a dented bumper...

'I'm...I'm extremely sorry...sorry...Mister...'
She jumped out of her sedan and walked up with haste to me...
Apologetic...
While I stood right on the road, my door half opened...
Staring down at the front bumper which got a big 'kiss'...dented...
I was furious!
How could someone drive so insanely in a narrow populated street like this?
I thought and looked down...at the front bumper...
'Sorry mister...'
She repeated second time...
I looked up...
And saw a face...
Longish but beauteous...
'You're in a terrible hurry , I guess...the way you nicked me...and before that nicked a van...'
I commented, coldly;

'Please...Don't mind...I can pay up...'
She said, looking nervous...
Glancing at her watch, at least twice in between...
 She must have been in a hurry
I thought...
'Okay...'
I thought to leave the 'kiss' there, unpaid...
And went up to the door...
'Thanks...'
I heard ...her sweet voice...
'Don't speed that way...'
I looked back and remarked,smiling...
'Yes! I shouldn't ...but today...my friend...I mean...my best friend...is taken ill...hospitalized...so...'
She mumbled, putting in clarification-
Emphasizing the phrase 'best friend';


I smiled and nodded...
She stared at me...half nodded...
And smiled...realizing that I realized her predicament...

She went away...
I took my road...
Only...the dent remained at my front bumper...
I didn't care to make it even...
I kept the 'kiss'...there...

the progenitor...

'Being the progenitor
Is really awesome...'
He thought, sitting under the cool shadow of the tree...
Watching his young one running through the greens like colt gone scotfree!
He just looked at his creation
Running by his childish whims and screaming
like hell breaking loose-
Into an ambiance that was otherwise so somnolent;

He stared blankly at the newest Bolt
Running to and fro aimlessly, so animalistic and so instinctive!
'Hey dad! will you mind if I run a bit away from you?'
His poem asked him...
He nodded...silently, full of satiety...

And the colt ran...
Ran away from him towards more green pastures...
He became anxious a bit...
'Kid...don't run too far..dear!'
He yelled...
'Its okay! dad! don't you worry!'
The receding kid answered back, sort of screaming...
The scream echoed...
He, the progenitor, was anxious no doubt..
But he felt the childish need...
He felt within the child...the child's curiosity to explore the unexplored...
To know the unknown...

Only the distance between him and the kid was a bit worrying...
'But he would always be there...let him run...'
He thought...
He felt a dual pull...
On one hand anxiety was gripping him...
On the other, he felt proud...of his creation getting more beautiful and strong...
And...
Sitting under the shade of the tree, he, the progenitor, had a dream...
The sweet dream of his kid returning like a great explorer...an Ulysses...
Returning home...after a long expedition...

at the souq...

The cave like entrance created confusions in my mind...
But once I got into the souq...
A whole world opened up before me...
A whole world of assorted goodies and gifts and spices...
I wandered aimlessly at the souq...
Enthralled by the textiles that hung from the wooden rails...
Traditional niqab...black...with head gears...
Modern versions with the face uncovered...
And shirts and jackets with geometric designs...and colors...so varied like jigjaw puzzles...

Wandering, I came to the place where spices were kept in baskets...
Spices ....ummmmm
The aroma once got into me-
Sent ripples of fruitfulness...
I walked like a dazed woman...
And then...
Somewhere in the middle I heard someone talking a bit loud
That surpassed the hullabaloo of the buyers and sellers...
I looked around...
And saw him...
Standing right there...
And the soft light of the afternoon fell on his face that looked helplessly perspiring...
At the souq...
He was definitely
Having difficulty in expressing himself;

I knew he did not know arabic...
But I know that!
So I went near him...
Thought of lifting my niqab even!
And put him into a surprise!

But then...more than committing a blasphemy
I thought...
It could lead to severe bio-electrical shocks to many...
To him...to my neighbours and family...
And it might cause my harm...
Lead me astray...

So...
I went near him,
Had a good look of his face
( which still had the innocence of his younger days...only the sight of stray beard was new to me!)
...after so many years...alas!  through my veiled eyes...
And slipped away-
Into the crowd;
Leaving him stranded there
Like a dumbstruck man,
Who was surely suffering from memory loss;

Before I took the last turn
That would take me away from his sight...and the souq
I turned my face slightly...
Pretending to look back at a shop that sold shoes-
And I saw him...
Still standing like someone who had seen a ghost!
Standing..as he was....in a middle of great confusion...
While the sellers still bragged him about some wristwatches and bottles of spices...


At the souq...
I met my old fling...
And still
Kept my hijab...

a rock song for you...

Darn! seeing you there so meek and timid, like a kitten...
I feel like pouring the rain of fire onto your shy figure...
Rain...
Rain full of fire and glowing warmth
That would send shiver down your spine dear!
Down your spine...
And jar your fragile heart to wakefulness...
And bar your senses from asking for anything more!
You would then, I hope, I pray, dear,
Feel the pangs of love restrained!
Love so restrained by chains of thorns that press onto one
To pierce through the skin...
Leaving spots dark...blemishes permanent...
And blood would ooze out from those sweet injury-spots of love,
Drops of red red fire...
Drops of red red wine!

Darn!
To see you there so timid and meek
Is like facing the iceberg on the voyage...hindering my movement of fiery soul!
I feel like pouring my redness onto dear!
Rain...
Rain of blood and wine!
Down your spine...
Sending shocks to you to defrost you
From your ice cold solid state!

Darn!
You're such a goddamn cold
A cold cold solid state...
And I am so fiery!
So fiery red, liquid...

The envelope...

She found the envelope
Kept within a book...after twenty years almost!
A red one...hand made stuff...
She looked at the envelope...
And...
Remembered the day...

A wet wintry day it was...
Mid December but the sky was a bit cloudy...
'It would rain...probably'
He murmured, sitting by her side at the deserted canteen of the university...
A scrapbook was open before him as usual...
She ordered two samosas...
The hot samosas came soon with red tomato sauce...
Rakhal da was busy calculating something sitting on his high stool...
The day was wet, moist, unlike a December date...
She was looking around...
He was drawing a picture or something on a page of the scrapbook...

'You have got nothing to say na?'
She had finally asked him, breaking the silence...
Between them...in the lonely canteen...with empty tables barring theirs;

'What?'
He had muttered, busy drawing a pencil sketch on the paper...
'About us?'
She enquired, feeling despondent really...
'Hmmm...'
Was his brief iconic reply;
'You're an ass...'
She teethed her words, mincing almost...
Enraged within;

'Hole...add that up...'
He said and chuckled, still drawing something;
She felt like grabbing the scrapbook and throwing it away...
She felt like landing a fist of fury on his nonchalant face...
He...
Was still drawing...
'Okay...I'm going...here's the money for samosas...eat more if you want...'
Saying this she went away, hurriedly, out of the canteen...
Her mom called just then...
Out on the street she yelled over phone to her dearest mom:
'Yes! yes! I agree to marry that poker faced middleaged junk! don't bother! tell dad to arrange for everything...but I'll be late for home today...'
Saying this she hurried across the crowded footpath selling books...
At a crossing nearby...
She had heard a familiar call:
'Hello! are you a deaf? calling you half the distance almost!'
She turned around...
To see him running towards her
With something that looked like a crude hand made envelope;
'What's this?'
She asked when he, huffing and out of breath,
Gave her the thing...
'Nothing...just some nonsensical idiotic gibberish!'
He yelled, unmindful of the peopled street and honking cars and hawkers...
Then he ran away...
She looked at him...running zig-zag...
Through the crowd...

the mariner...

