When the sky comes down...

When the sky comes down to kiss
The green earthern vast in the name of a rain soaked breeze...

Perhaps new life then is born
Perhaps then zygotes declare the dawn...
Perhaps then seas turn blue
Perhaps leaves dream then of only honey dew...

Perhaps...
All things then return to the core...
And the bard then rewrites a forgotten lore...

When the sky comes really down
The green of earth with flowers abound
Springs into a real unreal state...
Shivers then move the geo-tectonic plates...

A moment...a day...

Every moment...
Every day...
Brings stories...
'of being sad and also gay...'

This moment...
For instance...
Is a pristine chance...
A chance out of busy life
To fling away all worries and sighs...
And a chance sweet and brief though
A glassy city through a silent window...
A cup of warmth nostalgic brew
A taming of a restless shrew...
A book of life as viewed
by an old wise candid write...
Seats red and violet bright...
Wooden floors reverberate songs concerning flight...
Of fancy the cheater liquid like an exotic wine
All become part of the short story mine...

This moist city noon rare
Weaves stories for me...
And also perhaps for her...

Monsoon sale...

On monsoon the wet streets
Sell images...of people with umbrellas...slippery concrete...
Traffic guard white clad...
Heavy downpour causing congestion bad...
Mother and her child for the school...
Streets sell stagnant pools...
Minibuses yellow red and numbered...
Old legs across business lumbered...
Billboards selling clear visions did greet...
Monsoon sale with droplets round me meet....

the rain and a flooded lake...

The lake under the sky overcast
Got the touch
Of water drops...
As they fell onto her vast
And into little watery stars
They just burst...

 On her the drops fell the same
Sitting as she was by the lake...my dame...
I watched how the drops
Followed different routes
To reach her camouflaged roots...
Of dreams woven in solitude...
Of limitless ways of her own rendering
Her recent past with imagined glorious things...

The lake under the overwhelmed sky
Danced in joy by the touch of rain
And the lady, my dame...
Broke out into a peculiar strain
As if she had forgotten me...
As if she got lost in a sense of satiety...

Then slowly the rain got dense
The lake and the trees got blurred through the contact lens
Only the big heavy cool drops could be felt...
And walls of solid resolves got gradually melt...
Songs of her got mingled with thunder
The lake took shape of a turbulent wonder...
Then felt the twinkle in her eyes
And by the lightning surely recognized
How the water continuously on rise
Had reached the level of utmost surprise...

Soon the walls gave in
Million tons of concrete caved in...
And the gallant watery course
Gushed out in fullest force...

A horrible flood took all of us
Me, she, the lake...all- from the ages of dust
That had over these fruitless years
On our city left grayest graffiti laden layers...

A valediction to her who crossed over me...

She crossed over
The street before my windshield...
My late night lover...
Her shoulder
Bare...slender strapped...
Waves there on her bosom lapped...
Her glittering dress...onion red...
Her eyes filled with passion unsaid...
She crossed over...
My late night dream...
Her hair dancing on her waist so slim...
Her move...her quick brisk walk...
Left on road red flowery marks...
And a few petals of that red...
Fell on windshield...and to me said
Not to stare at her long...
She...soon felt me, was just a mirage strong...
So I let her slip away in the dark
Like an extinguished valedictory spark...

by your window...

Sitting by your window
I got with perfect ease
The purpose of the breeze
That had all years these...
Played about your hair...
And made you hum
Love songs some...

The sight of sugar canes green
From your window as often seen
Kind of a miniature wilderness
Brought to me your rusticity dense...
Your happiness and scraps of pains
Painted on walls...tiles...
Books lonely bedside piled...

Sitting by your window rewound
Within me sights and sounds...
Of nocturnal ecstasies...
Of cigarette smoke passive...
Of worn down ashtray woody feel...
Cobwebbed visions by black glass sealed...
Of a pond a few yards away covered by leaves-
Of palm and coconut trees...

Suddenly the car honked
And my visions got a jolt...
It was time the horn said...
To catch again the road there laid...
To go back...to leave...
To wake up from my sleep...

Outside of a night...inside of me...

Outside...
The night has become a saint
On his hair street light paints
White and hazy streaks of sleep...
And trance from the street peeps...
Through my window like airy layer...
And in moments like these I can see you there...
Combing a long stretch of love laden hair...
And singing perhaps an old song
Heard by me...once...the whole night long...

Outside...
The night is whispering a sense
Of peace...tranquil existence
And moments like these click open snaps...
Of you growing in length and width in undefined time gaps...
From your first word to your last kiss...
In moments like these
I definitely miss...
From your first yawn to your last write...
In moments like these
I back fight...

Outside...
The night grows dense to dense
Inside I just cling to the fence
Of present tense dividing the past
Your growth unparallel from dawn to dusk...

No place is alien...when for you I wait...

No place is alien
When I am kept on wait...
By you in parks...foodstalls or lanes...
Thus by my mere wait
I came to know straight
When the movie hall opens its gate...
Which tuberail runs whence a few minutes late...
Which street bends where to a tree meet
A flower shop or a bookstore stands on which street...
In which route the tram car runs with desire
Painted on its red facade bare...
On which pavement a singer collects coins flipped on his hat...
Which street sells love at a discount- twenty percent flat...
Where does Katheryn Bolkovac pinned
And burst the myth of human trafficking...
Which building has a rooftop bar
Where the sun light before death leaves a pinkish scar...
Where does the balloonist every evening stand...
Where under artificial rain lonely hearts dance...

No place is alien for me...
By waiting for you the whole world I see...

Going viral...

When rode out of the town
The sun like a bright halogen bulb frowned
At me...as if he asked
In which untempered glory me wishing to bask-
Had taken the untrodden path...
Which idea was I to give birth
To in this nuclear borne century...
Or was there any hatchet to bury...

I said nothing only looked
At the yellow light that booked
Tickets first class for me
A few nautical miles across the green sea...

It was a real hard choice
To choose between the body and the voice...
To choose between abstract and solid...
To choose between words and deeds...

I chose the real...
And so went out of the virtual town
Ignoring the sun's frown...

The place...

