite Jinnah give space to such partial voices.
GRAFFITI!
Some would label such elaborate wall paintings as artistic expressions or murals. The magnet inside me was attracted to these expressions of freedom, peace and tradition not because of their novelty or colour but because of the conversation they were having with the barbed wire, the broken glass, the leaves above and the piles of garbage, cement, bricks and flowerbeds (in some cases) below.
The colourful peacocks and the dancing dervish not at all warding off the harshness they were surrounded with. Had the dervish been cleaning up the mess around him with a jharoo. That would have been more spiritual.
Truth always is a stronger spiritual tool than love. Both combined become invincible.
This brings me to the nature of wall paintings and graffiti. Such a public expression often serves as a reminder, warning, protest (if not permitted) or mass awareness. Post nine eleven these wall expressions started springing up everywhere in lahore, the walls of kindness, the excess in charity. So much expression of peace and tradition yet truth rarely found a place in all the clamour for peace.
Visions and struggles are useless if they ignore the truth. The truth of the broken glass. The truth of the barbed wire. The truth of the guards all around. The truth is not conditional. It cannot be silenced. It has a way of speaking for itself. When we silence the truth inside. Nature speaks out. It protests at our lies.
The plastic eating bacteria and naturally recovering environment at Chernobyl are resilient examples of such protesting truths from around the world. I know only a few. There must be many!
We humans are an un-relenting obstinate lot. We choose to control the change when we needn’t. We fail and start again.
This brings me to another form of protest. PLACARDS!
Another silent voice. Another message. A message of presence. A message of access denied.
All the walks, the protests and the placards. A show of unity. Just that!
This is the inclusion and freedom of expression allowed.
Showed and Allowed.
SILENCE!
The truth .........
Saima Sher Fazal

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