I was fooling around the boat...
Knowing that she would be out sailing tumro...
With it...
The girl of the evening had turned into a dazzling woman of night...
I could see her ear studs twinkling in the dark sky...
I touched the wooden plank of the boat...
The stern post looked shiny...almost gleaming from the light that shone on it from the hull...
The white navigation light was on...
I placed my hands on the ropes and pulled them...
Like a child fiddling with a toy...
Only...
That effort of mine brought her out...
She...
The mariner...
Wearing jeans and a white flannel shirt
And a dark green jacket...
Her eyes fell on me...standing on the platform...
'Hi! need rest...going out tumro...want anything?'
She uttered in a tired voice, almost yawning...
'na..nope...only wanted to have a look at your beautiful boat...'
I mumbled, unsure of what to say...
She smiled, waved her hand and went back...disappeared...
'Hello...miss...hello...?'
I called out...
The boat rocked on the restful dark water...
As if nodded in silence...
I looked around...
Found no one...
Only found a small wooden board nearby...
Something was pasted on it...a kind of a notice:
'This is an abandoned place.Enter at our own risk'
I smiled
And thought to lie down on the platform-
Right beside the noticeboard...
After all who could leave one's beloved? even if ...
The voyage had been ended hurriedly-
And the boat had been left abandoned for long...

at the 'mechanics' class...

'So when we try to create a kind of free body diagram...
We always remember that we are considering the object to be free initially from all forces...
We think of a space...three dimensional...and then we imagine...
Yes! we imagine the object to be going through certain forces...
Imagine...dear...Imagine...'
The professor at the lectern suddenly raised his otherwise mellowed voice...
And pronounced the word Imagine with a severity...as if he wanted the whole class to be poets...

'Forces..'
He thought sitting on the last bench, pressing his back on the green wall that left flakes of green tinge on his shirt...
'Are every where...who's free really?
Then he took up his pencil and the drawing board...
Thought of a space
Put an object named 'i' there...
And let it float...
Then he thought of the space...
Thought of air...and its density...
Thought of the bottomline of the drawing board as the ground...
Put arrow downward to indicate 'g'...the gravitational force working on 'i'...
Now to keep it there floating...
He needed to make the situation on board a bit changed...
(So he imagined...)
He thought of exerting some kind of force upward...
He thought of the object as a rocket...
Exhausting ...gases downward...
He drew arrows up which negated 'g'...
He provided some kind of stability to the rocket like object...
Then he thought...
It was not so easy...
He ransacked his head...
The freebody diagram engaged him...
He was captivated by the diagram and the forces...
He felt he himself got entangled...

 'Freedom...'the professor, meanwhile declared from his lectern...
'is just another diagrammatic expression of servitude to forces...internal and external...'
He nodded...
And smiled...looking at his sketch...
And the object on the board...
'I'...
The object...
It was there...
But not going anywhere...
Only its energy was dissipating all the time...
All the time...

on rereading 'Aronyok'...

Rereading 'Aronyok'
Is my favourite pastime...
It had become so...over the years...

When first I got hold of that Bibhuti babu's book...
I was only fifteen then...
Young, dreamy, adventurous, erratic...
So...'Aronyok' made me wild...
I ran after wild berries, wild blossoms, wilderness...
And that led me to stranger realities...
Realities of sitting on the bow of a country boat under the soft, insane moon...
And humming tunes of 'Holud pakhi...'
And then...
I grew older...
The book grew older with me too!
It brought before me...
Realities of different kind the next...
Realities of Kunta...
Her piteous eyes...
Her rustic innocence...
My mind led me far and wide...
My 'Aronyok' led me to the depth...

It led me to Poesy, philosophy, people,and dreams...
It helped in a transgression...of a different kind...


'Aronyok'...
You made and spoiled me!

('Aronyok', is one of the greatest works of Bibhuti Bhushan Banerjee(1898-1950). It presents beautifully, in the most wondrously romantic manner, the life of the country people living near Mohanpura Reserve Forest and its fringes...it is a fiction, but it is somewhat journalistic in design, presenting great details of life of rustic people of Bengal and Bihar...)

winter...

You, sometimes, come to me like that grand old nanny...
Shaking and trembling all the time, wrapped in blanket...
Chewing betel-leaves...and telling us stories of ghosts...post dinner...

Sometimes, you turn up as a college going girl...busy...talking on cellphone...
discussing a point of rendezvous with someone-
Bubbly, unpretentious, sunny!

Sometimes you're a great cricketer...
Sending the leather to distant dew-laden meadows-
Amidst cheering minions;

Sometimes you stay indolent...
Like that next door boy...
Just listening to rock songs and boozing...

Sometimes...after the sunset...you bring warmth...
With my love's lips...
so tempting and lustrous!

Winter...
Have I told you ever-
That I miss you the year long...waiting and waiting...with all my heart?

at a coffee shop...

'Cool! so you've become a regular scribbler?...what do you scribble? How you manage to find time out? How's your kid and wife? how's kaku?'
She asked all these at one go, as if she had little time at her disposal and would go out soon...of the coffee shop...on this beautiful wintry sunny, sunday morn...at Park street...
I looked at her...
She was sitting opposite to me...
'Yes...about  childhood, mother, nature, and love...I scribble whenever I find time...kid is going good...wife is perfectly alright...dad is a bit ailing...'
I answered like writing down a horizontal line...no ups and no downs...
As I looked at her...who had grown a bit plump...womanly...
'Buss? aur kuch likhte ho ki nahin?'
She asked, suddenly as she completed her third long sip...taking a good amount of chocolate layered coffee from the glass tumbler...looking at me...with her eye brows dancing...
I know this...I know this dancing of her eyebrows meant playfulness...
This shows that she is happy...
And this knowledge that she is terribly happy, pleased me a lot!
So I smiled, and looked at my glass tumbler...not a sip taken so far...
'Sorry! I'm asking too many queries! Take a sip...its really good!'
She exclaimed and entreated...
'yeah...'
I whispered almost...and took a sip...and the hot chocolate went through my pipe...Ah! smooth...warm...
Now...it was probably her turn to scrutinise me...
'You look trimmed...'
She said, kind of commented upon, casually, merrily...
I smiled...
Not knowing what she had actually meant by the word 'trimmed'...my hair? my body? my moustache?
'You didn't answer me...'
She said, breaking a truffle cake by the  flat spoon...
I looked at her golden pendant hanging right on the cleavage...as coming to a brief view...a view of a moment...under the cover of her dupatta...
And looked outside...turning my head...
The cars were scarce on the sunday morn...
The red building on the other side of the road as seen through the big glass window of the coffee shop looked like freshly painted...
'Hey! you!'
She upped her tone a bit to gather my attention...
'Yes...dear...'
I murmured...
Suddenly her face went through a strange transformation, in front of my own eyes...
A sudden shadow of sadness made a brief impression upon her face of the morn...it stayed for a while before going away...
'I do write a lot...on varied things...about music, wine, painting, people, streets...life...'
I answered, taking my second sip from the tumbler...
'Not about me?'
She asked, looking at the broken truffle cake on the white chinaware at our table;