This place has a story hidden in its veins
In its every nook and corner...in its lanes...
Like that bench lonely now
Still carry the picture of two souls under that stretched bough...
Like the ice cream vendor nearby...
Selling sense of semiliquid sweet alibi
Of being present there a few days back
Two souls ...not then going through any slack
Of pulls working in them fine...
Of living seperately yet entwined...
Like that post box red at the kerb
Standing still bearing witness to the verve...
Of two souls celebrating life near it...
A sudden spurt of joy discoverably strong on the street...
Like that simple traffic post shed
Triangular white and blue and red...
Still carry perhaps the memory of an evening...
When rain lashing quick two people into it did bring...
Like so many other elements spread out
At this particular place...hold solid and stout
Memories of two specific people lost
In rains...summer...winter...and the frost...

The place...
It has a story embedded into its being...
Only for those who got eyes for the unseen...

the lady with a lantern when me called...

At first seeing the flicker
Of light, thought a seeker
Like me perhaps went out
Of safe and secure room but had doubts
Still lingering somewhere within
And so catching the rhythm 
Of waves...phosphorous white,
I walked along the shore- not losing the sight
Of the flicker of yellow beam of light...

I walked following the glare
And the waves roared loud and clear
Beside me all the time...a kind of charm...
Across the sands soft and warm-
I strolled like a possessed man
Across lonely deserted land-
I walked slow but under a spell
With a mind controlled by the flicker that fell
On sandy beach...a circular spot
The only visible thing in the deathly dark, a dot...
And I walked, finally arriving within a few yards
That light...and as more to the light I neared
Saw like a statue a woman in white
Standing there nonchalant bright...
And discovered the source of the flicker then
An old artifact in her hand hanging...a glass covered lantern...
The lantern swung a bit by the wind
And the flicker of light on sands a pattern pinned...
'Who are you? maid?'
I coughing clear my throat said...
Hearing my voice she turned
To me her face then fully visioned...
A face sad or happy don't recall now
But remember her hair played on her long eyebrows...
And she seeing me was not at all amazed
'O! you came! my man!' she smiled unfazed...
'Me? your man?' I stammered out confused
But she flashed the sweetest smile ever I viewed...
'Have been waiting for you all these years...'
Muttered she and in her dreamy dark eyes tears
Probably shone like little diamonds, sparkling sad...

'How can I be your man? I have only this evening come...'
Said I with a voice trembling...and felt my knees were getting numbed...
Then she did a wondrous thing...
She dropped the lantern...the light beam...
On the sand...still warm and fine
She stretched her hands to hold mine...
O her softness then put me into a dream...
Touching her palm sent to me a shiver... it seemed...
I felt like a cool stream somewhere on run
Through my veins...through my heart...a restful balm...
I closed my eyes as she drew me near
Feeling my face being swept by her hair...
The wind was not that terrible though
But within me a breeze cool did then surely flow...
I ...I lost my all senses after that
Next morn...when Sun fell on me flat
I woke up to see my self on a rock
Beside the sea, on the beach...I woke up shocked...
'Who that could be? was it a dream?'
I thought, surprised...then something gleamed
Just beside where I lied
Saw a broken lantern by my side... 

on such an evening...

On such an evening
for you I sing...
As rain drops through the leaf's fringe
Little beads of silver bring
For me to quench my thirst...
My insatiable lust...
On such an evening
for you I sing...
As my forehead and cheeks
Moist air with rawest passion licks...
And the veiled moon send her light
Through the air her silvery delight...
On such an evening
for you I sing...

Man...machine...

On cemented smooth
Rain drops fell and burst
Into little water stars...
And I,like a lone survivor, brood...

The sky...
On the shiny footpath lie...
Spread wide blue and dark...
Like an abandoned artwork
Of a painter guided by whim
Left midway with brush strokes
At someplaces loud and somewhere dim...
And I,the survivor of the forgotten age, brood...
Thinking of cyberlife as it stood...
In this techno beat superfast age
How the speediest owns all the edge!
I wish not to be a party
To this machine driven liberty...

But...
Machines sweep all so quick...
Machines churn monetary trick...
Last night a machine wrote
A ballad for another machine stuck abroad!
A machine rumbled melodious tune
A machine painted a golden sanddune...
Everything this age are machine run...
Machines kalories every second burn...

So...
What is my role here? Say?
Time has come to call it a day
For me perhaps...lost in wood...
For me perhaps who only broods...

But...
When the rain pitter patter fall?
When she with all her passions call?
What damn machine could hold
And replicate things felt and never told?
Can a machine wipe tears and cry?
Can a machine empathise and heave a long sigh?

In search of God...

In search of God
He left his home...
Pleasure dome...
Silk route...
Theatrical troupe...
Boyish dreams...
Silver screen...
Insipid charms...
Horseriding farms...
Toyshops...
On stage props...
Paragliding gear...
A book on Lear...
Blue blue eyes...
Midnight sighs...
Juvenile hopes...
Mountain slopes...
Gold plated brooch...
A red red smooch...
A lipstick blunt...
A motorcycle stunt...
Keys to vault...
Chilli pepper salt...
Rock songs sudden...
Rat race burden...
D grade films...
Sun tan creams...
Debit-credit cards...
Broken glass shards...
Bullet-proof vest...
Days of unrest...

He left all...
In search of God...
He left his bod...

a drizzle...

A drizzle...
is another form of pining I guess...
Coming slowly...making me undress
before her...
against the blur
of hazy street
lighted by luminous streaks...
a touchy-freely thing
a ride downstream...
from the eyes filling
pores million of my skin...
 A drizzle...
is another form of a pining I guess...
Coming  to cause a wetness
Which could not be always seen
But felt moist on shirt
Like eyes teary when someone departs
after a long eventful memorable stay...
Like coming to the end of a beautiful day...
Not accepting its end with ease
And still with its end anticipating  possibilities
Of rain with greater force...
Of an overloaded turbulent course...

A day with her...my glorious river...

While in hedges and bushes
Crickets and gnats play...
I...the modern megalomaniac
Start the second lap of my day...

But on a rare day
I could be a sage...
-a real man leafing through a page
Of a miniscule life...

I could die a temporary death
Falling in love with a glorious river
-an enchantress!

On such a day I sat with her for hours...
She singing a song of yesteryear...
I probably stared at her face
Lit up by the light coming
Like a column from a faraway place...
I felt on my palms
Her fingers playing soft
I felt her saree's end...
Spread for me to drop
Down for a sweet nap
O! On her heavenly motherly lap...
She sang one after another
Songs of parting souls...
Songs of flowers...
Songs reminiscent of some waits
At the bus-stops or fairyland gates...
Songs that could catch the flow
Of clouds drifting apart...
Of a speckled lunar show...
Of vegetable growth of cowardly affection...
Of trains whistling past a lonely station...
Of a cutting of forest -bare and aloof,
Of a tree falling to knees with tears,bent,stooped...
Of a night shift conquered by a fool
Under a shade...standing by a pool
Of water infested with deprived frogs...
Of dreams left abandoned like stray logs
Of wood on float nowhere to go...
She ,my river of love, everything me showed...

