Wednesday, August 21, 2013

The third ...

The Third
is like an elf,
cute and coiled
with a snail face
and a needle nose,
always existing in marriage.
A child or adultery,
tea cup and cigarette,
television or silence,
there is always a third 
with its shadow looming tall on a wall
that does not depart with the Sun;
Also, those worry lines on your forehead
that has nothing to do with age.
It’s a snail, withdrawing the tip of its head
into the stone shell
at times, poking its head out
winking,
moving inside its hard robust covering
even when not seen. The third is
a rotten fish smell that reaches you much before
you go to the market place.

You, her, I and the third – we all eat and thrive on betrayal. 






Tuesday, July 23, 2013

living ...

 Parsley, spinach, celery or lettuce;
get those green leafy ones;
they are good for health.
If you can’t buy, just pluck them
 from here and there.
Soak for a while in hot water
drain and dry
and you would be able to smell the
apple-green freshness.
Tear off the part that disturbs.
Sit gingerly,
 segregate the good and the rotten ones
with deft fingers dancing in a mysterious grace.
Snip off the blackened part
Split the spoilt edge
Slash away the bitter stem
And slit the thickened chunk.
Just a dash of salt n pepper
and sprinkling of sauce n oil;
Celebrate the union
and it’s magnetism in a bowl.
Eat them with rice or bread
Or even raw if you fancy.
Or else, feed them to a cow;
it will bring a li'l change
in the whisper of a breath,
in the echo of a smile
take a chance and just see.

Find a place in the soil and plant your destiny.
Water it with your own hands and
let a creeper of hope grow.
Pluck and fold the dreams neatly
clean it
clear it
and keep them fresh.
Find the corner under its shade and
 scream if the pain does not heal, and then
dump the rotten part
drown the noisy drum
straighten the uneasy bend
smoothen the roughened bounce.
Remember to eat well your leafy green vegetables.

Thursday, July 18, 2013

My predestined lover ...

 I could only see the jaded green frame of the window.
Dust has settled along the pane.
Once upon a time, there used to be a face of a beautiful woman
whose eyes were hungry with hopes of tomorrow.
But now
There is a strange eerie silence in the darkness behind.
And then, suddenly, on that day as I looked up,
hoping to see the same uncanny blackness,
 I saw Death; his shadow
perched on the windowsill.
Death had dropped in for a chat, on that day.
He wore the same rugged look and
 was dangerously handsome with his locks
 that were as tangled as my existence.
When I told him that he is Emily’s lover and
it would be a sin for me to come close to him
He laughed in his usual baritone voice
 that was irresistible and
 I found a thrill in this adultery!

He wanted to know, why I keep resisting him.
Why I fight the battle that eventually would be lost?
He smiled, and I knew at that moment
he would come to meet me now and then
till I surrender. And eventually we would be together
and it is going to be an insane love affair.
Death, my predestined lover,
I knew at that instant
 I would throw away morality and caution like shabby old clothes
 to live those dizzying moments with you.
Clasping concern with one hand
gagging conscience with the other
I will come to your arms with a readiness of a rain drop
that rushes to kiss the Earth.
But
Till then let me breathe the splendour of an airborne acrobat.
Till then let me kiss the roasted golden Sun. 
Let me whirl and pirouette in a tango
with my brittle thoughts and unborn hope.
Let me be the lover of rain and bear him a child.
Till then let me try remaking life
with swatches of stolen memories.

 



Monday, June 24, 2013

a cup of coffee for you...


I want to make a cup of coffee for you
at dusk
when the sky will be fuchsia pink.
While hearing the tip-tapping rain in the wind 
and the thud thudding heartbeat of the soil
I will let the liquid dreams and
fragrant desires to blend and simmer.
I will wonder, as I whip gently the
pearl white of the milky cream,
how the coffee tastes against your
lips, your teeth, your tongue.
I will stir the sugar and allow the magic
of the steaming cloud hang heavy and
I will test the ready ness of the cup 
imagining
will it sting or will it be just right!
The vapors from the storming cup
like rust golden beads on my forehead
and I will pour that anticipated light brown
into your cup,
a shade that fits between the tamarind of my skin
and the golden desert sand of yours,


almost the colour of my possible child.



Friday, June 14, 2013

that obstinate headstrong life-force ...

