Thursday, December 17, 2020

Dedication

You are my other that helped me to grow, to learn more about life and even about my own self. You might be a person, an event or a book that has left an imprint on my soul.

You are my first love, this entanglement with melodies, the way my soul lifts up in the Hosannah or feels happy with the Magnificat or bursts out in a raga with the rains.

You are my ever existing dream of weaving together dreams, words and melodies into a book of poetry worthy enough to be engraved in a beautiful script and to be set before your appreciative eyes.

You could also be my love, the one that never found its way to express itself yet reaches out to you in words, gestures and memories wherever you are.

You are a lesson, a mistake, may be a chapter that I cannot forget, a memory that I cannot erase despite of all the bitter strife of these years.

You have taught me how to be, how to love yet not to lose myself and the lessons are not bad as you can see for yourself.

Tuesday, December 15, 2020

One fine day

Were there expectations in your eager mind
As how exactly it is going to be like in real,
With you and me meeting each other to find
What the years have not taken away or heal.

Didn't your heart beat as loud as mine today
When walking down the street you saw me.
Not like in the days of beautiful togetherness
But like a pleasant surprise hard to contain.

For me, I saw you only for a few moments
But enough to keep counting even the time,
My face that cannot hide what it feels like
Or my words that might reveal what I want.

One fine day, this might become so unreal
This longing to have you beside me a lifetime.

Siesta


You and I share not just a life in common; 
Love of music, readable books and people, 
Fighting for rights of people in dire need
Of living a life together against all odds.

Dreams of sunrises, siestas and twilight, 
Our limbs entangled in sweet embraces
Your eyes that drink me up like coffee
Shared dreams of a life of togetherness. 

At times fantasies of idyllic happiness, 
That turn erotic at the slightest whim, 
Lips against lips, limbs against limbs
A longing to join heart, body and soul. 

May be a desire to lose myself fully in you
And get back to work after a sip of coffee.

@daydreaming

Wednesday, November 11, 2020

The Story of My Life

I have never seen the story of my life summarised in more poignant words than the ones on this coffee-mug at home:

 


  
Mary had a little lamb, a little toast, a little jam, a little pizza and some cake,
some French fries, and a chocolate shake, a little burger on a bun.
And that's why Mary weighs a ton. :-)


Tuesday, November 10, 2020

Bliss

The days of darkness are over finally.
I had waited for the dawn to come for long;
One little wrong word and too much veracity
Had killed this free spirit too early.

Thirst for knowledge and love of life lost,
The soul had shrunk as if pickled in brine
And lost its freedom, its love for life,
Become like an empty vessel thrown in mud.

Now you have brought so many joys and smiles,
You have changed the face of this terrain,
With your dash of luck you sail forward
Taking us both in your pleasant stride.

If I had not known this darkness, my dear,
I'd have never known the value of your smile.

Nostalgia

A flower of basil everyday
Plucked every morning and gifted, 
A gentle surreptitious stroke, 
On the palm of hand, 
A stolen kiss, 
Beneath the staircase, 
A glance across a crowded room, 
Caught and returned. 

A quickly scribbled message, 
And a faded rose, 
Inside a gifted book of poetry, 
Neatly kept, unread, 
Like promises unfulfilled, 
Long forgotten and buried, 
Those days of love, 
That are dead and gone.

Tuesday, November 03, 2020

The Wanderer

Your memory comes to me at the strangest of moments. I pause in the midst of things and smile as your thought passes my mind. Though it happened a summer long ago and I know that I am a fool to think that I lost you when I never had you in the first place. I cannot croon love-songs liked I used to nor can I waste my life wandering around searching for you in every crowd. But to get back my words, I know that I have to cure my funny little heart that has loved you with all its mighty silences of years.


Thursday, October 22, 2020

turning one's back

Summer Tedium



In the midst of this summer tedium, one longs for the rain;
In the orchards, water drizzles are made to battle the heat,
The ripeness of guava fruit permeate the evening air
While heaps of watermelons call your sole attention.

The songs that you play on your guitar in summer time,
The melodies that captivate the audience under a spell,
While you try to figure me out, to fix me somewhere
Within the matrices of your growing understanding.

One sole glance from your sprightly eyes full of laughter
One smile that could restore the energy lost this season
The longing that fills your heart in the summer nights
To be with the one you love and to be his companion.

