Waiting for the rains

At the sacred space by the temple, on a platform of red bricks,
The saffron-clad priest chanted in high tones, the ancient prayers for rain,
Amidst the blazing summers, to the Gods of the sky and the wind,
Where the green fields of yesterdays have become parched,
Dried up devoid of any trace of life,
While people draped in earth-coloured cottons chanted,
With the sun scorching their wheat-coloured skins.

Children played by the dried up temple pond,
Thinking of the days where they splashed in the cool water,
Sat idly in the cool recesses of the rocks,
Or chattering with the juice of ripe mangoes
Oozing on their hands and faces.

The ancient chanting went on incessantly, in a land of purity,
Where none could wash or bathe except in the muddy pond waters,
The holy fires blazed along with the hot afternoons,
When none could sleep, for the heat numbed and killed,

Oh you rain; much awaited, the boon of heavens,
That brings joy to the earth, wealth to its people,
Oh you rain, come with thunder and lightning,
And soak our brown skins with delight,
Oh rain, the fulfillment of forecasts and incessant prayers,
I invoke you in the names of the barren earth,
The dried up rivers and lakes, the animals and birds,
The silent trees and the people on earth.

You end the blazing afternoons of summer heat,
With the first drops of summer rain,
You set the warm smell of earth rising,
And bedeck trees with jewels like brides,
From furnace hot afternoons to nights of restless pace.
For you, incense is burnt and prayers chanted,
For you, the comforter in candent days,
Oh rain, come and give us comfort, the priest sang.

On the third day of endless repentance and prayers,
Grey and white dappled clouds rose to silhouette the sky,
With hints of a sudden outburst,
The entire city rejoiced, the wait is over,
Days of drought are finally over,
With bolts of thunder and lightning,
The soft rain slushed over the crowd,
Who received in open hands stretched to skies
What the heavens granted as comfort
From the scorching heat of Indian summer.

The rain fell over the blazing holy fire,
With the priest and the crowd soaked in the rain,
And the beaming children screamed at the ripples,
Forming on the muddy waters of the temple pond.

You

Flow with the rivers
Fly with the kites
When you come back
You are the river
You are the kite 
No more you. 

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.

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.

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. 

Freefall

Taste that magical drop and dip and dive,
Once more in oceans of words and desire;
The nights of togetherness are back again
That were cast aside with passing time.

A few moments of all-forgetting banter,
Though the rains torrent along with storms,
Once again in the candlelight, love flickers,
Till its fire can brighten the darkened home.

With no power and no distractions of media,
With hours that drop into the slow hourglass,
With food bought on order from outside
And chores that can wait till the power supply-

A sudden power failure slows your weekend,
But brings big surprises like romance and fun.

Counsel

Who knows when the eloquent falls in love
With your maddest saddest silences,
What strange contradictions arise,
When they want to listen to your words.

Still they listen baffled, tired, bored,
To endless conversations of pain,
While who knows their real motive,
Is it just to listen or gossip around?

With what gentle cues and many reasons,
Do they extract your wildest thoughts,
Along with your saddest experiences,
Just so they can know and be sure.

How can they know your silences,
If what they see is only sheer pain?

Your words

Spin me not one but many yarns,
I would read it with real interest,
With full understanding that you,
With a loving heart made them,
So I can turn to them for comfort,
When with an ailing heart or pain,
On any day, when I need support,
And smile upon reading your words!

Note- Written in response to Swapna's As I Spin a Tale

A perfect life

If life was perfect, I would never have lost you to silence,
Or you thought over what an innocent smile really meant,
It would have been a celebration of our mutual silences
With a huge degree of understanding, not hide-and-seek.

If life was perfect, it would have smelt of fresh coffee,
Your perfume, glowed with your glaring new blue shirt,
Your movie-star good looks and impeccable manners,
Along with those caring ways, never with another.

If life was perfect, to laugh would have been easy,
To cry easier and to trust and confide the easiest,
It would have given freely, not full of tragedies,
Which were between the cup and the lip always.