 I wonder how I
constantly tread this hyphenated zone!
If I turn off the light the moths will die
and so will the bats if I turn it on.
Should I spend life searching for an anchor
or shouldn't I just tear off the sails
and let it be?

How good is living
on a handful of yesterday,
an existence
neither real, nor fantasy,
like the alluring horizon
between the Earth and the Sky,
at an arm’s length away,
but ever distant?

Why do I fill my book of poems
with haphazard listless things?
A mail box with drafts, remotes, phones,
a crossword page of an old newspaper,
five odd books, a gift that you had refused to take,
some songs that I listen to endlessly,
a few old snapshots;
all flung heedlessly, uncaring,
here and there;
Just about anything to fill the void
that once has been your side of the story.

YET
even now,
 between the breaths
lurks a stubborn dream
defying all other doubts;
A dream that often morphs into a bird
and take colourful wings
preparing itself for an ambitious flight
to soar higher and paint the sky.

And I throw away my existential despair
like a pair of old, worn out shoes
and I remember to plant a seed, all over again,
and wait for the moss green sapling
to raise its obstinate head!




Friday, May 31, 2013

a poem, incomplete ...

Once, into his ears I had whispered
the story of those glowing fireflies.
And since then,
 during many mysterious nights,
under the magenta blue sky
my whispers deepened
and the story became a dream;
a dream of a tomorrow, pregnant with today,
a dream of an unknown joy
with strange pains, hidden,
a dream of a horizon
towards which I had turned my back long ago.
The dream was soaked with the moisture
gathered from the monsoon rain. And then
he became my rain. Now,
He keeps drizzling in my brain and
 I carry him within
Like the fragrance of the hasnuhana.

But I know,
Soon, a silence will grow heavy
burrowing roots in the corners of the house,
and  the rainy season will change,
leaving behind
memories of a rainbow sky,
that I alone shall have to carry
into a warm winter fire,
struggling  to decipher
the mysterious monsoon,
recalling
of having once been soaked
in the rains;
wondering occasionally,
if it still rains where he lives
and if he still thinks of the paper boat
that we together tried to make!

Answers to which I will never know.
And till then, each time he will say he loves me
I would be surprised why there’s a lump in my throat
that refuses to dissolve into tears!

Friday, May 17, 2013

untitled ...


What if I become a snail struggling to hide my body into a stony silence?
What if I become a porcupine and you can’t make love to me anymore?
What if I become a comma and fill those empty pauses?
What if I am a riverine nymph and swishing my fishy tail escape into the ocean?
 

What if Hitler’s mother had Jew connection and Osama bin Laden’s Hindu?
What if my mood stops changing like the monsoon sky?
What if I become You and I peep into your soul?
What if someday you get the strength to let me go?
 

What if I become my eyes and close it against the world?
What if the blue black night becomes me and you watch but can not see?
 
And
thoughts are a museum; pictures on a wall ...
you leave it but it never leaves you!

Thursday, May 9, 2013

for my unborn children ...


I have looked for you
into the pregnant river water
on the right side of my bed
in the crevices of my long stretched days
in basil leaf and jasmine flower.
I have looked for you
among the happy giggles of children playing.
I have looked for you in his warmth
 in his heartbeats.
In the day, night, dawn and dusk
and in the coiled vine of desire
I have looked for you.

When insomnia becomes an infection to the eyes
I  colour your apples
Name your dolls
Sing you lullabies.
When the night becomes a blue-black bruise
I look for you.
When the orange Sun looks like
an excess bleeding in the sky
I look for you.
When he holds my face in his palm
I look for you.
I lie
I nurture secrets
I long for the sticky knowingness of his skin
I die to see myself in his eyes;
All for you
Only for you.
Waiting for you to be.
Wishing for us to be.

Sunday, April 28, 2013

happiness ...


I will call you for sure;
We shall meet again’ he promised...
 
In between the velvety folds
of those promises she built a house, long cherished.
And to live in an imaginary house is the best,
her house, built from the grit of memory
has no trial and no test. 

good to have a fantasy house with hopes and dreams so little,
as the walls of which bear no rhyme and not another riddle.
no expectations, nor fear in the mesh of other allusions,
longing neither to belong nor to search for meaning in this illusion. 