She showed me how hearts with pleasure swell
And how also pains in the same place happily dwell...
She showed me how mystic light shine
On water at night when someone really pine...
She helped me to explore the unknown deep
She revealed Gothic art how in my mind I keep...
She taught me to enjoy the fanciful flight
She drilled my soul to embrace light...
She took me through her lovely murmur
To a cave full of iced sculpture...
To make me a witness of her birth...
She showed me how she greened this earth...

On that rarest of the rare day
She held me fully dismayed...
I slept an unforgettable sleep
I ,from the chains of time , just for a few hours slipped...
And being flooded thus by multiple incarnations of her...
I fell more for my silvery river...

are you sure?

Yes... yes...
I admit straight...
I fell for you
And got defeated...
 Yes..yes...
You really did break my glass case...
And my everything left you in a mess...
Yes...
I admit straight
I fell for you and got defeated...

But tell me...
Are you sure
You won it?
Are you sure
By eating up
Your words...
You triumphed?

Yes yes...
I admit it straight
I wrote a thousand letters to you
And left them undelivered
Under my mattress I kept them...
Out of worldly view...

But tell me...
Are you sure
You wrote me none?
Are you sure
For me you didn't spare moments some?
Are you sure
You threw all of me
Out of your door...
Are you sure?

la manana...

O my morning dream
Grainy golden sunbeamed
Turned halfway across the bed
Satin white cover draped...
Just before waking up...
Looked like from heaven dropped
Straight on the layered earth
To give a different birth...

A birth of a hero...or a coward
By pulleys gradually lowered
On uncovered plane... my morning's bride
Glossy papered- black and white...
Only some sunny spots on shine
Penciled dark and light...lined sublime...

O my morning dream
Grainy golden sunbeamed
Rose a sculptor in me...
Filling me with satiety...

Terrace learn...

She at the terrace
On the rails her elbow on rest
Drenched by the rays
Of broken sun...
Made me learn
So many things...

Her hair carried
By the breeze over her face...
Continuous shots digitally hurried
To me at a stupendous pace...

Then there was the dark orange sight
Of her 'anchal' on a flight...
Her great reluctant poise...
A poem almost born out of joys...

The way she cast her dreamy glance...
The way the rays on her curves danced...
The way on her forehead resplendent
Moisture the clouds did temptingly paint...
The way her long dark eyelash
Trembled... and whispered a titanic blast...  

All these simple things and much more...
She on the terrace poured...
As colored by the sun on set...
Made me learn so many things...

Untimely autumn...

Seeing those towers touching the blue
And the clouds...as a terrific untimely autumnal view...
I took a reverse osmosis-
A journey to our days of bliss...

Under such a blue blue sky
Once we all used to kites fly...
We used to take the sunday streets
Riding tricycles...and toyguns strapped by plastic bits...
We rode down then comic books...
We trees climbed till their branches shook...
We giggled...laughed out loud...
We lived fictional life without doubts...

Then a bit grown up...teenaged
We used to visit the watery edge...
The old nanny river where by gentle waves myths lapped...
We...like infatuated souls, in misadventures trapped-
Sang songs of unknown liberty...
Then we grew oneday to be men of the city...
We fell in love with girls in autumn
Pinkish dreams...floating ones made of cotton...
Many of our firsts happened then...
Kissing someone in a solitary lane...
Running to someone...with a gift in hand...
Ribboned hastily...toes filled with dust and sand...
Our first sudden heartbreaks...
Our first tequila shots leaving bitter aftertaste...
Our realisation of love as chemical reaction...
Pituitary glands...hormonal secretions...

All...all were given to us
By untimely autumn...an enchanting lass...

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...

stoppage time...

Down the bridge
Where my unforgettable past lay seige
Of broken castle...checkmate
I was stopped by my fate;

Down the bridge
Where left some pages of history on lease...
Of so many climactic dawns...
Of football pitches...scissored lawns...
I was halted by fate...
And then I knew I of late...
Had fallen in love with you...
Finding you often in stoppage time due...

dismantled...

'I will kill you some day...
Rip you open...dismantle
All your qualms, excuses, would wrap in a bundle
And throw them away...'
Saying this
Feverish
She looked at me...

Her nostrils...
Flared up;
Her chin
Stiffened...

I knew my end sweet is near
I rose to be dismantled...without fear...

summer dream...

Even if the heat remains such
A scorcher...filling roads with only irrevocable dust...
Even if the earth comes with cracks open...
Ponds lose water...a big blast furnace or a microwave-oven...
Even if the asphalt by heat waves simmer...
And visions of spring get eroded by the cruel summer...

I know...all these are only signs
Of big Cumulonimbus clouds inspired
Gathering somewhere...filling dotted lines
Of hopes and wishes of a great deluge...
I know...my city is going to face it huge...
Sooner or later it would sweep
All the dusty, rusty, sweaty dreams kept underneath...
The parched soul...the cracked heart...
The lips thirsty slightly apart...

I know...it would be raining soon
Making my city-lights whole night croon
I know...it would be a hail storm...
Fahrenheit scales would find tiny icicles formed
Across the streets now so full of dust
Across minds devoid of lust...

stay with me...

Stay with me...
Even if reality
Prod you all the way
Not to be swept away
Like  bottled up letter floated in the sea...
Stay with me...

Stay with me dear
Cause you got nothing to fear
I am no human disastrous form...
No Lucifer to blacken your glorious morn
But only a sense of melody...
An unwarranted rhapsody...
An emancipation of a poetic cult
A frenzy never to be dulled-
By real, sooty, banal shots
Stay with me dear...
And be never lost...

For if you be merged into the crowd
Of teeming generations so boisterous and loud-
All the time waging war
Tooth and nail as if to declare
Some reign of chaos without meaning
Some dehumanization by gunshots training...
You would lose it all dear...
The melody so sweet still in your ear!
You would lose the flight supreme
The satin soft balm of being in a dream...
So stay with me... 
And keep me afloat
Help me sing with ease full throat!




 

can't we be...two doves drenched ?

