أَعُوذُ بِاللّٰهِ مِنَ الشَّيْطَانِ الرَّجِيمِ

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ

In the name of ALLAH, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful

Mechanical Roar Weaving Silence

A city, after all is a collection of buildings, shops, and roads—with vehicles racing along them and people—walking, moving, and rushing—swarming within. It is a modern jungle where humans prey upon one another through the agency of machines. By establishing vast, densely populated settlements, city dwellers have rebranded this predatory existence as the abundant provision of life’s basic amenities.

No matter which city it is, it never sleeps; it remains in a state of constant vibration—much like a heartbeat. A heartbeat pulses ceaselessly—sometimes loud and hypertensive, other times faint and subdued—yet both states represent perilous physiological phases; extremes in either direction—whether high blood pressure or low—are equally damaging. In precisely the same way, city life is draining the very lifeblood of humanity; for if a person fails to keep pace with the city’s frenetic rush, they effectively perish.

Digital billboards set against a sky choked with smoke and pollution peddles the spectacle of an automated world—a realm where the human being is merely a cog and humanity itself is rendered superfluous. On the streets, people crawl through narrow corridors of cement and concrete, much like lifeless blood cells coursing through the veins of an unfeeling entity. Smartphones chime in every hand, devices in ears spew out data, and cramped houses, flats, and rooms orchestrate human lives with robotic precision.

In this cold, mechanical urban world, countless individuals live out their own stories, striving with body and soul—and seeking God’s mercy—to earn a livelihood. Among them was a man named "Barkat"; whenever he stepped out of his home, he was acutely aware that every step he took was driven by sheer necessity. He disliked city life, yet he was compelled by circumstance to endure the grinding mill of hardship. The city’s relentless pulse was gradually wearing him down.

The city exists in a state of constant vibration; it is never silent or still, and this pulse makes itself felt in myriad ways. There is the hum of household appliances and the roar of vehicles on the streets—the flow of traffic, the bustle of markets, the clamor of factories, and the ceaseless activity of commerce—all accompanied by the constant movement of people and the unending stream of their chatter. The hopes, dreams, and relentless pursuits of millions give rise to countless stories of success and failure. Whether bathed in daylight or the vibrant hues of night, the city never truly sleeps. While this vibration is a symbol of progress and vitality, it can also, at times, leave one utterly exhausted.

But it was not always this way. Where vast, verdant plains once stretched to the distant horizon, towering spires of iron and glass now pierce the sky, casting shadows that plunge the settlements below into a state of perpetual, haunting gloom. Streams that once flowed with cool, crystal-clear water have been transformed into concrete drains; and where nature once sang through the rustling of leaves, that natural melody has been swallowed by the screech of vehicle brakes and the ceaseless hum of high-voltage transformers.

Humanity has indeed built a magnificent world of connectivity, yet it has completely lost the essence of true human connection. In the race to forsake the soil for silicon, people have turned to stone—blind to the suffering of their neighbors and utterly deaf to the silent helplessness of the working class.

The vast machinery of the digital age promised to liberate humanity, but instead, it has shackled people in the chains of selfishness and material greed. It had become a world where the anguished voice of a poet rang truer than ever before:

تنویرؔ اب تو حلق سے بھونپو کا کام لے

بہرے ہوئے ہیں کان مشینوں کے شور سے

(Tanveer, now you must use your throat as a megaphone; For ears have gone deaf from the roar of machines.)

Barkat loved his village and was, by nature, a man who cherished tranquility; he wanted to savor every moment at a leisurely pace. However, local thugs had seized his land, forcing him to flee to the city to save his life. Yet, while his body resided in the city, his soul—and his true self—remained in the village.

Village life offered Barkat everything the city never could. In the village, the hands of the clock do not drive a person; time moves slowly and serenely. The first ray of dawn, the crops stretching across the fields, the rustling of trees swaying gently in the breeze, the serenity of the evening, and the beauty of the full moon at night—in short, every moment there could be deeply felt. Unlike the artificial frenzy of the city, life in the village moved to the slow, tranquil rhythm of nature. For Barkat, the village was not merely a place; it was a sanctuary of mental and spiritual peace where he could live life at his own pace.