I remained silent and sighed,
She looked straight at me, looked at my eyes-straight, very very straight, like an arrow almost, sharp!
I looked at the road outside...getting busy gradually...
The red building appeared fresh and redder with the sun now falling on its facade...
'Hello! gone to another land? you poet?'
She asked...
I felt the warmth getting back to her after a brief coldness,
I felt my blood getting the warmth from her,
So...
I took the third sip and took out a piece of paper from my wallet...a folded piece of paper that had grown crinkly almost...
And opened the folds and placed it on the table before her;
She sort of jumped onto it and grabbed it as if it was an expensive thing lying...
She took it up and started reading it, softly,
Her eyebrows were all concentration...
Her face showed curiosity, eagerness and...
Well...I don't know...
I might be wrong...
But...
At that coffee shop, on that sunny, wintry morn, at Park street...
I saw a glimpse of Love...
In her eyes...

my grandad's turntable...

The other day, when I went up to my attic
I found my granddad's old Thorens...broken...
It was not that I saw it for the first time in my life lying there...defunct...dust covered...
I found it there...lying useless from my teenage days, perhaps...
But as the beautiful rays of the setting sun fell on it through the window...
I suddenly discovered that it was beautiful...
It was like rediscovering something...
It was like finding the past good in an ugly present...
So I went up to my grandad's turntable...
And placed my hand on the platter...
Knowing that I would have to wash my hand afterwards...
Knowing that the heap of dust would make me sneeze soon...
Still...
I placed my hand on my granddad's beautiful possesssion...
An ol' Thorens...
Under the twilight light...
The thing looked awesome!
As if it was also shivered by human touch after a long time...
I tried to move a bit the platter...
It moved!
It moved as if it came alive by my touch...
And...
And Methought I saw my granddad...sitting right there!
I saw him sitting right in front of my eyes....rocking on his favourite chair...and smiling at me...

Fancy...you are a cheat!

You...fanciful image...
You look so gorgeous...
In your knotted blouse red and green lehenga saree...
A designer one, I guess...
So breathtakingly beautiful!

I look at the peacocks dancing at the middle of the lehenga...
They dance all the way...
They just dance...from your lower abdomen to your feet...
And I keep on looking at you with unabashed curiosity...
I look and try to realise your beauty within me...
Try...to become a woman, by bent of mind...
Effeminate!

You...the peacock-
Maketh me one...
In my bewildered state...

You...the fancy...
'Cheats so well...'
And God knows-
I love to be cheated!
I love...so well...to be forfeited of my senses...by you...
And I the man, become a woman...temporary...
You ...fancy...you're just a cheat!

knowledge comes coupled... with ignorance...

Knowledge comes intertwined
With ignorance...
Sometimes...

I don't know what you did last summer...
I just don't know...
I don't know where you actually stand after walking so many miles...
I just don't have that precise knowledge...
But as the earth revolves...
And rotates...
I know...
We'll meet...someday...
In some foreign land with a big blue ocean by your side...
And a desert by me...
I don't know...
When...we'll meet...at exact what hour...or at what exact moment...
I just don't know...
I just don't know...dear...

regrets...

Regrets...
That I gave you pains
Regrets...
You gave me pains too!
Regrets...
You shooed away all the goodness that came from me, inter fused with insults and injuries, for sure!
Regrets...
You hinged all of you on my tiny fulcrum which screeched like a rusty thing...too rusty...
Regrets...
That I dipped my pen and wrote and dipped and wrote...not minding how the process emptied gradually the inkpot!
Regrets...
I spent you...
And you spent me up...
Regrets...
You can't let go of past...
And I can't live in future...
Regrets...
I drank tears
And You didn't drink wine!

virtual coexistence...

We co-exist, don't we?
Though, you live at a place near the salty sea-
Far away from my town...

If my hometown has krishnachura and radhachura painting the streets red and yellow in spring...
And sheuli blossoms...strewn all over the green grassy lands like white cotton flakes in autumn...
And smell of chatim filling up the dense air of winter like perfume spray...

Your town has the coconut leaves falling off everyday...
And salt salt sand sand air!
You live with them...
As I live with mine!
Still we coexist..
Aren't we?

I know...
you know the same...
So when I see you at your living, arranging the white lilies in the copper-pot, following a particular ikebana pattern...
You see me also...watching those flowers shiny and spreading grace to your living room and to you!
I know...
You know the same...

Last night...
I bet you saw me throwing that cigarette end out of my window...
You saw it...didn't you? the projectile of my fag-end losing energy and falling on my neighbor's roof?
You got irritated for sure then! seeing me doing school-kid stuff!
But dear...
At that point of time why you kept your sash-bahu soap on?
I mean... if you are really enjoying watching me doing things like that, why keep that television burning energy?

Don't do that...
I assure you-
Next time around, when I'll throw that fag-end, I would be bettering my aim...it would never fall on my neighbor's roof!

So...
We live...
We coexist...virtually though!

surely! you've left me a legacy...of Love!

You left me a legacy...
Really...
A legacy of images
Of dreams...
Of memories...

And I am just holding on to that legacy...
Of your rich and sublime presence-
That evoked so many and varied burst of passions...

I bear that image of yours-
Working at my kitchen...
Wearing that yellow cotton saree with light green borders...
Your rear-view from my study...
Your long braided hair dancing at your back as you move so restlessly with ladles and spoons and dishes...at my kitchen...sweating and working and singing a song of love...

Then another appears...
Another image bearing your legacy to me...
Of you putting my soiled jeans into that white chamber of washing machine and setting the knobs with perfect elan...
knowing exactly what should be the spinning time and what amount of detergent would my soiled jeans take...
And curiously as you did all that...cleaning and washing...you murmured your womanly chit-chats...as if you were wondering 'what particular muddy field he had tottered about...'

Then another appears...
Another image of your legacy of love and affection...
When I recall how you used to take away that empty coffee mug from my table and replace it with a filled-up one!
How...through your every moment of staying with an idiot like me...
You left me more and more dependent on you!