Ahoy!
When it is raining outside
how come dear you hold your tide?
When the blades of grass are dancing with joy
how come dear you so much coy?
Open up dear...open up
Peep out across your glassed airshaft...

There...yes right there...See?
How a pair of lovebirds wriggle off drops
Of water on their feathers soft?
Keep a watch on them...
Look! They are beaking each other...flapping wings to spread warmth of feathers...
They are surely stung by love...
Two pure hearted lovely doves...

Tell me...can't we be just like them?
Two doves...white...without shame?
Let the cars honk in streets...
We would be perched somewhere to breath in the moist breeze...

You would beak me...
I would do the same...
Two doves perched high above the insanitary lane...
Can't we be...for this rain filled season...
Doves in love with love being the reason?

Artemis...

That slender tree
Like  female form
All over me...
Gave birth to you...
Artemis...
And you when blew the kiss
Carrying scent of wild blossoms
Which in my loaded concrete scape I often miss
Felt like being into you so much
Thousand algae grown on me by your mossy touch...
And embracing me you then creepers plant
On my mind, my heart, my diseased land

You wanted a green revolution in me...
Now...now can't you see?
Artemis?
How much green have I become?
How in my bosom I let grow forest ranges some?
How in my every pore of skin
Pollen beads...with generic desire over-brim?
How in my blood chlorophyll produce
Million megawatts energy I every moment diffuse?
 Artemis?
Can't you really all these perceive?
Greenness spreading in me wide and deep?
And I becoming the rain forest of Amazon?
And taking to a hypodermic meadow form?

Iachimo's confession...

Imogen...seductress mine...
your deep designs whence I find...
Beside the shadowy lunar scape
Water dripping by your nape...
After bath for my eyes agape...
Ripe peach toppings me wish to taste...
with no hurry...no mortal haste...
I embark upon your cool summer lake...
I embark...
Like a slow feathery song of dew
To implant that blushful hue
Across your terrain wide like a chill
With a mild shiver we would each other kill...

O Imogen...
Siren mine...
Beads of glass on you how shine
like beads of sweat accumulated
On your navel...by passion thus clearly stated...
And that black mole under your breast
Is my only witness
To the adultery I take you to
To the mischief I play part into...

finally...

Having spent a whole Cassiopeia night
For you dear,missing teenaged delight...
Having wasted a Nebraska morn
For you my love,in shapeless form...
Finally knocked at the presiding cloud
Over the dark sky...made hoarse by dauntless shout...
With a fading ice all over me
Buzzing turbulence as propounded by bees...

Finally cracked my watch's glass
To move the arms by your remnant touch...
With the object of erecting a tomb
Of my receding pride's heirloom...

Finally...tossed away life's level crossing gate
Letting trains to me bifurcate...

Finally...made a precarious resolve...
To energize the deserted electric bulb...

Finally...
I decided only to live...
All your deferred podcast I decided to keep...

Anita...

'when you know he doesn't for you any feelings show
why? why you still descend to the low?'
Anita's closest friend her asked...
'For...I still love him the most...I love him unmasked...'
Anita answered brave
And she so much still craved
For an opportunity to lodge
Her love sincerest like something he couldn't dodge...
Away he couldn't from it just go
Something like putting love...into him deep but slow...

A few days after that...
With him Anita had an unholy spat...
'I don't like you or your baggage of love...
Fly away from me as quickly as the mind on flux does!'
Teething all the way he uttered these words cruel
But instead breaking her...her love only by them swelled...
She saw him rushing out of the college gate...
She saw him unmindfully being hit by a van straight...
Next moment she saw blood everywhere...
Next moment she rushed to him...paincky...struck by fear...
She took him to the hospital bed
Doctors wanted him to be infused with blood o positive red...
She at once by him got laid
In her the doctors luckily a live blood donor did get...

It took thirty three minutes for her to pump out
Her blood wrapped so much in love sans doubt...
A few more hours later he got the sense
Of regaining life...post traumatic experience...
But why she is there still lying by him unmoved?
She got severe anaemia...her haemoglobin count proved...

'O Anita! My love! Why you volunteered?
Didn't you for your own life take the slightest care?'
He...the man...who so far cursed and blamed
Anita and her love...for the first time felt ashamed...
He then took her weak hands in his
And drenched her awake by planting innumerable kiss...

When you are my long road...

The morning once brought you before me...
A long road as if going straight to the sea...
Though the curves on you are not all seen...
But felt I had there earlier been...

You the road covered in morning mist
Bring to me a long wish list...
A pretty long list to be marked and checked
Square boxes by red ribbon taped...
You perhaps would bring before me a show
Of dizzy high embracing the delirious low...

Because of you I saw wildfire
Catching forests once leaving nothing spare...
Because of you in impregnable dark
Flint of fire...blazed me up...
Because of you on a hot summer night
Seamless poesy upon me did erupt...
Because of you I fathered so many
Inglorious forms in melodious epiphany...
Because of you the near went far
And the far came down on me so near...

You-the long road,I am yet to traverse
Take me off road...to the beauty vast...
For you I live with an unclinched goal
You have replaced my piteous soul!

Ishhh! Had it rained...

Ishhh!
 Had it rained
I would have sent
You an eu de cologne kiss
Wet on your bed so far without sleep...

Ishhh!
Had the storm raged
I would keep you dazed
By my pining so strong and unfazed...
On your bosom by the white curtain laced...

Ishhh!
Had the hails from sky dropped
I would scribble a poem on you soft
Colored by your blues
A bunch of my choicest billet doux...

Ishhh!
Had it rained
I would've been filled with your scent...
And perhaps rain would I become
And the desert drought sands would surely overcome!

reinvention of my prose...by your music...

One evening
For a metro ride
You to me sent the invite...
And I came to sit
Vis-a-vis you by the setting sun lit
And watched you...

Just you I watched
By you I got torched...
Like a sanguine river
I rowed up and down with fever...
One evening
In a metro fast
Gliding up the stream
Of my youthful lust...

Felt like touching your secrets
My eyes your cliffs only met...
Felt like savoring your all
Into you I took a mighty fall...
One evening
In a metro cubicle
Into your crevice
I the voyeur fell...

You said nothing-
You just sat up close-
With a promise of music
You reinvented my banal prose...

where have you kept your heart?

Where are you?
I don't know...
If I'm now thirty three and half years old
You're sure as much old by now...
Got married... aren't you?
Got kids? I'm unsure...