But he was helpless; those who sought his life had turned his existence into a prison for both body and soul.

The thrum of heavy iron looms operating in the textile mill would travel through the floor and seep into the very bones of Barkat’s aching body. Outside, the modern city glittered with digital-age speed, yet inside the factory, the same old, merciless saga was playing out.

Barkat looked at his hands—dusty and smeared with grease. He recalled the village of his past, where, in his youth, those very hands had guided a plough through soft, moist earth.

He remembered the exhausting yet sanctifying toil of the harvest—a scene adorned with the golden hues of wheat and the rich, earthy scent of the soil, where the air was infused with the fragrance of rain and blossoms. And that very fragrance was deeply embedded in his soul.

At sunset, the body’s fatigue would give way to a strange sense of peace. He would lie on a *charpai* beneath the open sky and the canopy of stars; the cool night air would cradle him, and he would feel a deep connection to the earth.

As the late poet Tanveer Sipra wrote, it felt as though the night itself were a mother lulling the day’s exhausted laborer to sleep in her lap:

اے رات مجھے ماں کی طرح گود میں لے لے

دن بھر کی مشقت سے بدن ٹوٹ رہا ہے

(O night, take me into your lap like a mother; My body is breaking from the day's hard labor.)

Barkat had been forced to migrate, finding himself ensnared in the concrete web of an industrial city; yet, he witnessed the city’s relentless sprawl and saw how the encroachment of corporate entities was rendering the surrounding village lands barren. Here, smoke had usurped the place of stars in the sky, and the night had been reduced to a mere fleeting interlude before the start of the next shift.

Barkat was a master weaver. With his own hands, he transformed fine synthetic filaments into exquisite, modern "smart fabrics"—crafting luxuries for the wealthy. Yet—as the verses of Tanveer Sipra often echoed in his mind—he was merely extracting "musk" from the navel of iron; the fragrance and the profits alike were spirited away by the mill owner.

آج بھی سپراؔ اس کی خوشبو مل مالک لے جاتا ہے

میں لوہے کی ناف سے پیدا جو کستوری کرتا ہوں

(Even today, Sipra, the mill owner takes away its fragrance; The musk that I extract from the navel of iron.)

Barkat earned barely enough to scrape by—just enough to sustain a modest existence in his small, rented room.

That evening, when Barkat returned home, the roar of the machines was still echoing in his ears. As he opened the door, he saw his ten-year-old son, Bilal, sitting engrossed before the screen, watching an advertisement for a sleek, expensive digital gaming console.

Bilal looked up at his father, his eyes holding a familiar, wistful longing.

"Baba! Can we get this? Just this once?"

A sharp pang shot through Barkat’s heart. Decades ago, when he was a barefoot child roaming the village, he too used to gaze longingly at those cheap tin toys hanging in city shop windows—toys he could never have.

Generations changed, and the agrarian world transformed into a digital empire, yet this cycle of deprivation remained unbroken. Even today, the laborer’s child remained trapped in the quagmire of class division that separates the rich from the poor.

How beautifully Supra had encapsulated this unending pain:

میں اپنے بچپنے میں چھو نہ پایا جن کھلونوں کو

انہی کے واسطے اب میرا بیٹا بھی مچلتا ہے

(The very toys I could not touch in my own childhood; For those same toys, my son throws a tantrum today.)

As he stood there, a vision of the future unfolded in Barkat’s mind. His roots lay in the village, yet his child could no longer return there; he was destined to remain a city dweller. But would the divide between rich and poor persist like this? Would the relationship between laborer and tycoon continue unchanged, and would his children’s bones continue to grow frail in the same way?

This internal conflict and fear belong to a father who yearns to shield his child from the city’s ruthless system, yet knows there is no turning back.