Surely!
You had left a long legacy of Love...
Love dripping still like water drops from a tap that had been closed tight!
A leaky water spout...leaving drops of love...

pink pullover...

The other day I saw the pink pullover
Paired with blue jeans
Standing at my door!

The hours of the day were early...
And the sun was just kissing  the earth, lending his warmth...
The pink pullover and blue jeans arrived unheralded!
I was not prepared for the sudden visit...
'You? here? so early?'
I asked...
Looking at her shiny face...moisturizer-ed...
And her thin lips carrying the smell of strawberries...

'If you call...how can I stay back?'
She replied ...sweet...
'Sure...sure...but I gave you a call...the day before yesterday...'
I mumbled;
'Yes...I know...I'm late...but will you not forgive me?'
She asked...
I looked at her shiny face
The dewdrops on her eyelashes shone like jewels...
And her face had that pinkish glow...
I at once forgot all causes of pains and agonies...
I chose to forget all causes of estrangement...
The pink pullover and the strawberries done me in...

God and His protege

God...
Serving for all
Down the ages...
Took a break...
But left the world to His protege...
A young man with a heart of gold...

This young man was delighted by the task assigned to him by no other than God...
He took the helm of affairs with an element of surprise...
But within moments
He was approached by a beauty...
She requested:
'Hey...young man...now that you're God...please let me live another day...for the earlier God had limited my stay to this day only...'
The young man was softened by the mellowed voice of the beauty...
And thought of listening to her story...so he asked:
'What have you done?'
'I sinned...I cursed the earlier God for He took away pride...He took away my Mirror!'
The young protege of God thought that the God might have been too harsh on the beauty...
So he extended her stay by oneday and smiled...
The beauty smiled back and even kissed the young God's feet...
The young protege of God was amused...
He felt a kind of shiver...unknown...

The God Himself...
The Omniscient...
returned soon after the break...
And He smiled at His protege when the young man asked Him about his role for the brief period as God...
The protege insisted on an appraisal from the Almighty...
Then...
He...the omniscient replied:
'Well...you did well...really fared well...only your sensory perceptions are yet to be numbed...you are yet to become God...'

'Why?'

So...
You've taken the crudest path to apparent triumph!
Probably you wanted to be that danish warrior
Who took the bid...and became a true victor!

But dear...
Knowing that you are incapable of listening to me...now...that you traversed the long road...
And met your destined horizon...
Still...
My god!
Why?
and
Why?
and
why?
and innumerable 'wh' questions play...
Between you and me...

You traveled  through your path...and you got every reason to be on that path...
I am not in any way posing a road-block...
I am not by any means slowing you down...
Only...
Only there remains a query...
A single one...
A singular kind...
'Why?'

a view of a room...(a narrative)

'My god!
The room is so beautiful!'
I exclaimed within, trying to be at ease with my amazement and bedazzled state
Entering her room...
So perfectly decorated...
She ushered me in and opened the big glass casements (for me?)
The rising sun rushed  into the room (for us two?)
Through the white curtains hanging like some princess' flowing gown...
The bedstead was neat ...white bed spread...white pillows soft and silky!(for he and she?)
The bed side table had two books...(one by me! My God!)
The ottoman was there too! big! cushioned to rest any tired soul( for he or she or me?)
The glass cabinet had exotic bottles...(Perrier-Jouët!Chardonnay!Pinot Noir!Cuvee!...all french! for both of them? for guests like me?)
I was stirred and shaken...both...by the view of her(their?) room...

She understood my discomfort...my unease...knowing me for years...
So...she just hang loose around me,keeping a curious kind of smile on her thin lips...
'Hey! make no mistake! I'm really kind of flustered...if you see what I mean...'
I murmured...not trying to hide my ill-at-ease state;
She giggled...
She giggled like a child, as if she had not yet grown into a woman proper!
'Why are you laughing? at me?'
I asked, irritated somewhat...
She still giggled...
'Look...as you asked me to come...so here I am...but where's your partner?'
I asked, looking around (as if I am to find him hiding somewhere in the room! me the idiot! curse me!)
She stopped giggling...looked at me...
'Sit...' She said...(as if she was ordering me! so easily!)
'No! I mean...I need to go...I need to attend some other works...you see...'
I protested;

'Okay...go...'
She said, nodding...(what a woman! come'n! ask me to stay dear!)
I looked at her...(me... the idiot!)
'Okay...bye bye then...take care...'
I said and started walking out of her room...
'Wait a minute...'( so? now you're calling me from behind? good!)
She said;
I stopped...
(God knows I was always willing actually, to stop and stay for a while....)

'Take your novella...its useless!'
She remarked, handing me a copy of my first published work...
I stood like a statue...
The book fell from my hand...
On the white marble...
Somewhere a cuckoo cooed...
Somewhere a linnet sang...
Somewhere a violinist played a tune of mourning as well...

stresses and strains...

She came to me oneday morn...
Her hair was not combed, unusual, very unlikely of the lady who loves to be neat...perfectionist...
'Hi dear! you look kind of disheveled this beautiful morn...'
I remarked, thinking of a session of banter and fun...
But she looked distressed...severely distressed as if the whole world had fallen down somewhere and she was part of the Fall...
She upturned her upper lip which looked beautiful still...sans lipgloss...
She furrowed her brows...which looked like the bow beautiful...though not marked or lined by the eye-brow pencil black!
She fumbled for words...though I knew exactly that her face carried a wordless cry...
'I ...I... lost my all hopes...I'm ruined dear!'
She cried out suddenly...as if a tumult had left her into a wreckage...
'what happened?'
I asked...looking at her salty eyes...still dark as the black night...still shining...with a different kind of passion...perhaps...
She looked at me...a plain look...however...it had deep pathos...pathos never to be revealed...pains only to be understood...unspoken though...
I always knew she was an introvert...
I knew that she loved me once...
I knew she deviated because of me...
I knew I was the cause...
So...I sat still...looking at her eyes...deep...pained...teary...
She was trying to surrender but how could she?
I declined her once...she could never let go that...
She shouldn't!

I decided to jabber...then...just jabber away her stresses and strains...
'Look...dear...life is a liquid and we are just like wires dipped into it...If you try to pull your thin wirelike existence out of life-liquid...tensile forces will surely be at work...don't force yourself...just let it happen...feel the dual pulls...the surface tension of the liquid-life and the surface energy...be good...cry hard...shout harder...let it go...don't suppress...'

She looked at me...
Her eyes were fixed, but her lips were trembling...
She was going to cry...
I moved a bit forward...
Gave her my shoulder...
She caught me like a straw...drowning...in the flood that broke...

love-bugged...

