Knocked down by a reverie...

'Was that tree earlier there?
Standing stretched out with branches bare?'
He thought
Pressing his knuckles soft...
Going into a strange reverie
Afternoon dropped so many queries...

He knocked on the wooden door
Placing his ears tried to hear jingles on the floor...
Of silver anklet's charming bells...
He thought the past would him tell
Stories so many varied and young...
Stories woven in afternoon songs...

He knocked on the door twice...
Standing like an occasion bright...
As if he had come to renew old ties...
He just stood there betwixt truth and lies...
Every moment passed sepulchral
Throbbing like veins with premonitions dull
Asked him not to wait...
Asked him to ride back straight...
To his native place...
To where the afternoon would've changed her dress-
Into something purple huge...
But he ignored all expecting a deluge...

Finally the door got opened...
She stood there...swollen eyed...woken...
Perhaps from a deep sleep
Ten years...was a long gap to keep
All things tidied up...
But her face got surely lit up...
Her face got surely lit up...

Then he thought everything remained...
Just the original...just the same...
Then he felt in his nose
That smell of blossoming gulmohor...
Spreading out wide and far
Prodding him not to mar
His reverie shaping up
In her eyes just lit up...

A dream for a life...

There should be my cottage...
in vine covered peace...
would pass there my days...
would live life unleashed...

There would bees hum...
There would be champak,deodars some...
There would wake up with cuckoo songs
would live a rivery life long...

There would dip feet in grass...
would chew life full...
There would lemony days pass
There would be swept by breeze cool...

Inadvertently...

Inadvertently
Your hidden unborn flowers
Under a heavy shower
Once bloomed before my eyes...
And set pores of my skin
On fire...
Inadvertently...

On being lost...

'I went to a strange hill
Grassy...woody...with tunes filled...
Met a man there...o what a fluteplayer was he!
Pressing fingers on holes
He just stirred the montains and their souls...
At one point I felt as if
The whole world had nothing in it
But only a restful deep
In which every thing could be tamed to sleep...
Believe me nothing jarred
Not a noise could there be heard...
Even those trees and hills and the flock of sheep
They also made no sign...
Restlessness there I couldn't find...
And...surprisingly I also adjusted
To the silent ways as kept...
I also lost gradual...
The graph depicting my rise and fall...
All those systoles diastoles
Echo cardio records of my past...
All...all I lost...
And...as leaves fall onto dust
And mingle with the fertile earth...
I also embraced death...
And the death...had been so glorious-
That wish I die that every moment which pass...
And be born again the next...
Finding life in a perfect context...'

the maiden of the valley...

Staring wistful
At that not so distant top
She drooled...

The day has waned
The sun will soon its path bend
Behind those cliffs...
She sat there still and stiff
An eternal wait...

Staring wistful...
She drooled...
For her wight...
Thinking how she would him greet
As soon as she would see
His silhouette...
By that garden gate...
Where tulips bloomed...

She drooled...
Thinking so many things...
What from the town he would bring...
For her...perhaps a lovely nose-ring...
A pure shining silver...round
A bangle rarely found...
Or it might be a newly woven
 satin headscarf with a lovely pheran...
Hemmed with flowers at its border...

She drooled...
The evening changed into night...
Her wight didn't return...

Only the next morn
When the sun again shone
Her man...
Did to her gate return
But carried by helpful souls...
Over shoulders held aloft cold...

Her man...
Did return...
Without that lovely pheran...

vignette...

On the vine leaf...
Rain like a thief
Wrote ballads of love...





 

Atop...

'And the best part of this place...'
She continued lying down on the triangular edge of the terrace...
By me...looking up to the night sky
'Here cell signals don't work and...
You can think of it as a kind of cliff
From where you can jump-start a glide...'
She said...dreamy eyed...
while beside her I lied...
The sky looked like a dotted ceiling...
Threads of her soft hair probably
Flew towards my face...
I allowed them to caress
My soul and mind...
Below...much below
We both were sure
Life steadily might be on flow...
And cabs might be honking loud...
But we were both reluctant
To leave our flight with clouds...
We both chose to lie...
Under the open night sky...
So dark and pure...
Like the darkest form of disaster...

still blowin in the wind...(a tribute to Bob Dylan)

Perhaps all of us know
How the answers in the wind blow...
But do we really care?
Do we really have guts to dare?
The fences of barbed wire...
The rocket launchers...
Do we really them dare?