Do you still have that lovely sea green dress?
And that pair of studious spectacles?
(Through them your eyes...
Once saltwater lined as they did shine...
On me...in an Ernest Hemmingway class
Wiping off all my brown lonely dust...)
Do you still wear that curious smile?
(With which once you sat on a stone mile
Waiting for me...long twenty minutes...
You know...you still in my dreams there sit!)
Is that red stoned ring there still on your left ring finger?
(O! I still feel...the play of your fingers
On my unshaven cheeks...they still linger...)
Do you still draw doodles?
(At the back page of class notes...photocopies...
I remember you inking my name...a  catastrophe!)

And,by the way, where have you kept your heart?
After, like a meteor, falling from me apart?

O my angel...

 


O my angel free
from all cares...
when you I see
swinging tied to the oldest of trees...
going up once
going down the next chance
a picture of heavenly satiety...
wish you could take me aboard...
wish me with you could soar...
o my angel of fire...
there as you swing through the cool air...
your black tresses afloat...
music from your lucid throat...
I just wish to die...
With you vapoury wish to fly...

village postmaster...

Like that 'postmaster' of Tagore
Wished to be posted in a village
And be flooded by folklore
Sung by intoxicated white bearded sage...
Specially in an afternoon after rain
Leaves trembling getting freshened
By water from heaven...

Wish to live in an earthen hut
Devoid of electric psychedelic smart...
Only with poetry will be bored
Only with pining for someone dear be lured...

Not sure whether there would be a kid
Like Ratan...learning alphabets with me...
But life such idyllic would in me grow
A village postmaster sure...

Evening...

On one evening decent
I Ferris - wheeled...upon you descend...
From the sky I perhaps fall
To drink venom...by your call...

One evening dark as old unlit tree
By the wasteland...spread even nocturnally...
I thought I got you closest in me...
I thought in you Mt.Vesuvius I did see...

One evening when gnats sprung a surprise...
Frogs croaked...fields of play by rain got seized...
In you I planted an unusual creed
Of unborn poems...in you I them did breed...

Several such evenings spent thus
Made all my days into evenings merge...
Perhaps one life I turned into twilight
Perhaps made evening my solemn bride...

a depth charge...

Seeing the lake one summer evening...
By the light of the moon so glistening...
He went to her bank...
And he to her shadowy reflections sank...
He sank...
To the bottom of her depth...
Not measured by hitherto any measuring tape...
He sank...
To reach and touch
The last cold stone of her deepest part...
He touched...as he sank...
To the deep from the bank...
The journey was definitely breath taking...
The swim was like a movie in making...
A movie under water kind...
A movie playing in his mind...
He sank...
To the depth...
In process he also drank...
A few gallons of fuel...

And that unwittingly...
Kept him on move...
But burnt him as well...

what happens then?

what happens when one can't scream
despite being witness to the killing of one's dream?
what happens when one can't cry
but has a few oceans in one's eyes?

what happens when there's a storm within
but outwardly it can hardly be seen?
what happens when the china ware break
but fragmented heart can't them anywhere take?

what happens when the doomsday call
but knowing death one can't stop the fall?
what happens when death is denied
but one has already with death got tied?

what happens then?
what?

i wait...for she the rain...

To get the full sense of rain...
With her wet strong smell...
Her moist liquid joy on me pouring long...
I wait...

I wait like a desert unfilled...
Like a hard ground by none tilled...
Like a thirst unsatisfied...
Like a dried scorched sight...

I wait...
To get her all in me
To make me turn into a sea...
To topple me upside down
To sweeten my glucometer brown... 

I wait...
For her the rain
Blinding torrents bursting open
My canned and sealed and dried pain...

I wait...
To get the full sense of her...
The rain...

last night...

Last night like that movie poster half flying...
From an ironstand like an incomplete line...
I flew...

Last night like that kite stuck to electricity post...
Curiously on its flight direction lost...
I flew...

Last night was just like that...
I flew in sixty seconds flat
Around the world...with no hiccups...
Only there was a tug sometimes
At my feet...a cableline...
To bring me back to the walled town
To the traffic jam me get downed...

But then the remembrance of flight
Kept in me buzzing right...
And then the jam...the sweltering heat...
All appeared like a dream loosely knit...
The downy strait looked upstream
The blinking lights an interlude bring...

Last night was such magical...
A perfect seismic rotation on auto-start...
A hanging canopy like over the river...
A sensation of catching a shiver...

Nature's child...

'when two tunes definite
Mated in a moonlit silvery night
I was born...
when two swans came each other across
And they had been by passion tossed...
I was born...
I saw the first sight of this earth
When I was given birth
By a poetess ...
After she was impregnated by a divine song...
My birth made her wait for long...
A few anthologies...
A few rapsodies...
A few dreams of romantic lust...
A few years of immeasurable poetry past...
A few fountains of joy on erupt...
A few heart rending improbable burst...
Then was I born...
Then from her was I forever torn...'

wish to be filled with 'feel'...

Wish could amalgamate
All 'feels' as the guitarman put unsaid
Into his strings...of copper- aluminium...
A life felt in fingers...living carpe diem...

Wish drop by drop
Collect on my leaf soft...
Waxen dollops...
Of sunset yellow...
Of wind touching my skin...a cello...
Of golden rays of the sun
An opera ethereally churned...

Wish could lap up too
An oceanic love uncommonly blue...
Wish to feel the storm
Within me...an elliptical form...
A spiral cyclonic rise...
Wish could I with one Atlantic passion demise...

Wish more could meself me sensitise
So that I could feel the cool of icelandic sighs...
Carried by winds per chance
From a province too far western...

Wish to 'feel' really everything...
The song of cuckoo how tranquility bring...
On hot tin roof...on fire a furnace
Wish to feel how clouds wrapped in designer dress-
Weave unique interpretation of the sky...
How smell of wet grass all mortal sniffles belie...
Wish to be filled with 'feel'...top to toe...
Wish to feel the whole of earth in a single magic show...

thanks My Lord!

My lord...
Thanks a lot
For giving me unsought
Time so eloquent
Time that brought...
Sights and sounds
Filled with meanings not bound
By the real sordid ghastly-a great great bore...
But newer thoughts that on me poured...
As if just I have woken up from sleep...
As if just I fathomed proper Your impossible deep...

the road...the carrier...

The road like a silent summer noon
Slept before me...and the city bred trees crooned...
To make the road sleep...

The sun like the expatriate
Over the sleepy road fret...
For time has him ordained
A few hours only to lay his red kisses faint
On the road...slender...destined
To flow surely towards the horizontal sky...