'Bitten by love...dear...
I got wings...so I must fly...'
He said, reclining on the sofa, putting his left leg on the arm rest...
And the right on the mat...
Me...his friend...looked at his posture and the sweet smile on his lips...
'God! she had turned you into a poet...almost!'
I exclaimed...with a bit of sarcasm unrevealed...under my tone and tempo...
He did not mind...
He was flying...
He...was love-bugged...
So he kept staring at the ceiling...
And I bet...
He was thinking of her...
'Hey! you!'
I tried to bring him back to the wingless world...real...harsh...stony...
'Yes...'
He replied in reluctant manner...bitten he was...by that Bug that had a long history of instilling frenzy...
I remembered Romeo...
I remembered Majnu...
I remembered Othello...
And even Stephen...
And so many of them...
'Hey! what's her name?'
I asked him...
'Don't know...'
He answered in a same lethargic tone...
'You're an idiot! don't know her name even? don't know her name whom you love?'
I asked, amused by his bugged stature...
'no...she could be anyone ...Aphrodite...Venus...Laila...Juliet...'
He, my love-bitten friend replied...still lying on the sofa in a precarious manner...
'Darn! you're an idiot! How can you love her without knowing her name?'
I asked, sort of irritation working up in me...
'I have no need dear...I have no need to know her name...I care not about her name...her father's name...her family's history...her gene codes...her blood group...all I care...is that her eyes spoke to me...
Yes...her eyes...they told me her love...they told me all about her passion for me...her presence...mere presence...made my day...and that is all about it...that is all one should really care for!'
My love-bugged friend replied with a sudden rise of tone...as if he was getting theatrical a bit...
I said nothing in response...
I just looked at his lit-up face...his throbbing veins on his temple...
His reddened ears...his inflated nose...
And I knew...
Then and there...
The disaster had already taken place...
The quake had already happened...
All these are aftermath...

on the place...where once one stayed...now deserted....

Looking at the ill maintained building with chunks of plaster
Falling off like dry leaves shaken by the autumnal breeze-
Revealing teethed existence-so meaningless...
He felt pained...
'Pained'-will be an understatement...for sure!
He felt...ruined within...
As if chunks of his own memories were falling off-
Irresistibly,
Rage inter-fused with melancholy and contempt gripped him...
As he looked at his residence of childhood...
Now lying vacant...uselessly vacant...dilapidated almost!
He stared at his play-field of childhood
And thought of his youthful adventures as well...
Days of standing at that balcony...now weed covered...
Days of sitting on the porch...now dust filled and unkempt...

There...
In front of that worn down, mossy building...
One would find him every other day...
Standing stagnant...
Be seized by memories...
He would surely be found...
Standing ...like a coconut tree...bereft of leaves...blackened, burnt...
After all the lightning crashed on him as well!

she...and he...

She...
Comes to me in forms so dissimilar!

Last night...
When she came, in her red chiffon
She just bowled me over...
My god!
She took me by my hands and helped me to light fire in her...
And be fiery myself!
She knew how well...
How to touch the string
And bring out the tune from my jarred guitar-so off-tuned!
She danced
To take me to the kingdom of satiety!

The day before yesterday...
She was all thorny...
Pinching salt over my bruised heart...
She knew how well
How to make me cry
On bended knees
She was a hard task master...

Last Monday...
When I was feverish
And the digital numbers showed heat within me rising...rising...all the time...
She came and sat by me...with that worried look that drove me mad!
She came and touched my parched throat and singed forehead...
Dipped cotton into ice-bucket
And cooled me off!

She...
Comes to me in varied forms...
Benign, heartless, raunchy...
Deity and the enchantress!

He...
He comes to me with his wild loud laughs
Resonance being created in the empty hall
By his growls...like a tiger almost!

Then he comes...
As the mighty hearted strongest man...
With muscular arms...lifting me off my feet!
He comes as true dad almost...security...assurance...
Reminding me of my dad...so often...

He comes carrying Old spiced shirt
As if he had returned home after a long battle and got freshened up the first thing...
Fresh...clean...joyous...


He comes...
Like that jerk also...
'Jailhouse rock!'
Ear-plugged...spiked hair...


He comes in varied shapes and forms as well...
Like a child almost...oneday...
Searching lover...
Groping in the dark...
For a drop of milk!

Writing...with blood......

I write with blood, dear...
I write using my drops of redness that provide me the oxygenated heart!
So dear...
Leave me at my desk...
If you find me buried in thoughts...or somewhat bizarre...with a face not seeing you-
Coming to me with your best preserved look...
Please...
I write with a lot of wine in my soul dear...
You know...don't you?
As you found me on several occasions mumbling within me like  possessed man...at eerie hours of the night...
You found me...
Walking absentminded...on streets so glitzy...
You found me sitting at the restobar...
Sipping the potion...with hazy eyes and blurred vision...
You found me dear...
Haven't you?
Last winter, you recall, how I rode away for a night trip to the forest...
Trying to find the way by the headlamps blazing...casting semicircular glow on the asphalt...
That moved straight into the abyss of dreams...

You saw me doing things like that...over the years...
For I write with blood dear that oozes from me all the time...
You know that, for sure!
You know ...
Don't you, dear?

Remember Maenads?
Why can`t you be a Maenad?
Come dear...
Let us be followers of Dionysus...
Let us be...

the tale of my ragged jeans...

I have got a ragged jeans...
It bore several marks of strife and tears...
And lipmarks too...
Marks brownish red...
That of a smooch perhaps...
College days' hangouts...
Carnival days...
Days of sitting together with friends...on highway dhabas...
Of loitering around aimless...
Days of makeshift tents outside a big stadia...
Days which came and went like flipping of coins and fate...

My jeans ragged and torn at ankles...
Bear it all...
Stories...of love, lust, venom and wine...
Of roses and thorns...
My jeans...
Tell me stories...

at the end...

The crimson red...
Fell and spread like a satin cover before them...
He and she...
As another day of peaceful silence came to its legitimate end...
'Sometimes...it is so wonderful...'
She murmured unconsciously...
Speaking for her own self, perhaps...
Watching the sunset on the ocean...
He said nothing...
He was incapable of even mumbling for the beauty arrested his senses...benumbed...
He stood looking at her face and the ocean vast as seen on the major portion of the frame-rectangular!
He saw her side face and the waves lapping up...and the sky red...and pink...with a touch of blue on the upper side of the frame...
So enchanting!

'Sometimes...the end becomes so sweet that we tend to believe it to be good...but...'
She continued mumbling...
Half conscious of the evening setting in like a curtain, slow-drop...
Slow curtain... in theatrical parlance...
Soon the audience would stand up from their feet and a big applause would break...
Clapping of the multitude would be heard...
The end of the play as enacted with perfect synchronization should be always clapped hard!

'The end is so sweet...that we forget that the play has actually ended...'
She elaborated further on her mumblings...
He nodded...in silence...