How many people have died
Since Bob...you wrote those lines...
Do you know?
Does the figure in stock index show?
Does anyone have any knowledge
Where exactly that dove fell dazed-
After flying across...so many seas
Where he found his desired life's lease?
We still look the other side...
In our smiles we tears still hide...
We still hope and pretend
Oneday all struggles will end...
As if everything will fall into place...
As if peace will naturally kill the unrest...

Bob...
You wrote it all...
Only your voice couldn't stop our fall...
Such shameless we are...
We spineless failed to dare...

kashmir...eighty six...

He had all the hurry of the world
'This freezing cold...
My father must be waiting for me
Under his favourite chinar tree...
For his usual afternoon tea...'
Thinking this he ran
Hard as his breath could possibly
him take...
He ran by the snow covered lake...
The samovar in his hand swung
Wildly as he ran...

'Hey you! Halt!'
Heard he a gruff voice...a jolt...
He stopped...knowing he was caught...
'For convoy duty you're sought!'
The olive green dress code
With a gun...automatically which bullets could load...
Told him everything straight...
'I would be late...
For my father who is on wait...
For his afternoon tea...
I got samovar...see?'
The boy fumbled out...
But the automatic rifle totter had doubts...
'You're an informer...
I know...
Now before me your head keep low!'
The olive dress code green
Showing his broken teeth grinned...
'I need to go...please...
Don't put me here...unnecessary...
I need to hurry...'
The olive green thought and looked far
'Okay!Leave me this warm samovar...'
'How could I possibly that do?
please leave me...' mumbled he looking down at his frozen shoes...
'No! I need warm tea...
otherwise you're not doing your duty...'
The man looked stern...cruel...
The lad knew this verbal duel...
Could put him into trouble...
He didn't know the way out of the puzzle...

He stood...still...firm...unyielding...
The olive green...his rifle butt upon him suddenly did bring...
Hard...wooden hit he got...
Upon his head unsought...
He fell...
The samovar on white color pale...
Upturned hot smoking liquid...
The tea in snow mixed...

A few yards away...
Where the chinar tree in wind did sway...
His old father was still on wait...
For a cup of warm tea on afternoon late...
He did wait...
Not really knowing why the shadow of his son
Couldn't be seen still at the turn
Of that road kissed golden by yellow sun...

a song played on car stereo...

When the car stopped
At the traffic post
A song from yesteryears...soft...
In car stereo played...
Unwittingly...to me said..
'Days once gone...
Never come back...'

'You're so restless...
Why can't you sit
For a while
When the sky with the ocean
So lovingly meet?
This starry...oceanic night...
Can't you hold me tight?'
She once told me...
when the air from the sea
Swept through fresh
Her white flowing dress...

Sitting in the car
The rain on  screen...
Took me to the sea far
And that night...came untrimmed
And the glassy barrier by me left...
Unbroken yet fully me swept...

Again... again...
Like that night
I restless became...
but this time certainly in vain...
'Days gone...
Never come back...'
That car stereo track
Blew in real deep...
On the back seat
I fell to sleep...

Spatial thoughts on her...

Getting out of enclosed space
To get a smoke...
When reached down
The pavement with pentagons...
Felt somehow she was on her way
To catch me...

She must be in a hurry
For thought I got a glimpse of her saree...
With black base...golden border...
Over the distant sky scraper
In the breeze aflutter...

A little later
Her perfume me soaked
With Clive Christian she me poked...
Her Imperial Majesty got me fell
Ambrosaic patterns her did me tell...
This act of mine standing quiet
On a wet footwalk like a fallen kite...
Is the only possible space for me assigned
At that moment...precisely signed...

evening...a part of being...

