Some even laugh in anticipation the moment he takes the stage. When Khalid Masood shot a volley of his bilingual comic couplets, there were ripples of laughter at Giwana Hall in Radisson Blu Hotel, where a distinguished audience were attending a poetry symposium.
Masood had returned to Doha from Pakistan with some new and some of his all-time hit poetry. Besides the evocative verses, he provided the quintessential comic relief for the 22nd Aalmi Mushaira (International Symposium) organised recently by Majlis Farogh-e-Urdu Adab (Organisation for promotion of Urdu literature) in Qatar.
Coming from Multan, Masood is hugely popular in Pakistan for his signature style where he mixes Urdu language with Punjabi. His style of reciting poetry is also unique and makes him a regular feature of all major mushairas across Pakistan as well as abroad wherever Urdu and Punjabi speaking people live.
So how does he come up with such a perfect combination of words from two different languages to make it click?
“I am basically a Punjabi and it is my mother tongue as well. It is quite natural for someone to think in the language. So I get my ideas in Punjabi and then translate it into Urdu,” Masood tells Community in a chat after his poetry session at the mushaira.
“However, what I do is I do not change those words of Punjabi for which I do not find any substitute in Urdu. And it is not intentional or voluntary. It just happens,” he explains, keeping that straight face with which he recites even the most funniest of couplets.
The poet says he does not let the actual spirit or the meaning of the lines to get lost in translation. He also likes to retain those original words of his language that are now slowly being lost in the so-called evolutionary process. Masood says he takes his inspirations for poetry from the people around. He feels he is lucky that he lives in an environment where he interacts with common people on street on almost daily basis. And from observation, he gets the ideas for his verses.
This, he says, is exactly the reason why his audiences so readily connect with his content and appreciate it. “I do not bring my ideas out of vacuum. They come from my observation of the surroundings and from talking to the people around me. I love to do that,” says the poet.
He says he has never even attempted serious poetry. The comic poet says one should only focus on what he is good at. “I was good at comic poetry right from the beginning and always stuck to it,” says Masood.
For him, it started from college and then remained with him in the university. He used to recite a few poems here and there in the college mushaira. From the appreciation he used to get from his audience at the college and university he took heart and continued writing poetry.
Masood says the quality of satire in poetry has suffered in Pakistan a little, however, there are people who are coming up in the next generation who he believes are good and would continue the tradition.
However, he complains that electronic media is destroying the quality of satire in the name of certain TV programmes which are not up to the mark.
“See the TV channels and media in general have now started focusing on ratings and viewership. I think viewership is not a parameter to gauge quality. Just because something is viewed more does not mean it is of good quality as well necessarily,” says Masood.
He has also been a regular contributor to popular Urdu newspapers with his column. He started writing for Khabrain group with his column called Matha Column and then moved on to join daily Express where is currently contributing his columns.
Masood says he mainly focuses his column on political issues but he also handles various social issues and other prominent incidents of happening around him. His style of satire often reflects in his columns as well.