The red passionate dying solar streaks
Where the silent sleepy road meet
Lay probably awesome memories
For the road to carry them forward to where evening breeze
Had already set up lovely tales of fanciful flight...
Where the city brims over glittering magnesium lights...

Thus the road now sleepy summer noon
Carry the love of the sun dying a bit soon...
To the place where it could bloom...
To where it could surely bloom...

'I want you...'

'I want you...'
Once her voice came over
Across thousand miles...catching one after another
Innumerable cellular network towers...
'I want you...'
She whispered as if something clandestine...
A top secret file...declassified
Coming into open...vaulted for years
In FBI headquarters...
'I want you...'
Her words like rumbling stream
Rushed through me like a supranormal theme...

I can't lie to you...when I lie by you...

I can't lie to you


Can I?

I can't...

So when the hour strikes

I put a stop to my bike rides...

From a roadie you me turn

Into a domestic animal...

I sit silent by your side...

I sleep off like a child...

On your shoulders soft

I my all burden unhesitatingly drop...

On you...

I drop everything...

My cries, wails, angry screams...

My trance...my fatigue...my photographs

My songs...my dreams...my idiotic stuff...

My drawing board...my playbook...

Upon you my restless mountain brook...



I just dump them all...

My morning rise...my nocturnal fall...

My pink spreadsheet...

My intoxicated street...

My telescopic vision...

My abandoned station...



 I can't lie to you

When I lie by you...

Can I ?

I can't...

He took to the forgotten soil...

He was for office late...
So when the traffic jam he met
On the street...he was irritated...
Felt an uneasy disquiet
Within him rising right...

Then through the window gray
Across the street...fully dismayed
He found her...like an alien flamingo
Caught in dust heat bickering show...
His mind...
Recoiled like a gun
He felt he got into his days of fun...
His college days...without cares
Garden punctuated by love struck pairs...
A green widespread look
A poem torn from a scrapbook...
A carriage drawn by horses white...
A rain filled saturday night...
A superimposed picture gallery...
A toast raised...of Bloody Mary...

It took only for him a few seconds
To travel down all those shots once taken...

So he embarked from the car...
Feeling no heat of the molten tar...
Beneath his feet...
On the boil...
He took to the scorching street...
He took to the forgotten soil...

metamorphosis...

'let's begin
A metaphysical dream...'
Saying this like a magician
He brought out a wand...
And...
In his fist clenched a bit
He as if caught the air...
And blew it
The next minute...
To her...
Sitting in front of him...on a cushioned chair...

She felt...
Her essence melt...
Her body
so tempting a glory...
All melt...
All...

Only a ball...
Of fire...not hot...
But like a luminous dot
It arose somewhere from her navel...
And it did travel...
Up up
A journey it made...
Within her... following a line straight...
It went further up
Through her heart...
Through the veins...
To her brain it made a sense...

A sense...
Of being in harmony...
Of tasting the rawest honey...
Of going slow...to a tour
Of being eternally lured...
By miniscule time dripping a glow
Upon her an unprecedented show...
Of going beyond the timescape...
Of finding an untraveled landscape...

Several hours after that sleep
When she woke up she found how on her lap...
A glow worm she did keep...
A glow worm just on shine...
A glow worm translucent...
A glow worm uncovered...nascent...

To...Cool summer night breeze...

O cool breeze of the summer night
Where from you took this flight?
Where you met with your sister rain?
Can't you me take there same?
Can't you create supercool drops
Of my fumes of vapoury eyes?
Can't you show me musical highs?

O cool breeze of my summer night
When you flow with such a delight
There's no reason to think of sultry heat...
There's no climatic imposition on me strict...
Just let me flow with you..flow  forever
From one shore alien to known another...

He passed away..with the song of his wedding day

The demons came like a crowd...
He with his unsheathed sword...
Cried out to make them attack him... loud...
For he wanted to distract them
He wanted to save his dame
Who was visibly shaken and stirred
By the sight of so much of blood
On the floor of the old fort...
She was preparing to court
Death devilish dark...
She closed her eyes but then a spark
Did happen...her inner eyes
Found a strange device...
She saw a simple card...
With a picture of woman somewhat blurred...
Without clothes...the nude figure
In her an escape route triggered...
She knew she would be taking a risky chance...
To save her man...the warrior from sharp steely lance
She disrobed herself calling the hounds...
Asked them to have her fully without bounds...
Only her man should be left to live...
She thus stirred a starving hive
Of hungry bees...
The chief of the demons looked at her
His mouth had all the lust for the fair...
The chieftain made a smacking sound...
He licked his lips...saliva dropped...
His eyes surely then popped...
'Okay...here's a deal...
My men... we could always win...
But now it would be wiser to announce the truce...
Have your leisure...enjoy life's juice...'
Saying this the chieftain signaled
To one of his men who got hold of the girl...
And the battle came to a sudden halt...
The warrior saw how the men
Dragged and pulled away his maid without shame...
'Away...away...you escape...'
The maid cried hard showing him the door...
A rectangular route to selfish freedom...sure!
But somewhere within there was a sting...
He with his spirit drooping
Tried his best to bring...
He stood up finally to fight them back...
He chose to tighten his muscles slack...
But she was by then taken away
Bolted in a room they made her stay...
Two armed men were on the vigil...
He...with savage wounds...
Flung his sword to them kill...
Losing blood so continuous
His eyes didn't give him the sight
How a few more men there stealthily passed...
He got cornered...still he fought
Only more mortal wounds he got
By the fight...he probably sought
To alter his pre-written lot...
All the cries of her wounded man
To the maid's ears eager through the door did land...
She came up to the door
And cried by his name several times...
Her cries...her wails...
Also came to him...
But he knew he had failed...
For his eyes...they were shut...
He was incapacitated...he was lethally hurt...
Only he then had a strange feel
As if through the door bolted and sealed
His maid had come up to him
She for him a lullaby as if then did sing...
He smiled...his last smile though
The angel of death on him did then bestow...
A dream laden peaceful dawn...
He felt then he heard clear a wedding song...

when i live thee...as life...

Watching the green leaves
Fanned by the light and supersoft morning breeze...
And the rays of solar energy
Upon them as a reality...
And the shadow of the whole existence
Casting innumerable mosaic sense
On the grassy field below
Like a light and magic pyro-art show...
I find you my dear...
Like another just born year...
Like another day taking me to the summit
Of eventuality...of another birth...
-A possible reincarnation of me...