Another evening how descend
Smooth like a soft drizzle
Only for me a journey it meant...

Standing beside that singular tree
A branch following like a shadow of me...
A field filled by seasonal rain
A frog croaking persistently in vain...
A light from an advertisement board-
Dreamy voices penetrating ether poured...
A street getting slightly lazy
A glassy sight... trance like easy...
A melodramatic cry in between silence
A falling down to the deepest dense...
A smoky interlude like an eternal wait...
Another year of intoxicated fate...
Come to me like an exotic wine...

I believe its  magical effect
Can only be for none but mine...
And the more I am allowed to drink
The more in a dream I just sink...

More years God give me thus
Let me live through more evenings such...

when the rain fell...hard...

When the rain fell
hard
With a white blinding start
Like a cool music on flow
Catching sizzlers lying dangerously low...
Across the long span of urban life...
Hesitant...bedazzled by imposed fever and strife...
Joys...unbundled...severe...
Fell like 'Meghmallar' !
O dear!
The woken up soul...stirred up surprised...
Wishing to hold drops stretched palms prized...
Out of conditioned glass doors...
Black...cushioned...gaped at outpours...
Dancing revelry shot like arrows
Filling with water urban furrows...
This rain...turbulent...
A dravidan monsoon sent
Horrid torrid windy drums
To bury classnotes full of sums...

I see how the city rise above
Gameplays...moneygate scandals
Only in rains to be bound in love...
I see umbrellas color city like dots...
I see water nourish dried flower pots...
Hanging from dingy space
I see my city putting on a watery dress...
I see a Rebecca breaking impromptu
Into a jig under shower...flinging off her shoes...

for my kid

O kid! Don't you cry
Like a forlorn street don't you sigh...
For I am still here
why life's winding course you fear?
Still you got miles to go
Why to pains you foolishly bow?
Be brave...valiant...face life strong
You got a road ahead really long...
O kid! Don't you be a dumb
Grab life like a rare honeycomb
Only then you can live it good
Now...go get life...as it stood
Go out...take a plunge into life
To get hold of treasures take a deep dive...
Who knows you oneday might discover
A land long sunk...kept from eyes covered?
Who knows you might be that lucky man
To unearth a gem from layers of sand?

Upon receipt of your picture postcard...

Writing this to tell you plain
Yesterday received by the evening mail
That picture postcard of your snow covered lane...
And watched with particular interest
How on your window rest
White snow flakes...
And how the neon lamps spread
A festive touch on trees...
And probably the misty breeze
In a hushed up tone
Wake you up in a leisurely halved up morn...
Then I think you thought of me
Sipping from the warm cup your first green tea...
And sent that postcard so perfect
Though I received it quite late...
Your halved morn must have lost in crowd...
Your calender now surely got noisy and loud...
But now that I receive it
I can easily travel to your not awakened street...
I can see you there engaged...
Visible partially through the white curtain
Your engrossed self I could get...

Ablaze...

I sped...
Through the streaks of yellow...orange... red
As written by tail and head lamps
Of cars revving up like champs...
I sped...
Relishing the cool air
Through my wet hair
A shiver down my spine
A-d-r-e-n-a-l-i-n-e...
I zipped...zapped
Touching down the final lap
Of my round... just for fun
Playing a Russian roulette
I... r-u-n...
Whoa!
I scream
Heightened...
Brightened...
A blazing dream...
I became all muscle
An untamed horse...
Speed, fire, death...
I surely endorsed!

that pool of water...

That pool of water must've been born
Last night by the rains and storm...
A fine pool of water stagnant...
Upon which trees magically plant
Images of their divine growth
Little waves move images back and forth...
Images of the sky spent a bit
After the last night's first monsoon treat...
Images of my boyhood's fun and frolic
Running through the water...or a stone-throwing trick...
Through the water's flat silver surface...
Playing football in water...a muddy mess...
Images of paper-boats made of pages from exercise books
Stopping, turning, floating...on an imaginary mountain brook...
Images of cycling through the rain
Needles of sharp droplets...a slightly joyous pain...
Images of so many other relics from the past
On the pool float ceaselessly...merrily just...