If life was perfect, I’d be what I am in my dreams,
Putting words into perfect little sheets, bound to books,
Or teaching children to sing rhymes and poems,
Or loving my little voices that mingle with mine.

Still if life was perfect, I would sit at night on the seashore,
With you gazing surprised at how beautiful I’m in black,
Talking of sweet nothings to remember and treasure,
That would be a perfect moment, for years to come.

Memory

A song for you

Of all the songs that have been made,
For you, until they turn old and fade, 

This one is short and may be the best,
In this world, I love you the most.

Let new songs come and years pass,
I cant find a word that rhymes with pass..;-)
(well, I can, what i mean is I don't want to)

Don't have much to say,only new words,
Come and take place of the old ones.

The Come-back

The yellow metal lured while the frail fingers clutched,
Dark nights were denied sleep but love reigned,
In pale cottons with jerry work, in the silent long hours 
Much run stories of mind, they come back vividly, like a cat,
Suddenly upon the threshold of my quiet life, intruding. 
Where would I bury that secret desire, one long love?

One long love, the sacred spaces uttered fearlessly,
For this love that never was or will be bound by time,
Or by hands that touch or lips that kiss or whisper,
Only by a strange silence that tells you about me,
In circular miles that entangle with despair,
They begin nowhere and end nowhere,
A nowhere from where I turned 
But couldn’t find you again, 

When arms entangle in passionate whispers,
Diluting the ancient brine of all losses,
I wish with all my heart that I could erase
One whole day, one wrong word, one moment,
To bring back the same shadows of real life,
That glowed in dark nights a long long time ago.

One small step would have changed time,
If only you with your pale cottons, 
Turned back and listened to what strange tales,
Others couldn’t say for they never knew
The world you were to me, 
In a sacred space that I call my soul,
Not yellow metals that still clink melodiously. 

Flavours

Once I dreamt that if I were your wife,
Then I would set the table with flair,
Collect the recipes you like in a book,
Create dishes that could bring delight.

The dream meant spicy chicken soups,
Roti and dal and whatever was special;
Yet you and I remained just a dream,
And this book of magic was forgotten.

When I did became a wife in real, 
I could not please him with my skill,
For he was really skilful as a cook
And never knew how to praise a wife.

Here, he cooks and calls me a beginner,
While I sit quietly and smile ironically.

Few words for a writer friend

 A shade of violet, modest and humble,
Terse in speech, polished in style;
A rare specimen of delicious wine,
From choicest fruits with perfect taste;
So rare a being shines behind the words,
Graceful, intoxicating, beckoning for more
Words that mirror unspoken thoughts,
Known realms and a kinship of wavelength. 

Old Friend

Spring Song Sung on a Swing

A Proper Burial

I was only ten when I learnt about unhappy endings. 
Like when I knew my grandmother had cancer, 
I kneeled in churches, for God answers a kid’s prayers, they said. 
She died and I didn’t meet her to say one goodbye. 

She looked like a horrible nightmare, 
Not the one you saw last, not the one you loved,
A swollen, ugly remnant of what was once beloved, they said. 
Once botched goodbye, an unresolved parting for a little girl, 

There were no tears for her, only numbness that didn’t feel real,
From that chirrupy girl who never gave her a proper burial, 
Who died a little that day, with prayers unanswered, 
Full of questions but never with answers or resolutions, 

Now, I’ve grown older with bungled muted loves, 
Improper goodbyes, giving up too easily, too too easily. 
  

Scholar

Two contradictory currents pull
This strange intellect
That loves to string words together
Or pull apart them in analysis.

The one that loves to string words
In wild garlands of ecstasy,
Is silent and rarely present,
While the other mocks daily.

The one that pulls apart words,
To gather meanings and rules,
To make wild guesses at context,
Never comes when needed.

One voice of wild creativity
That has no rules at all;
One voice of scholarship
That finds boundaries hard.

So this life remains still,
With a journal serious trivial
That rarely ever records
The failures of the scholar.