But the hall erupted with applause!
'The end' has begun!
Credit titles start appearing...on the rectangular frame!

a chance meeting

she looked at me...half-glancing...as if I was part of the moving world...of which she was also an element!
My eyes met her the moment when she just stopped from walking briskly...
On the other flank of the road...
She wore the onion skinned garment...
And the golden blouse...
'Still looking so good!'
Methought
As I slowed my pace to gather hints of the past from the moving picture...of simple love...so childish!
Probably I was gaping...
Seeing her on the other flank...
Walking beauty
For her eyes quickly looked the other way...to the green grocer selling brinjals and tomatoes and cucumbers...freshly delivered...
She looked the other way...
I looked at the onion colored saree and the brown hair...
And the simple leather slippers with thin black laces...
And the brown leather purse on her right hand which had a sparkling gold bangle also...

And methought...
A car stereo sang by at that precise moment-
A familiar tune...so familiar...
But...it seemed so alien...

remembering her...

Sitting on the couch,
At her palatial mansion so peopled...
On her birthday party night...
I saw her chatting with an enemy, in the black suit and pointed shoes...
I saw her
busy talking to her friends, as I was left forlorn...on the couch...

Methought it was raining outside at that point of time-
When my scanning eyes fell on her...
O god! it rained within and without!

I looked at her ears with perfect lobes bedecked with long drops...
I looked at the tinge of pink on her unkindly cheek...
I looked at her heaving bosom, wrapped under the veil...
I looked at her happy spot on her swan like neck...
I tried to gauge the valleys and the hills...
I tried to take a plunge in the lakes...

Methought it was raining then as I stared at her dazzling presence-
Oblivious of me...

Sitting on the couch,
At her palatial mansion without people...
Methought I saw her open and unclothed...
It had been raining that day as well...
Methought we entered the heaven of bliss...
On the couch itself
Upon which now I sit...
Forlorn...

what a day...

Getting release from work midday
With he never anticipating it...
Gave him a sense of newly found joy...
A kind of joy which floods the school children if they get a mid day break all of a sudden!
A kind of release from the usual mundane existence of running ten to five- abiding by the clock...
A kind of sudden rays of freedom falling into the darkest cage!

Going out of the cage...
He felt light and free...
As free as a truant boy almost...
Not knowing exactly what he should do with his temporary bliss...
He thought he should have his own day...
A day fully owned by him...
A day for him...

So...
He pressed on the accelerator
And rode down the busiest road of the city...
With a song ringing in his ears...
He rode with ease...
Taking precise corners with elan...
As if he could drive through all hassles effortlessly...
It was his day he felt...
The day was perfectly his...
The sky was blue as ever...
The stray leaves were falling like feathers on the road...yellow dots...brown dots...scattered on the road...
And he drove...
With the song ringing in his ears sweet!

viewfinder

I was on the road again...
Every time a car honked from behind, I looked at the viewfinder...
'Objects might be closer than they appear'
I look at the cars through the glass...
And often try to gauge their speed and movements behind...
Surely drivers do that, I believe...
But...
'Objects might be closer than they appear'
This oblique watermark printed on the glass 
Put me in great confusions sometimes...really...
Once I thought I was ahead enough to escape collision...
So I pressed the brake paddle softly
Only to be rammed from behind!

God!
Viewfinders are really deceptive....

After getting a dented back and several scars on the bumper rear...
I simply don't rely on the viewfinder...
If  I,  hear honking...from behind...
I roll down glasses...
I peep out like the baby out of the crib...
Curious...agile...

the flower girl...and the city

I saw her this morning...
Just happened to meet her on the road...
Walking blithely carrying a wickerwork full of flowers....
Flowers so beautifully vibrant!
Flowers of different hues....an assorted collection of joy and perfume...
Joy and bliss emanating from her as if she was born that way...
Happy...So happy by her shiny face...dimpled cheeks...flushed lips...

I saw her, the flower girl...
Selling happiness and warmth...
On the chilly morn...
 On the busy street-peopled...
On the street so noisy and baffling...
On the street of the city...
With people walking mindlessly...
People and cars speeding like traffic...
Reminding me of Lois Lenski...

the cigarette lighter...

So you roll your thumb...
your right nicotine-smelling brownish one all the time on my rollers...
I see your ignited face bright all the time...round the year...for years...
I have remained a witness to your days and nights ...your works on the table with litter of papers...your workless dumb existence...puffing...
I remained a mute spectator on the rainy nights when you searched for the last fag in your closets, pockets of coats...trousers...
You miss me...lose me oneday...you discover me another day...
You lose me...
You find me...
And you need me...
Not as desperately as you need fags of course...
Fags have become inseparable to you...
Not me...I know...
Cause you use matchsticks to fire your fags...sometimes...when you find me out of fuel!

Feberge` eggs...

Look...
you are no 007 codenamed super smart...
And not enacting in any Octopussy, right?
So why?
So why you run for the Feberge` Eggs?

Yes...yes...I know...
You're obsessed with its beauty and splendour...
After all Kamal Khan fought for it...
And Alexander III and Nicholas II possessed them...ain't it?
So you love to possess it...
So just love to hold it in your hands
And like Narcissus, would spend several springs by your swimming pool...
Looking at the reflection on water you holding it in your hands!

Good!
Only one information...
Nicholas II was abdicated...
His family got killed...
He actually wanted to possess a few more of those eggs...
But the year 1918 was unkind to him, his family and the eggs...

language...

Though he and she were different linguistically,
Apart from being different in sex, race, religion, caste, creed,blood group...and numerous other factors...
They went out one day for a ride...

They went out...
And came before a beautiful lake...
So blue with the clear sky above
That both of them were dumbfounded...
They just stood near the lake placid...
And enjoyed the calm of the place...
They stood watching the beauty so wide and incomprehensible in magnitude!
She asked:
'Te kaneis?'
He replied:
'I love the sight and the sound...of the place...'
She looked at his eyes for a while and said:
'min me afisete'
He could not understand what she uttered...
So he got closer to her...
She extended her palm...
He held it...curious...
She uttered smiling:
'I tha prepei na echete'
He held her hand and tried to grasp the meaning of undelivered words...
He just looked into her hazel eyes...
Just looked as time elapsed imperceptibly...
They stood there, hand in hand...
Beside the lake placid...
Under a blue sky which had a curious looking cloudlet passing by...
A speck of white cloud...
Which strangely looked like a smiley!

the player and his notations

He stood still almost like a bust made of stone, save, his hands ...
They moved all the time...fingers those of the hands...
They move to make the hands move...on the fretboard...on the woodwork that often found photoshop editors' joy-when the editors turned the wooden frame into a woman's back...so beautifully poised...hourglass! perfect!
A model...almost!
So he played his fingers on the model...played them nimble, soft...
Sometimes played singly on a particular string, repetitively, jarring the senses of both his own and the audience vibrantly cool...

His plectrum
 moved
     moved
          moved...
then
              moved back
moved back further ...
   
       moved away
providing gaps...
With his taps on the board...
Minors mingle haply with Majors...
So merrily like couples dancing...
Waltz...
  F
    o
o
    t-
       t
  a
p...