 

for a change...

For a change...
You decided...like a revenge
Upon me...to cut off
Tresses black and soft...
Knowing fully well
How in long black threads of hair
I often dwell...
For a change...
You decided...like a revenge
Upon me...to topple your earthen spot
Moved away everything to create a vacant lot...
For a change...
You decided...to erase
That crayon touch on your dress...
Thinking that would end it all...
End the days with the fall
Of a night...devoid of dreams
Sleeping tight under a garb of aromatic cream...
For a change...
You go to the shop
Buy unnecessary
Practice 'retail therapy'...
Buy the whole world till you drop...
For a change...

A postscript...

The rain with torrents came so fast
That got wet within a few minutes...
Unwillingly got stopped just
Where in a rundown shelter did sit
A drooping old woman...cobwebed...
'Come here boy! You're drenched!'
she said...

Went to the shelter... hurried feet mine
A small candle with overwhelming dark did shine...
'You're wet...want to drink a cup of tea?'
She asked as if she for ages knew me...
I smiled grateful...

The old woman...
from a silver pan
Poured neat brown liquid
Into a glass quite quick
Though her hand always shook
And when the liquid I took
Felt warmth in it
By the generosity lit...

Took out a fag half wet
From her chulla by fire it set
And took a long puff...
The old woman probably coughed...
'Are you ill?' asked me
In her my lost mother I did see...
She looked up wrinkled face
Saw poverty had left marks of stress...
Upon her...every way possibly
Looked at her through the smoke from the glass of tea...

'Illness?' she laughed
'How would you that know?'
She asked next twisting her brow...

I said nothing
Looking away to the rain just heaved a sigh...
Thought how rain with that old lady me temporarily tied...

on a cloudy day...don't you me deny...

On a cloudy day such
If I want to touch...
your folklore laden hair just
Before moving away...
To the cloudy gray...
Am I asking from you much?

On a day cloudy such
If memories of you emerge
One by one like leaves on tremble
Waiting eagerly for the tempestuous rain...
Am I asking for much-
Imploring you to touch
The deepest of my existence
Now left bare...unfenced?

If the sky is herself so wet
With possiblities of rain...
If the day is so poetically spread...
Why my pleadings should go in vain?

If the trees are also pining hard...
Seeking wetness for their unborn buds...
Why you me deny
A bit of moisture from your dreamy eyes?
Why you ask me to hold
back my sense of being bold?

morning monsoon notes...

Woke up with the rattling sound
Of rain and wind Eastward bound...
Playing a lovely hit and chase game...
Across our 13/2 P.C.D lane...

The sky wore a black silken dress
And those glittering white speck
Of color...looked like a marble lace
Hung around her beauteous neck...
As if she had dressed up too early
To attend some joyous party...
She looked like a temptress
In her black silken dress...

The red and white and yellow flowers
Spread evenly by the lucid shower
And the gust of wind cool and gay
Welcome notes for monsoon did lay...
Here...there...everywhere...
On the street...on the grassy blades...
On my eyelids... on the sleepy beds...

And methought time has finally come
to be really drenched for long...
Methought now I could open up more
Live a life with unbarred doors...
And let her...the rain...come to me...
In days and nights...stealthily...

on a breezy evening

When the evening is so breezy
And the light post across me is drawing designs easy...

I wish to be-
A non entity...

Then perhaps there would be
No sword hanging upon me
Then perhaps I could to you run
With your hair I could've spun
A mysterious story...

Or would have played with your saree's end
And planted a kiss on your neck's bend...

On an evening so breezy
Soft luminance playing on me lazy...
I wish to be...
A non entity...
An infinite space
full of void...
Playing with you
So much coyed...

being incapable...

Don't know how to put it...
Can all feelings be by words lit?

For example...a sky apologetic...
A glass with opaque vision...
 Or the smell of a cross
Between lavender and Venezuelan moss...
 Or a sense of time
Fleeting fleeing like a rolling dime...
 Or you
The full sense...
A complete comprehensive view...