Watching the movement of rhymes and reasons...
Running around with some kind of precision...
Performing works,assigned and unassigned...in their daily momentous motion...
I find you there again...
Written indelibly on every grain
Of life spread wide...vast...
Of life taken forward every single day thus...

You , I think, my reincarnation
You, I wonder, my life's potion...
I drink thee my love...my life...
I live thee...through happy hours and strife...

Marie's dance with her dad...

'Now...finally...the thing customary...
Our new bride Marie...
Would have a dance...
With her dad...'
The woman on the podium declared...
Marie knew it was a wrong call...
She knew her dad would be nowhere there...for her...afterall
Hadn't he her left?
Hadn't he away got swept?
She looked helpless...
She looked at people's piteous face...
'tsk...tsk...what a misfortune...
She got no dad to dance with her to the tune...'
Someone made a pretentious remark
She lost her makeup...her face got dark...
And within her she felt a strong hopeless urge
To have a dance with her dad...who lived far...
From her...since the ten years last...
'He could have turned up
Today at least...for my sake just...'
She teary eyed looked on
How people danced with the song...

'He could have turned up
For me at least...for me for once...'
She muttered and went a bit away
From the spot where people danced gay...

Towards the lake...
Upon which lights did a bath take...
There on a wooden pier
She sat lonely with a blank stare...
On the water...still...dark...
Just then she heard 'Hark!'
She turned around...
And with amazement did note
A man with black-silver hair and white coat...
Standing there with eyes wet
Standing there like man beset
With cares of the world torn...
Standing there like a figure lone...

'My girl...Here I am at last...for you...won't you come?
For a dance with me...as I have undone...
All follies made by me...
All mistakes I threw away...see?'

She stood up at once with sudden joy...
Happiness rang within her...and she was buoyed...
'Now I could be the real bride...A proud Marie...
Now with pride to the dance floor I could hurry...'
She thought and tugged her dad fast
'Quick...quick...we can still have a dance...
With the dying music we still have a chance...'

moment of ecstasy...

The vehicle dropped me...
At the gate of the monastery...
Just then sounded the gong
The little ones would start their morning song...
The distant hills under the cloud
Looked like my uncleared doubts...
The trees...
They a murmur did create...
When I hesitantly crossed the gate...
The graveled path unbent
Chose Me straight to the stairs...
All silent transcendentally layered...
The hallway vacant and long...
Still had echoes of the abandoned song...
And He I found seated with an aura
luminous
In His eyes images of my past...
Flickered probable...
'Yes...yes...I know you fell
...'
He...muttered looking at me...
Then His eyes resembled a sea...
Blue oceanic sight they had...
'Sit quiet...here my lad...'
He mumbled soft
And I dropped...
Before Him
Held strangely aloft
By the silence a mystic pose...
I bend forward to touch His toes...
'Disrobe yourself of your thoughts...
And close yourself utmost...'
He saying this went to trance...
'How could I?'
I thought I should Him ask...
But He so calm...not wavered
My  voice was unheard...my voice just quavered...
So I decided to sit...
The hallway by then by the Sun got lit...
I looked at Him...
The high ceiling...
The trees outside...
I felt then a slow tide...
Rising up me within...
A rise...so fascinating...
A rise...so enchanting...
I felt then everything...
How birds sing...
How winds chime...
How on hills snow shines...
How foolishly I so far pined...
How stupid was it to live with reason...
How banal was it to run after beauties of season...
I felt...
Everything...
Every moment then did bring...
An awesome ecstasy...

on a highway nocturnally broad...

I,the knight of the day ,drove
Through the highway by the grove...
And she by me belted to the seat
Slept off...god knows when...
Only by side glance...
By some silent chance...
I saw her eyes shut...

Her eyelids trembled a bit...
By me...belted as she was to the seat...
And the circular orb of moon...
On her sleeping face wrote a tune...
Of going back secure and sound...
By the wayside where few minutes back her me found...
Tired...distressed...fatigued...
I drove the highway big...
The night would be surely long...
But the sleeping babe with moon on her as a song...

I slept not...
I drove...
The highway so nocturnally broad...
The headlamp cast twin columns of light
On the highway dark descended bright...
The glass of the windows on her did leave...
Sighs of tiredness as sometimes she heaved...
Secured and saved she slept
By strings of silvery dreams perhaps draped...

a runaway bride...a poem in dream...

The music was unanimously lousy
And I was feeling drowsy...
The ice on redness did float
Before me...a cubical boat...
Was feeling so sleepy...
Cold darkness creepy
Lurked around in nooks and corners
The evening looked like a serious mourner...
'Afire me...afire me...'
Was I on the constant murmur...
Light from my table top
Ran out of steam
And there it dropped
A few paces before my seat
Like a runaway bride it did me treat...
Tempting and yet escaping
Leaving me gaping...

Then my flame walked in
Having a glass of unknown drink...
She...me thought...stopped...
By me...and my god...she dropped
On a seat to stare at me...
Whispering only 'catch me'...

O what a smile she got!
How by her eyes she me caught!
I moved a bit to her close
Her eyes...her eyes...me chose...

Her polished nails moved around
The brim of her glass in hand round...
I moved my fingers to hold
Her hand like a man too bold...

Just then the dream broke
Leaving in me a feeling choked...
Just then the real beckoned
On my table...I reckoned...
I lost myself in a sleep
In my clutch I did keep
A crumpled ball of my last poem
Which I had curiously forgotten...
 