Following you...

I know by the wind that you are here...
I know...
The wind from the north carry cream that moist your skin...
The leaves say that you've grown a bit older...

Last year, when you came near me,
The lone swallow on my window twittered your arrival...
And even before the door bell sang...
I knew you were there!
I knew...

This morn as I sit at my typewriter
And press the metal on the ribbon...
I know ...
I am just following you...
The path you left for me to tread,
The light you left for me to shine on me,
And the songs you hummed into my heart...
So unknowingly...
I know...
I follow...
You...

just...let it go...

Just ...let the world of cares be gone dear!
Just leave all the crooked eyebrow-business be gone for a while from your face, dear, just for a while...
Instead come...we look at the yellow moon on the sky...floating like a balloon...
Think of the moment slipping by through our hands like a water stream from the tap of Time!
Just let go...
Let go of your captive heart...
And take a plunge...for a moment dear...
Just for a moment...
Come!
We dance...to the tune of the spring!
We dance like the lemurs there...see!
How happy are they dancing under the spring...cleansing their spites
See?
Can't you?
The yellow moon turning up...
Like a balloon of joy!

Teklanika river there-
Of Alaska, is waiting for us!
Can't you see that pier?
Come!
Let's take a jump from that thing...straight!
To the blue...

when he came one night home...

when he came finally one night to her one roomed home with a tiny passage linking her
Bedroom to the loo...
He was drunk...out of wits...to be precise...
She almost carried him with a lot of strain...
As if she was bearing a heavy load upon her...
So she took a bit of time to gather her lost breath reaching her one roomed flat...so clumsy...
'Coffee?'
She asked him...
Her long lost love...
Who just batted his eyelids not knowing what he was doing...
He looked groggy...
His eyes were closed almost...
Then she undressed him...
And helped him to lie down on her cot...so small...
He lied down and started snoring almost...
Intoxicated as he was...
She thought she should call him awake...
But his pitiable state hindered her from doing that...

She just stood by the bedstead for a while-
Looking at her lost love...
Snoring hard...ignorant of her presence...
She undressed herself...
And just lied down on the small, uncomfortable bed...beside him...
She just lied and took his sleepy hands upon her...
She played with his unkempt hair...
And smiled silently...
She just smiled thanking her fate...
She thought herself to be the luckiest girl of the world...
Finding him alone on the street one night...
She smiled awake...
And tears rolled down her cheeks...
While he snored hard still...
One night when he came home...to her one roomed flat...

the last chance...

He knew that it was his last and final chance to stick and get stuck to her...
Tensed, as he was always inside...
He stopped chewing when the movie was on ...
The darkness of the auditorium deterred him from making mistakes...

He kept himself on the screen showing Dustin Hoffman roaming like an old man with irregular heartbeats...
And Emma Thompson...So tall and rustic!
He imagined...
To have one day a cottage in Spain and to live a peaceful life with a writer like Kate...Emma...
He imagined so many things but never let `em out...
His own irregular heartbeats prevented him to become adventurous!
He just sat tightlipped almost...through the flick...
Showing love going across the continents...
Showing chance meeting turning permanent...
He recalled so many faces...
So many faces came and went...like the frames on the screen...

Thus...
He moved in and out of the screen...
He moved to the past before he came rushing back to the present...the auditorium...with heads all around black...glowing by the cinemascope!

The movie ended happily...
After his hero returned from the hospital
And arrived by the river Thames...
The lights got switched on...
The darkness gave way to light...
He squinted his eyes...
To see her eyes squinted too!
He took a half glance to her...sideways...
And to his dismay...saw tears too...on her deep dreamy eyes!

to whom who sat there...

Last evening, when I was about to wind up for the day...
Leaving my unburnt fags on the silver ashtray glistening under the light...
And through the glass window took a pre-departure customary look on the street outside...
I saw her...
She...
Wearing a dress so flambouyant...
Sparkling ear-drops...
Brownish lip stick...
Colored hair silk...
Pinned up elegantly opening her beautiful neck-adorned by a gold chain...
Only...
Her eyes were not keeping with the tune of the place...and her dress...
She looked absent
As if far away from the street eatery-joint...
So uppish...
So full...with people of the city...busy people spending lazy hours talking
So much of life!
Only...
Her posture was down...
Her eyes kept fixed on her nails manicured...
She was thinking something...
Her eyebrows revealed her fixed mind...on her nails...on her thoughts...

I felt the coins dropping on the salver somewhere...
I heard someone calling his girlfriend, lying blatant...
I heard the soft words of passion flowing nearby...
Only...
She sat there...
Looking at her fingernails red!
And I...
thinking of the street outside...
On the other side of the glass window...
Flowing so indifferently...
Flowing like a favoured song perhaps...

my father...

He had survived the hails and the storms of the most unholy kinds!
He survived like a big banyan tree spreading his branches out...
As if he had that only job assigned by the God!
He stood steadfast on his grounds...
Facing the cruelest part of history books- the violence...the bloodshed...
He bled...
He bled profusely sometimes...
But he probably had that memory of a banyan tree...
Which he had as company in a different geographic location...
So he took all the challenges...
And stood still...
Holding on to his grounds;

A man with jewish origin gave him joy
And filled him with wonder...
He ran after the man's works...
Just ran...
Giving the run his greatest physical energy...
Like a negative atom running towards the positive one...
Laws of attraction took him there!
Simply!


Time glided by...
As usual;

He is still running his own way...
May be stumbling a bit...
With cough and cold...and the sugary blood...
Still he's on the run!

The jew died long ago...
But he left his books! luckily!

the swan...

Have you ever seen her?
When she took to the lake blue...on the mist filled winter morn?
Have you seen her white playing about on the blue blue lake that took the gradual shape of a stream to heaven?
Have you?

Last dawn...
Like a memorable dream
She came to me that way...
Taking the form of a pure swan...so white!
She came with her neck bent smooth on me
To nudge me out of my sleep and dream...
Nudging me with her moist beak to give her company
On the lake so blue...like a dream...reaching the heavenly stream...

I followed her as if I was under her spell...
A kind of complete submission...
A submission which my heart longed for!
I followed her to the stream of heaven....
Blue...so enchanting...
Blue...so cool...
I followed...as if I was blinded by the beauty...
And we took to the stream...
That the lake had turned into for us two...
We swam the whole morn...
Till the mist covered us from the world that passed by...
Till the shadows of the bushes kept our swimming undisclosed...

I fell for the swan...
And the swan fell for my dream...

the tattoo...

The dragon took the pose of a sprinter on her shoulder,
The big spout was open like half opened, hinged, scissors...
And the dragon was spitting fire!
Fire...red and yellow...coming out from the flame gun...
It spread across the whole right shoulder of her...
She was dancing hard...
Oblivious of the dragon on her shoulder
That she carried so fashionably!
She carried it throughout the evening...
As she danced to Santana who was jamming his lovely guitar on the deck...
Her backless stringy halter helped the dragon to roam freely
On her shoulder...spitting hot...