 Don't know...
How to put it all...
My words remain dwarfed
By your shadows tall...

Sorry...
I'm incapable...
To fill pages with the bass and treble
Of  every part of my small life marked indelible
On my mind...
 Incapable me...gosh...
Can't you in words bind...

revolution...

Got the smell of ginger-garlic paste
On the wall of my city...perhaps on your walls...
Graffiti laden with dreams of revolution in haste...

Revolution...
What color does she wear?
Red? green? saffron?
I only find ginger-garlic everywhere...
As if the whole damn thing is cooked...
Revolution are all printed on books!

Revolution...
When it really happened? where?
Earth does it...I think...every year...
I swear!

Relocating...

Called the movers and packers
Relocating...haven't I?
From the city thought to away fly...
Everything was being packed...
Your framed existence from my wooden rack...

Books with yellow pages...
Notes autobiographical abandoned for ages...
And that carved wooden box...
A pen with which spent days of detox...
Assorted wrappers of memorable chocolates
Bold and nimble handwritten dates...
Relocating...have I not?
Matrix printer without dots...
A small figurine...a copper brown dancer...
The unchecked questions...unsaid answers...

Recolating all those things tiny
Really became a trouble too many...
Weighty...aren't they? Really heavy?
Would they fit into my next location savvy?

Thought hours to decide...
How could one carry in truck the river-tides?
How could one relocate a whole silver night?
How could I pack and move several moments of delight?
Little things...but can they be packed?
Can drops of rains with fire be ever put in sacks?

Happy hours...

All those days are fading fast
Those days...of being together
Spending Happy Hours just...

The tumblers got filled...
You used to take a pitcher
I with bubbles chilled...

Then there were hours to witness
How the lawn under light changed its green green dress...
From green she would be dark violet
With a Santana she was sure beset...
We would stand there by the marble pot
Ashes of hurricane would on marble stop...
And the smoke from last fallen fags would spread...
Before our cigarettes dropped into the pot ...dead...
Then we would go indoors sloppy
You and I where would hold aloft trophies
Of our lives...passed in settings idyllic
A misty evening...a morning sleek
A rainy afternoon full of her
A travel made to a mountain far...
All...all would to us come...
Kind of enchanting... make-believe balm...

Happy hours...so many we spent
Now...those days are getting really faint...

finding Ginsberg...

If on Midday of June
Found by chance
Your memoirs...
Of my city...

Your take-
O my unorthodox poet
Your September days...
Not hot and sultry
Like June...
On my city filled with your tune...

what a wonderous discovery
Your scribbles savoury
on buildings and carts...
As found by chance
In a June glassy mart...

Took a long deep breath
Hoping to you somehow by mistake
Reach...
Your September...
In my June...
the city being the same...

walking the swinging bridge...

Walking across the stringed bridge
Hanging and swinging lucid
Sighted life in present tense...
Each step taken forward bent
The canopy a bit...a slight tremble...
Enough to cause me tumble
Down several feet straight
Into the gorge could have met
The dark face of doom unwept...

But the other end tempting quite
Whispered dreams of heavenly light
Into my soul...my heavy ragged boots
Like an undiscovered truth...
And I moved...

The stringed bridge hung still
But then got the feel
This present tense could only swing
And by doing so it could thrills to my past bring...

awakening...

Every moment rolls of films spill
On gas stations, terminus, bazaars, crowded... till
I close my eyes to have a feel
Of the guitar strings somewhere in between
Windows displaying fashionable mannequins...
 Every moment words go up in air
Through mouths and chimneys of my city fair
Till I close my ears to greet
The silence hidden in noisy streets...
Every moment pictures are left scattered
As if they really for us not mattered
But closing down the externalities
All the sounds, snaps,words come together to please
Me... like they are reborn with new hopes
They supply my life saving dope...
And I live and thrive...
In this buzzing beehive
Without really doing anything...
Just then the darkness becomes so blinding...
And the noiselessness becomes really deafening...

when I don't hear from you...