When love comes back...jetlagged

Three hundred miles he crossed
And when he finally came...
To that small street
He appeared kind of lost...
But isn't this the street
In his dreams for the last few years he meets?
Isn't that Mahogany tree
He in his imagination does always see?
But now on the real plane
He noted how the landscape changed...
A few years back...
Only vans and cycles plied this track...
Nor were there so many shops...houses...blocks...
Now big glassy facades his nostalgic mind mock...
He walked...
With a searching look
Turning silently the pages of his memorized book...
There should be a house...at the end
Of this street where it should bend...
There should be a pond on the left
After a few yards of walk there should be yellowish gate...
There should be...
He thought and walked
As if he by some memorable sight stalked...
But the real was different...
Not with his mind it matched
Instead of a pond...he found apartments...
His reverie got perhaps smashed...
Still he walked with a hope...
He had,as if taken a dope...
To find that house certain...
That with a probable pink curtain
On a front window big...
He again his memory rigged...
And he walked...
'Here...it should be the house...'
He mumbled within ,standing dazed
In front of a house...double storied
With a front garden and a pathway...
Like those unforgettable days...
And now he was in trouble...
He was not sure what to do...
'But when I really traveled
Three hundred miles...
I shouldn't leave without a clue...'
So he thought as he fumbled
Between present and the past...
All tumbling down fast...
So he cleared his voice...
Checked his shirt...his poise...
And then stepped on the door-front
And knocked soft on the wood...
And...the door opened to give him a jaunt...
For there stood in white dress
A nun like figure...devoid of black tresses...
An old looking tired face...
But still those eyes carry that faint trace...
Of fire long burnt...dissipated...
Of love gone wrong...unanticipated...
He said
with a tone...clumsy...
'Are you...if I am right ...Shree?'
Hearing the name shortened
The woman looked straight to him...struck...
She squinted her eyes...
She gave a suspicious look...
And then her saree's end she took
To cover her mouth...her surprised stare...
She looked amazed...
Her forehead bare...
Got a few curves...
And he dared...
To drop the last hint...
'I'm me...Remember?'
 Saying this much he dropped his eyes...
For a terrible storm was about to rise...
Within him....after the long travel...
He looked at his shoes...
Tapping soft on the marble...
She said nothing....
She just stood...
For a few moments...
She just stood like stone...
And then...
There was a whooping cry...
'Why? Why you come back? Why?'
She almost let out a scream...
He knew then storm did begin
A pleasant whirlwind took its claim...
On him...the stupid man...standing lame...
He then felt tired...
Enveloped by the jet-lag...
And fell...
On the woman who could still bear
The burden of love upon her... so frail a figure...

Me and my mistress the rain...

She came to me ceaseless
My shirt, my jeans all wet...
She me caressed...
And the photographer...
Up there...
Flashed His gun relentless...
Taking snaps of me by her embraced...
As I rode...
Through the street a reflector turned
By people temporarily shunned...
Only me and she the rain...
Laughing, rollicking, driving same!

She came cold and shivery
Breaking me into utmost revelry
After a suffocating text
On my windscreen-a lashing pretext!

All shots were taken by Him up there
Continuous shots...with none to share...
Me and she all enclosed
In a super-sensational hypnotic pose...

Only those trees were witness
They perhaps by their swaying heads
Affirmed...and appreciated our terrible weakness...
And they joined us...they swung, they bent...
Our conjugation they heartily meant...

Iris

Iris my maid Latina
Come onto me...
Come you may as you choose
To take me to a Mediterranean cruise...
Across the navy white...across the algae green...
Come my latin maid...on my silver screen...
Come as angels descend
By some unknown providence
Like a benign soft blessing right
Come on me...cure me with your loveliest sight...
Your hair curly brown cascade
Your smile bettering Monalisa...I bet!
Come to awake me
To a lesser but still a Da Vinci...
Come to my fingers like a flow
Doors of the World's Greatest Show...
Of Iris splendor ...an Iridium bright
Come to me to wrap me with a rainbow-light!
With seven ribbons of wondrous refractive length
Come on to me like Godsend...
Empowering me with a frenzy so blessed
Take me to liquid tiny wherein you whiteness made
Colors breaking out  into a wild vociferous loud
Come to me like a religion devout!

her song...light up an aurora borealis...

'Gosh'
He half exclaimed within
Hearing her singing
Her song...
Took him away from his real occupation
On a leather seat in a big hall
Among thousands perhaps enthralled...
But he felt he was all alone
Listening to her song...
Her song...
Caused sun rays to break
Through the dark cloudy flakes...
Caused saplings perhaps to shoot
Branches of love took their strong roots...
Deep deep into his soil...
Penetrating his inner heart...his copper coil...
The coil took the impulse electric
Flashing red red heat...
Her song...
Multiple manifestations caused
He got perplexed and fully lost...
Into the fountain of love and melody mixed
Fountain of joy wet his cheeks...
Her song...
Brought before him the birth of a planet
From a cold cold dark starlet...
Brought before him shapes and sounds
Beats of rhythm within him did pound...
Her song...
Gradually was him sinking into a space
Infinite...long stretched...limitless...
Into a real awakening...
Bestowed with newer meanings...
Her song...
So expansive...so profound...
So luxuriously him drowned
Into a bathtub full of melodious foam
He became at once the discoverer of alien tunes some...
Her song...
All encompassing...omnipresent sense
Flooding all hills and plains...
Came to him like a Holy Spirit
With an Aurora Borealis he got lit...

Marijuana...

'What's the point?'
My friend asked, rolling the joint...
Soon we would be with smoke dressed
Soon we would leave all curses of fate...
And fly...

Soon we would be the king
Soon with teary happiness we would sing
The lake before us would be the ocean blue
We would take into dreams a plunge so improperly true!
And we would dive...

'What's the joint?'
My friend would raise a pertinent point
And we would be rock-stars
Calling this life a big rounded farce!
And we would castigate...

Soon from that downy state
We would rise...
Like Phoenix rose...
From ashes to a divine pose...
And we would rise...

She in me wrote a fat book....by her talks...

She spent several years
With me...talking it out...filling my ears...
She filled me by her talks...
Her Dahlia dreams...
Her tuberose whitish green...
Her past love affairs...
Her vacant mind's layers...
Her novel unwritten...
Her nights' groans bitten...
Her sunny brightest morn...
Her remembrance of a formidable song...
Her days of walking past
Her love, her chaos, her secretive lust...
Her hopes...her tears...
Her getting a strong hard slap...
Her blackish tears...
Her longings...her spaghetti top...
Her bathroom cleaner...her big wide mop...
Her travelogues...
Her lighthouse tall...
Her Virginia Woolf...
Her Great  Great Fall...
Her Subscriber's Information Module-
Lost in water...
Her nom de plume
Of a paperback writer...
Her vision of passions
Kisses moist and tensed...
Her writing it up with fingers
On smoky glass of a casement...
Her clothesline thin and hanging...
Her nights of  party...all head banging...
Her pedicure...
Her hot water bath...
Her broken heart sure
Her Jean Paul Sartre...
Her 'A few Good Men'...
Her flooded lane...
Her lotus flowery pool
Her neighbouring trees...
Her coconut leaves...
Losing dupatta in a breeze...
Her dreams of being a man...
Her  life protestant...
She said it all...
To me after nightfall...
Several years it took...
She in me wrote a fat book...
By her talks...