Barkat looked at Bilal’s small hand—the very hand that, one day, might toil like a laborer’s in a factory, a corporate cubicle, or on a construction site, feeding the insatiable hunger of machines. He felt the city was a massive dragon that sustained its towering structures by consuming the blood and bones of innocent children arriving from the villages. The chasm between the tycoon and the laborer was centuries old, yet the digital age had only deepened this divide.

Barkat wanted to keep the "soul" of the village alive within this city. He would teach Bilal to become a person who empathized with the suffering of others, rather than merely a cog in this callous machinery. To bridge the gap between rich and poor, he would learn the principles of human compassion, not algorithms. He wondered: what could be done to halt this cycle and ensure a better life for future generations?

Barakat resolved that Bilal must receive an education that would not merely turn him into a "boss's employee" or a corporate robot. Education should not be about becoming a money-making machine; rather, it must encompass social consciousness and ethics. He wanted Bilal to grow up to be a changemaker who transforms the system, rather than just a cog within it.

Barakat felt that, even amidst the city's frenetic pace, he needed to transform his home and community into a tranquil haven. By limiting time spent with machines and screens, they had to keep alive the traditions of sitting together, sharing joys and sorrows, and engaging in meaningful dialogue. Compassion and love must not fade from the hearts of the new generation; this would ensure their souls remained warm and alive.

The only solution to alleviating the burden of materialism in urban life is for a person to limit their needs. One must step out of the "blind race to acquire more." When a person breaks free from the enslavement to cheap gadgets and brands, they are no longer compelled to bow down before the boss.

Barkat sat beside his son and placed his rough hand on Bilal’s small shoulder. He cast a glance around the tiny room, which was weighed down by the clutter of cheap gadgets, tangled wires, and the burden of materialism.

Society had traded its humanity for machines, and the gap between rich and poor had widened into an unbridgeable chasm.

"Bilal," Barkat said—his tone was gentle, yet his voice rose clearly above the distant roar of the city's traffic.

"These machines out there can build towering skyscrapers and high-speed computers, but they cannot create love. They cannot infuse a restless heart with the serenity of peace."

Bilal turned off the screen and listened intently to his father.

"Our world is growing cold because people have forgotten how to talk to one another," Barkat said—voicing the shared anguish of all humanity.

"If we bequeath nothing but this greed and new machinery to future generations, your children will live in an even darker world. We must place humanity first once again. We need to sit together, look into each other's eyes, and bridge this class divide—not through algorithms, but through our emotions and dialogue."

Taking a deep breath, Barkat said, "Bilal, this cycle will only stop when we cease racing at the city's frantic pace and set our own rhythm."

For a fleeting moment amidst the flow of time—perhaps for the first time—the digital noise in the room faded into the background. In the quiet warmth of that small home, a father and son began to talk, sowing small, delicate seeds for a better, more humane tomorrow.

In the cold, small room, amidst gadgets tangled with stars,

A father placed his rough hand upon his son’s head.

In that moment, the blind rush of time seemed to pause,

And the roaring noise of the racing streets outside suddenly drowned.

Barkat looked at his son, and a lament echoed in his heart:

"I belonged to the village; I wanted to live life at a slower pace.

But this dragon of a city has now trapped my child.

This boy will never go back to the village; will he live only as a city dweller?

Is this how generations will melt away? Is this how bones will break?

Will the bond between the master and the laborer always remain like this?

For every single morsel of food, must humans be traded for machines?

Will the divide between the rich and the poor always remain a deep abyss?

This endless cycle must stop now! This web must be torn apart!

We must return to pure emotions; we must start the conversation again.

For a few moments, we must turn our eyes away from computer screens,

And by looking into each other's eyes, we must change this dark night.

Bilal! Listen, these towering buildings and these high-speed computers—

They can manufacture everything, but they cannot give you love.

We must step out of this race; we must reclaim our own pace.

In this dense jungle of algorithms, we must keep humanity alive!"