Resting under the painted ceiling out of which Images grow,
she feels happy as the walls cannot anymore smell of sorrow.
Not aching to make sense of the day or the night,
she doesnt weep any more, try as she might.
For she knows this is all there is, and this is so,
there’s no panic of an end, and no one to leave and go!

 

 

Sunday, April 7, 2013

an utter mistake


Her father did an utter mistake
of not holding her
of not carrying her on his shoulder
showing her the world.

And you too have done the same
of not binding her with the sacred thread
or a stained centre parting, the mistake
of not giving her someone to carry your name.
So she never learnt how to belong
She never felt home.
 

And she kept dreaming
of roaming in faraway places,
of the night sky
all alone,
her fists closing on strangers’ stories;
 

Now, often,
she becomes a kite, the string lifts her and
she flies.
She feels that she bears a river inside her
her hair floating like water-weed,
she lies still and listens
to the upsurge of a river within her,
the water rises, rippling in circles,
legs, waist, arms ... and
she paints a blue bird on her navel ... 


And she never learns to belong
she never learns home.

 
They made an utter mistake
Her father and you!

Sunday, March 31, 2013

untitled ...


One day
a bird named fear
flapped its wings and sat on your shoulder
whispering sweet nothings  into your ear.
When you closed your eyes in pleasure
It hooted and entered your head.
It furled its feathers and made a nest there.
Since then you hear the beating of its wings
inside your skull.
You see its jet black rapid eyes wherever you look.
Now, you smell the bird even before it appears.
In the night, lying beside your man
feeling his body against yours
you wonder whether you belong,
 a place
as uncertain as your unborn child!

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

waiting ...

for http://dversepoets.com/
http://poetryblogroll.blogspot.in/2013/03/poetry-pantry-143.html



How long are you going to wait for him?
The night has fallen. Go home, woman!
There might be a storm.
The dust on the street is swirling
with the stray paper and plastic bags,
night has consumed the signboards, windows;
buses, scooters, flashes have turned around the culvert
and now there’s only a left over sound.
The insomniac night is seeping into the breath of the trees,
the insomniac night is licking the roof,
there’s a strange restlessness in nearby skyscrapers,
night is swallowing the shadows.
Go home woman
 wait for the man, no more.
Go and see
The day that you had left behind
fell asleep waiting for you.


Saturday, March 16, 2013

a few remedies ...


If you feel lonely
read a book
or watch an ant,
stand at the balcony
and observe
millions of same story
in different clothes,
you can even think of that person
whom you carry in your brain
like a nagging dripping rain,
listen to the footfall of the day
that had already receded; or
stare at your sorrow.
Your sorrow is a tree that was pulled out
but whose roots had spread all across,
your sorrow is an old photo on the wall
that was removed long ago
but the square imprint remained,
Your sadness is a blood red hibiscus
with a red bud and a red corpse.

And then, suddenly, ... perhaps ...
in the smell of a dovetail autumn wind
or in between your shadow and the soul
you may find peace.

Monday, March 11, 2013

Relation ...

Written for http://magpietales.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/mag-159.html

I am afraid of your scientific mind;
I am frightened
that if you give me finite answers
there would be no space
for hope
for daydreaming
for yearning
for longing
for my search of myself
in you ...
So let it be vague,
abstract,
like eternity
like an ocean; 
Do not try to find the imprints

of moments

of memories;

Let it be the whisper of the waves

amidst all other noise!


 
 

Sunday, March 10, 2013

Rain ...




You stayed inside the house
guarding your peace.
But I had nothing to lose
So I came into the rain
and danced to the end of its alley. 
Rain
I didn’t know earlier
that you could have wings
and that I can fly with you! 
Rain
cover my agonizing veins,
whisper me your secrets,
I will collect your words in my palm,
tell me that I am the lover you dreamt of!
Let me touch your toes
and play with your tendrils.
Tell me you have come to lick my sores.
Caress my insomniac moan with your fingertips,
go round around me,
run after me,
settle in me.
Rain
Let me bear you a child.



I will surrender only to the Rain....

... ...


Beloved moments
Please stay;
I am frightened.
What if you aren’t true?
Stay with me,
keep touching,
take my hand and be close.
I am afraid.
Hold me
the way 
near ones hold the dead at a cemetery.

I fear
this moment also might be
 false
like those endless yesteryears
like the uncertain timeless future!