Part illusion, part dream but this growing understanding
Of an affection brings back life in this summer tedium.

stupidity

A story

Thursday, October 15, 2020

Ineffable


Eternal and strong, water-like, your love comes to me,
With the aid of silences and a few gestures of affection.
Where else can you come, when denied a real meeting,
You choose to drape yourself with words in dreams.

Ideal and true, my shy one, you shine bright in words,
When all the others have gathered here around me,
To know the truth with its many facets and versions,
Your memory lights up my soul with more words.

Witty and understanding, you past antics bring laughter
And so many words piled up on pages and pages,
So many lost, so many forgotten, so many yet to be,
All that found shape around an unforgettable you.

The one behind the words is ineffable, magical, eternal,
So apart from all the ones who think they spur words.

Journal: Serious and Trivial

A thousand blank pages wait to record a few lines,
Some serious, some trivial, some mixed like life,
All gathered from the same rambling mind,
Which has loved to dream, to love and to lose.

The serious thoughts were all about your loss
A vacuum that I have never been able to fill,
A turning point from the fact that I was loved, 

Into a world full of options and crossroads.

The trivial thoughts were all written in joy,
A bundle of words on a beautiful morning,
When the fresh air and bright blue sky
Was more than enough to make me high.

But the best was always the mixed ones,
Not too sad or happy; just real like today's.



Thursday, October 08, 2020

From Your Valentine: Dedication

I love you! 

These are the words that might start a relationship; a turning point from where there is no return. At the same time, many dread these three little words as it might be the beginning of a commitment and the end of freedom. But I guess there are bonds that need no words, loyalty that transcends time and true love that goes beyond death. 

For me, I thought that such things were things of the past yet when I caught affected with a happiness virus from you, what I realized is that it is a time-sent present for all grief. Just like a bout of chicken pox later in life can be very severe, your virus has not been very benign as could be seen from the fact that I am not cured yet. 

Yet in an intensely private world, my sore unfulfilled desire might be a restoration of the status quo, of just being the air around you and nothing else! 

Sunday, September 27, 2020

Harmony


In the first three months of marriage, there was no reason for disharmony. Theirs was a marriage that was the fruition of five years of love that began somewhere at college.

Yes, they had kissed under the stairs at college and they had fun at times. But they had troubles that began when their names and their religions clashed against each other.

Akash Nair and Meera George were not meant to be together, so said her parents. When Meera ran away one morning it was not at all surprising to her parents.

It was an ordinary day like all the other days. It was Akash and Meera who made it special by getting married in an empty church. He loved making her happy.

The church was open and they said the prayers, Meera reciting them from memory. Afterwards, they went to see Akash's parents who received them with love.

The days of love were lovely and beyond words. But when she started retching, she felt sad. May be it's the food, it might not be suiting me, she thought.

Then the days began on thinking of her mother getting up in the morning and running to work while managing to survive with her sloppy cooking.

What do you want? Akash asked her. In her mind, she said, I want my mother's sloppiest cooked pickles, the better ladies finger fries and the best potato fries.

Nothing, she replied and went on sulking. Was there any way in which her cravings could be answered? With the newly understood feeling of carrying a baby inside, she thought.

She hated the smell of Akash's sweat and even his shirts could make her puke. He walked out angrily on seeing her puke and slept anywhere but near her.

Tears began and so did sleeplessness. Then one day, she bought some raw mangoes and tried to pickle it in the sloppiest way possible.

The aroma was unmistakable, the same sloppy smell of home. She ate them hungrily and hastily. As she found herself happy again, she felt a nauseating feeling and she puked.

She puked in the kitchen and ran to the bathroom, where she puked again and again. When Akash turned up, he was horrified at the sea of vomit around her.

Mango pickle, she said and as he swept and washed the floor, he swore and swore at the stink. She felt a movement in her belly and she felt the baby kick.

Look at this, Akash, baby is kicking. Though there was danger written on his face till a while ago, he came near her and said, “It's my boy learning how to head”.

No way my dear, it's going to be a woman, may be she will join police, Meera said. She thought harmony was restored at least for some time.

Saturday, September 26, 2020

Seasons

How can you live like this,
Anywhere but here in this moment,
Held together by a million voices,
Glueing your existence,
In a life that doesnt move,
Yet with plans that astonish,
And never fail to astonish,
With perfect names for baby faces,
In the right order, too perfect.

