Amore & Accelerants

By Hannan Khan

i charred the haven to hone how torch behaves
my jaws were always stuffed with someone else’s fire
the fucking mirror lamented but no one dared to salvage
 
the pots still simmered; the knives still craved
even the bloody rats mastered how to conspire
i charred the haven to hone how torch behaves
 
perspiring on her spine turned sanctified, depraved— 
she frenched me raw, like sin in barbed wire
the fucking mirror lamented but no one dared to salvage
 
the goddamn gas leaked hymns; the curtain misbehaved
a cockroach sermonized from a fucking funeral pyre
i charred the haven to hone how torch behaves
 
my moniker, a contusion no damsel forgave
each syllable thwacked with a mum’s ire
the fucking mirror lamented but no one dared to salvage
 
now ash cements snugger than amore ever gave
each kiss, a laceration; each invocation, a liar
i charred the haven to hone how torch behaves
the fucking mirror lamented but no one dared to salvage

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Saffron Does Not Weep but We Do

By Hannan Khan

                             saffron stains the tender fingers
not like savory turmeric, yellow-bright, light, forgiving
                             but a deeper ache, the color of dusk pooling in palm–lines, the root of loss
dawn: a field of mouths open, crocus-throats gasping in the chill
           tongues of pollen trembling, licking the dry air
           the lush fields are a logbook, column of want & waiting
           the dye of labor bled into the soil
           hands dip, pluck, bruise— 
           a red-threaded rosary, a sacred prayer unspoken, a bitter curse swallowed
           the body folds, bends, breaks
           becomes earth’s punctuation:
           comma of spine                        ellipsis of breath                     hyphen of hunger
 
count them: filaments flickering between forefingers & thumb
                     twenty-two strands per flower, a crimson arithmetic
                     a sum of exhaustion & worth measured in grams, not grief
the weight of gold is not in its gleam but in what is gouged from the hands that hold it
                      a saffron picker doesn’t weep
                      the eyes are dry as husks, rubbed raw, lined with dust
                      the wages come late, the debt earlier
                      the sun is an iron brand, the petals close, the zones still whisper starvation
                      the tongue—stained in saffron
                      doesn’t taste sweetness
                      only the ghost of once it was;
                      the yellow milk                              in a bride’s glass;
                      the sacred ink                                on a monarch’s robe;
                      the sacrificial thread                     over a god’s lips
but here in the dust, in the marrow of market, saffron is only debt

the market hums, an iron throat
clearing, a vendor’s call stretches
thin as appetite, coins clatter, hollow
as striped stalks, baskets overflow with
​weightless gold

a woman firmly grips a bag of strands
a month’s work, her tapper tremble
counting…counting…always short
always less, always the scent of
​saffron on skin, not on tongue

​&

the hands that ooze amber?
they are engulfed by the same fields they feed
the crocus blooms, the digits disappear
the harvest doesn’t remember the harvester

but
the land does
it carries their names in its roots
buried but never
​gone

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Hannan Khan—a nefelibata, poet, and scholar of literature & linguistics from Pakistan. He combs through moments of love, death, delirium & relational complexities, seraphically tracing what’s breathed and what flickers unbreathed. His pen grooves between haibun & heartbreak, ghazals & ghost games, intimacy & apocalypse. Winner of the Native Voices Award 2025 for his poetry collection Isn't Cooked Is Cursed, he thrives on distorting ordinary until it sings. When he craves reprieve, he devours dark thrillers like he’s dissecting crime scenes—psychological, raw, unpredictable. He sips coffee, reads Manto & lets the world unravel. His work has appeared in Failed Haiku, IHRAM Literary Magazine, Graveside Press, SpecPoVerse, Eye To The Telescope, Abyss & Apex, and The Headlight Review, and is forthcoming in The Literary Hatchet, Notch Magazine, Winds Of Asia & Native Voices Anthology. Poetry is his altar; Fiction, his rebellion. He writes to unsettle, to unearth, to unlace. For a glimpse into his life, find him on Instagram: @hannan.khan.official