The evening worn down to become  night...
She got weary a bit and settled on a couch for a sip or two...the potion...
The blue potion upon which the bartender just played fire...
She drank the first one quick...
Meanwhile Santana cleared the deck for someone more fiery...
Who did no jamming...
Who just unplugged steam straight!
But she the dragon bearer was a bit tired, as you see...
So she just tapped her heels on the wood...
And sipped her second, followed by her third...

By the end of the first half of the night...
The dragon on her shoulder also stopped shooting the flame gun,
For one could see it not running like a sprinter...
It was lying there...like a harmless creature...
Sleeping after a lot of hard work...
Sleeping hard...snoring!

the saree...

'She must have left in a hurry...'
He thought as he entered the room...
And perceived distinctly her saree on the bed...
Lying there crumpled...almost thrown down...

He got closer to the saree...
It had motiffs of the moghuls at its border...
Moghuls...sitting whiffing rose...
Moghuls on thrones...peacock thrones...
Moghuls...spreading empire vast...upto the extent of the whole saree...
Silken routes...
He took the saree up and felt the silk...
Felt the intricate weaving...
So intricate...details to the point of making it a silken canvas almost...
He got the scent of her as well...
Scent of her taking him away to past...
The route was silken then...so smooth...

They had arrived at the grand store with red carpet and glass panels...
Full of sarees unnumbered!
Sarees cotton...silk...muslin...rayon...linen...carrying so many names...
They got all the shapes and styles and prints and embroidered ones...
She then took the moghul one...violet and purple and black...
So enchanting!
As if a riot of colors took the centrestage!

Touching the saree...
Was like touching her...
Was like going back so many years...
In a lightning pace!

The saree
Spoke volumes...

the defector!

She had never been still...stagnant...
One moment if I see her standing on the rooftop, arms akimbo...
The next moment she's gone!
Search ...search...
And I find her cycling down that alley fast...
Head bowed almost on the handlebar...eyes sharp looking upfront...
Gleaming!

Once I saw her chasing that ruffain,
Her muscles sweated...
Her body hugging tee spelling doom for the beast!

The next day...
I found her at the pole!
Dancing like a poledancer quite!
She looked half russian...
Half-greek!
She...
My god! the defector!

Until yesterday...
I never had the idea that she...was a defector...
The ex-FBI!
Now working(sic) for an arms dealing conglomerate!
God!
Give her peace...
God...
Let her realize there's no light at the other end of the tunnel through which she runs!

my friend's last notes...

Tall, dark and handsome...
That was my friend...
He had been my friend since our tricycle days;
We used to do things crazy and simple in our school days...
I remember...now...more poignantly as he had left me with his bunches of papers...
Printed ones...
Printed words black on pages...

I recall...
How we ran around our compound with toy guns...
Trat-trat-trat-tra...
Shooting at imaginary foes...
We were G.I Joes!

Then we grew in height and width...
We just grew,
To smoke our dad's pipes...
Secretly, sitting thrilled behind the garage...

We grew more to see more in women...
Earlier they were our friends and friends' sisters only...
But we saw more in them...
We fell in love...with our friends' sisters...cousin sisters...
We grew still...
In length and width...
We grew...

We soon realised our love was just an infatuation...a passing phase, in the annals of man!
We grew more to become pros...in drinking and smoking...
Pros...we were!
Knowing exactly how to roll leaves and put the flakes into them...
Knowing how to open bottles with teeth!
Knowing our wayward ways...

We grew...
We grew to know more...
More about life and death...
Death came first as a dream...
Then it became a terrible foe...taking one of our friends away, forever!

We still grew...
We grew to become fathers...
We grew to become husbands of our girlfriends!

We still grew...
We grew to become trees by ourselves...

Now...
With my friend's last notes in my hands...
I feel...
Our growth curve is good...
We grew...
Keeping things steady...
Through the tides...
We kept heads above the waves...and swam the ocean good...so far!

on the terrace...

She discovered him sitting happy on the terrace...
Two legs flung on two sides...kind of riding on the iron rails...as if he was a horse rider...
'Come on up! if you're brave!'
He teased her, from there...exotic smile pasted on his face...
She looked up...
She the cellist...
Just coming out of the concert hall...captivating the audience...perspiring, excited;

She climbed up the iron stairs...
Her white gown was a real problem...
It was hindering her steps on the stairs narrow and slippery...
She got hold of an end of her gown, tugging the flowing thing up a bit...
Revealing her soft white thigh...
So sensuous!

She climbed, teeth gripping her bated breath...
For she wanted to be there, desperately...
On the iron rails...
She wanted to sit by him on the rails...just like him...the nonchalant horse rider...

The moon was brightest of the season...
The night was the coolest one...
And from the top of the building they could see life passing by, ignorant of the two
Sitting on the terrace fringe...
On rails...

Then, breaking the silence of the night,
He started the interlude of his favourite song...
'And it seems to me that you lived your life...'

'Hey! Am I really a candle in the wind?'
She asked him softly, swayed by the night, the moon and the eagle's eye view of the city...
'Yes! you're...dear...you are!'
He murmured, absentminded...

Then they embraced...
They embraced each other...
Balancing their bodies on the rails...
A tricky thing...risk-prone...
But they still did that...
Bound by the night and the moon and the eagle-eyes...
On the terrace...

the birth...

She knew all those lil signs...
Something...err...someone moving inside her protruded belly...
That had been quite flat even a few months back,
Now looking like exactly a balloon...
Inflated by the existence of someone moving...

Last night...
When just the dawn was breaking as the east took the color of the pinkish red...
She felt someone there hitting her with its legs...
She giggled
And sitting up on the bad... touched the spot with her palm...
Closing her eyes, she just mumbled a few words, as if she had already become the mother...
'Come'n kid! don't throw your legs like that...are you hungry?'
Then she got down from her bed
And opened the can of biscuits...
'The kid likes them for sure...'
She mumbled as she chewed on the biscuits, softening the bits
By her saliva...
And she looked at her belly again...
A wondrous balloon...filled to the full...ready to get burst almost...
She thought of the seeder...
The seeder was not there...
He might be sleeping hard somewhere...in a hotel room...
somewhere in the western part of the country-
The seeder is on office tour...

She thought she should pick up the phone and call the seeder straightaway...
Call him up from slumber
To let him know that the seed had turned into full grown tree finally and knocking hard on the wall...
To break free to see the light of the day...
She thought
She shouldn't call as that would be not pragmatic...
Pragmatism...
The word stopped her from calling the seeder then...

Exactly ten hours after that hard kicks on her belly...
She brought home the baby...
She gave birth to dreams...

Only the seeder missed them...