How could you make it more perfect,
When beneath the resounding words,
The intent is hollow and changing,
With the moon, with the seasons,
Before deities that dont reply,
An emptiness chanting promises,
Yet at a loss for words,
For that which matters most,
True, close to the core.

There lies silence and a spirit,
That expands in directions,
And grows inward and inward only,
Eyes blind to the future and past,
Not even this moment alive,
Just there, for another dawn.

In another dawn, when the sky is red,
The spirits may call each other to a tryst,
That never was or never will be made,
Consciously by you or me.

Friday, September 11, 2020

Our story



On the walls of the street I have seen
Our own faces on Radha and Krishna;
While the busy traffic rushes on roads,
And we search for a life of our own.

When this spring that much-awaited
Reaches us finally after a long wait,
It has taken the leaves of our calendar
And left behind nothing but a shadow.

Radha and Krishna swing and sing,
Play games of togetherness always;
While you and I are gentle and aloof,
Looking at the happiness that drains.

The years we lost will never return,
But hope lies hidden in words of loss.


A Rose

A faded rose is not a worthy gift;
Yet playfully I offered you one.
A broken heart is not ready to love;
So I waited for time to heal its wound.


 My heart has danced along with the earth
And has blossomed into petals of joy.
It sings melodiously for one unseen
For whom the roses bloom and my heart smiles.

Wednesday, September 02, 2020

Chingam

pic: shaadi.com

When the much-awaited Chingam is around
You and I enjoy our days of togetherness,
The scent of sweet jasmines on our bed
Your fingers undoing my long-braided hair.

The long heaps of my kasavu sari all crumbled
Along with your two yards of shiny kasavu mundu
The sweetness of these long waiting years
That finds its way into your limbs and mine.

We rest together after a sumptous onam feast
Amid smells of childhood and old boatsongs
That you sing in your sweet mellow voice,
To the snake-boats across the River Green.

When the spring is finally around for us both
We reign an ancient king and his demure queen.

Tuesday, September 01, 2020

Find that rainbow day


Thursday, August 27, 2020

steps to love

Twilight





My dream, in what strange world have you set me free?
As witnesses to twilights, embraces of dark and light,
Holding in arms, lulling asleep, reluctant partings,
Dual dancers in that uncertain zone, separate, leaves,

We wandered, in those green fields, on those blades of grass,
Our lips drinking sweet intoxicating drinks from silence,
Watching the birds that fly in the blue skies, amazed,
To feel the rain that drenches us lying lazily surprised,

As our love, like starlight from distant stars, at night,
From far away, gazes at where we have roamed,
In day as a stretch of rainbow after heavy rain,
Written clearly against the skies, in vibrant colours,

For this mythical bowl of dreams was always filled,
Everyday with love and hope, now with our desires.

The mind

Sunday, August 23, 2020

nature's gold

Save Paper; Save Stress; Avoid Scandal

This year, I have made a rather strange and dramatic New Year Resolution. No diaries, this time and writing only on scrap paper and with the help of the PC. Regarding empty pages, I have plenty of them left in my other notebooks. So all I need to do is to start writing on whatever sheet of paper that comes handy.


My last year's resolution of writing a page a day was kind of stressing me out. Somehow, there were days when I found it impossible to sit down and write. Of course, there was a hectic, unhealthy and trivial life to lead. Moreover, the empty pages stare at me from the diary accusingly, for I have left no record nor memory of many of those passing days.

Finally, there is this habit of mine to pour out my true feelings and emotions on to paper. For me, that is my remedy for stress and tension and bottling up emotions. But it somehow backfires when I forget to lock my diary up and leaves it right in front of my family with whom I might have fought and wrote venomously. So no causing scandals this year.

Lovestory

You tell me this story of your beloved everyday,
Whom you want to tell your love in many ways;
I advise you  like a sage of much experience
Without telling you anything of my story.

Who has not known, my dear, this agony,
Of unexpressed love that sank into silence,
Of a love that required more than poetry,
Mutual knowledge or entire life history.

For you and me wavered millions of times,
For you wanted to know me well enough,
Like the palm of your hand that I'd held,
While I took nothing seriously that time.

Whatever be the truth behind our silences,
It nudges you in the form of other new faces. 

Couple Goals

We have celebrated our days of togetherness as if each day was a special occasion, gone on adventures in the city, explored new nooks and co...