Haven't heard from you for long...
really...though everytime the cell shook
I for granted took
The call to be yours...
And rushed with heart in mouth
as if I had a bout
Of some disease...
That failed to cease...

Haven't heard from you...for long...
really...though everytime the bell rings...
I just from my sleepy state spring...
And rush to the door...
Hoping you there with strawberries sure!

But darn!
I see numerous unwanted faces...
Faces of insurance agents...
Tailorman...gardener...
But not that lovely face
Eyes sparkling under the lens...
And dimpled cheek...
Carrying all the happiness that I stupidly seek...

your saree yellow-green...

That saree yours
Like a mustard field
on me sometimes yellow flowers pour...
Yellow tiny blossoms of the fall
Giving me untimely call
take me out often to unseen place
Where perhaps visions are light-traced...
With precision so practised
That I can rewind all episodes of our soap
Which I,being occupied with banalities-
unfortunately last season missed!

That saree of yours
All the time me lures...
Spread like a mustard field on bloom
On the clothesline visible from my room...
And I fall again
to the pit of love and pain...
Curiously putting all the blame
On your green saree with yellow dots
And thus another saree-story with you at the centre,I plot...
With all the beauty of late spring
Woven in yellow-green...

I felt you...

I felt you
last evening
when the rain with storm
Started ringing ...
I felt you
wading through
Knee deep water
without clue...
I felt you...
In the spray of water jet
From rushing vehicles that I met...
I felt you
an illusion momentous
Being suspended in the subconscious...

A Recluse...

Don't you me call back
losing myself from the beaten track
Now that I'm lost seemingly
Into the woods full of scented trees
with barks upon which
The Angel had fables of life wished
Several centuries ago at stone age
Far removed from hemlock days...

Don't you me call
Now that these green trees tall
Cast magical wonders upon my soul
And dreams upon me like a continuum fall...
And I lose my possessions all...
My favored linen...cotton wear
My happy moments...sad tears...
My stolen heart...broken glass jar
My pinings innumerable for that gold plated star...

Don't you me call back
Despite knowing I lost my track...
Leave me as a vagabond of past
Leave me... sinking in misadventures...
Leave me as I slowly merge
With the pictures of woods...trees...as they upon my eyes emerge...

The deep dark forest is about to me swallow
My gravest mind...my sleepy hollow...
Leave me here to be fully consumed
Now that I got that source of lively tune...

Don't you me call back
Lost in forest I got my track...

In silence...

Tonight just we both be silent
Like the inner chamber of a church decent...
You will not talk,I also keep mum
Only will gather moonlight in our open palms...
You would bat eyes to tell
How time through sandclock fell...
I would also reciprocate
Telling you through the deafening silence...
How in silence Freyja the beauty  manifest...

Tonight in silence sombre and dense
Let us try to conceive a perpetual sense
Of being together though several miles apart
Of being near staying immeasurably far...

Rowing...

If you had somehow become a boat
And the boatman I would row you about-
The river... straight to the ocean blue,
Sitting under your sail with copper black hue,
Only being in love with your slender form,
Cutting across waves and smooth foam...

That would be a wonderous travel
As good as any journey unmistakable...
I the boatman and you the boat slim
Rowing and rowing across the watery film...

If you decline...

When you decline
Drops of honey and dews
That usually paint those forest pines...
With forbidden taste...

When you ask me not to shake
Those leaves of autumnal mistake
On you by any far fetched chance...
I get the sense of your heart
How it throbs...in fits and starts...

How then can I move through streets?
How then can I tell you all those images that I meet?
How can then I show you how birds build nests...
And how in green grass mist its refuge takes?
And how sometimes by lunar brush
Paintings are unveiled on placid water such?

If you really decline
Drops of water on eyes mine...
How can I to you send
Tears of joy that once me you lent?

The sky...

Looking at the sky...with redness
Added as riot of love these days so scarce...
Me thought you have done it with a purpose...
To remind me duly of the flight
Once I took... when the pineapple light
Fell just over you with a softness of cream
And I exfoliated under that touch of dream...
Looking at the sky of the twilight spread
I got letters of love printed in red...