Almost Love...

 365 days and a few nights later

I am trying to taste the familiar warmth

and hear the forgotten footfalls

that has become silent like both of us.

We have kept veracity and a few smiles

In a curtain box

planning to take it with us

later

someday, sometime,

when the callings of life will be completed.

Till then we will postpone love.

Now sleep is lonely and famished

as dreams have deserted the eyes and

both of us imagine

a future love
waiting
today...
the day after...
and a day after... 

and this explicitly is the loss of love!

Moon ...

Full moon,
At lonely night
When autumn cry
I will climb up to you
To kiss
Or not kiss
May be just to hold
Or laugh by
Or listen you talk
And then at a deep summer night
I am searching for you again
While crossing the field
I will stop by
A while
Looking for you
Across the way
Round the next corner
Between the mind and the voice
You remain
Minutes of moments come and gone
But the dream is forever the way it was!

Untitled ...

She writes poetry in the middle of the night

hair undone

eyes fixed at the golden moon.

When everyone is asleep

She bakes and eats the pulpy sadness

She is a witch

Or perhaps a lunatic.

But her soul is still a virgin.

Its soft petal skin

as old as the primordial thought;

Its every breath is a new hymen pattern.

Looking for peace

It grows wings

and transforms into a butterfly.

It takes a roll call of

all tall promises and smiles.

And its sadness is like a white hibiscus

resting on a garden fence.

Do you remember the gold fish

that used to swim in her heart

before it turned into melted ice? ... 

Surpanakha's soliloquy

My much-loved friend,
my most despised friend! 

We loved the same man

rightfully yours and

oh so wrongly mine!

It's a chance that you stood

behind the protected zone of

the lakshman rekha and I

on the neglected other!

But you became the Goddess

and I the whore!

Your unwavering love became his support and my unconditional one his deepest secret! My dearest friend, my most despised friend, I weep for both of us. Your silent scream matches mine my darling sister my most hated sister we are each other’s hidden secrets we are each other’s secret pain. I cry for both of us for the life that gradually drips away from your fingers and the illusory one that I struggle to hold in my palm, we the beloved and the betrayed you the Goddess and I the whore we are the She; day dawns the same for you and me. .Ref:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surpanakha

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. 

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.

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.

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!

for http://magpietales.blogspot.in/

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!

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.

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!


 

 

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!

 

Sometimes ...

Sometimes,

just like that

I open the suitcase

and unpack that gloomy loneliness

and my moods.

They sleep with me all night

I hold my companionship tight.

Do not call me a lunatic,

say it differently,

call me a poet.

Do not call it a sin

for I loved the wrong man;

say it differently,

call it the unknown error of my life.

Beloved

If I call you my beloved …

… Will you promise to open the window wide

and let me hear your melancholy notes?

Will you make a collage

of the restless stretch

between that coffee cup

and the steering wheel

 and the

desert flower?

 

If I call you my beloved …

… Will you let me live

even when I am dead and gone?

desire

The dreaming desires of life
I am looking for you again
after very many years
in the same old places;
and I have found you
... same old desires of life,
life’s dancing delight,
dancing around
a day
a night
like a butterfly
my indigo blue butterfly
flutter by
float and fly ….

And then
I let go of you
like the sand off my fist
like the stars in the dawn
like a dream in the morning wakefulness
I let go of you.

 

 

What do I do with so much love?
They are of no use in my everyday life.
Sometimes, I use them in poetry
for it leaps, I don’t know from where!
Or at times, I bury it below the Gulmohar tree
... And keep expecting burgundy red flowers…
My pitiful waiting!

untitled...

Through time, pouring away like water

we have been living together;

my soul and I.

We are so familiar

 that we almost

 repeat each other now.

She is I and I am her

or both are us

or something like that.

To be far away

I went to the shore

but she was already there

struggling to hold that whiteness in her fist.

When I had thought of going to the mountains

she started whispering

the noise of serenity into my ears.

Then, I had wanted to escape

 into the wilderness of the forest

but I was afraid

 that she would weave

the moss green grass and twigs through my ribs.

For long I am searching for a home away from myself.

They’d been living together a long time

And where beginning to repeat each other:

He was her

And she was him,

She was her

And he was her as well,

She was, she wasn’t,

And he was them,

Or something like that.

Especially in the morning,

Until they’d sorted out

Who was who,

From where to where,

Why this was and not that,

A lot of time elapsed,

Time poured awaay like water.

Occasionally they wanted to kiss each other

But realised, at some point,

That they were both her —

Easier just to repeat.

Then they’d start yawning with fear,

A yawn like soft wool,

Which could even be crocheted

This way:

One was yawning very carefully

The other was holding the ball.

I want to build myself a house

As far away as possible

From all the things

I know.

As far away as possible from the mountains

Out of which squirrels leap in the morning

Like apostles in a clock

Naive beyond belief.

And I don’t want it on the shore

Of that white tiredness

Where I could see through every window

An enamelled scale.

And I know all the tricks

Of the plain.

What else can you expect from her

If at night she frees the grass and wheat

To grow through your ribs and temples?

In any place at all

I’d get so fearfully bored

I couldn’t even

Hang

On my wall

Pictures

The doorway would look too familiar

I’d be feeling I had to move on.

If only I could build myself a house

As far away as possible from

Myself.

I want to build myself a house

As far away as possible

From all the things

I know.

As far away as possible from the mountains

Out of which squirrels leap in the morning

Like apostles in a clock

Naive beyond belief.

And I don’t want it on the shore

Of that white tiredness

Where I could see through every window

An enamelled scale.

And I know all the tricks

Of the plain.

What else can you expect from her

If at night she frees the grass and wheat

To grow through your ribs and temples?

In any place at all

I’d get so fearfully bored

I couldn’t even

Hang

On my wall

Pictures

The doorway would look too familiar

I’d be feeling I had to move on.

If only I could build myself a house

As far away as possible from

Myself.

I want to build myself a house

As far away as possible

From all the things

I know.

As far away as possible from the mountains

Out of which squirrels leap in the morning

Like apostles in a clock

Naive beyond belief.

And I don’t want it on the shore

Of that white tiredness

Where I could see through every window

An enamelled scale.

And I know all the tricks

Of the plain.

What else can you expect from her

If at night she frees the grass and wheat

To grow through your ribs and temples?

In any place at all

I’d get so fearfully bored

I couldn’t even

Hang

On my wall

Pictures

The doorway would look too familiar

I’d be feeling I had to move on.

If only I could build myself a house

As far away as possible from

Myself.