Homecoming

Home
I am home again,
Rainwashed, purpled
Strung jewelled squirts
Whitepinkfuschiaorangerustturmeric
And green- the emerald vividness of
Bevelled facets, the moss of velvet teasingly spread
Spikes and fronds and umbrellas and curtains
Pot paths disappearing into pools of cloudsky
And thousand hands, tugging me in
Home.

Jogi

There's something in his eyes,
A wandering, a path not taken
Looked upon, pondered.

The moment is now.
Will he?

There's a waiting on his lips,
"Piya..."

I strain to hear the faint...

Wind whispers
tanpura whirls away.
Desert settle
The little sandwhirl

Never had a chance.

Poetry

Its been waiting
shadow puppet strings,
its been waiting a long time
Eon flexing space,
gathering stardust
Oldest to young,

till space is no more a time,
no more a past,


only perfective..

written.

Tell me something my love,
Did you see the dew today?

lasted all morning in the leaves
of the bottle brush,

Nah, thought you wouldn't have.
You don't look
at all.

Did you see me smile at the dog,
the one outside your window,
white with splotched eyes
rabid, diseased?

no you wouldn't have.
You don't seem mad.
not one bit.

Today

The sun rose today,
and it set.

The wind whispered today
of rain and warmth, your warmth
and it died on me.

The sand shifted today,
slip tide rise of sorrow
and it sucked the world in.

Courage came calling
succour saviour sleep time muse,


It hasn't left
yet.

Breaking

The darkness creeps in
mist-silent, light-sharp.

Doors groan under its
unrelenting weight
bar bent iron
drumming slow tattoos of sorrow.

The jungle rushes in
Crushed velvet swathes
glinting in the black-bluing heaviness
Silent tide
rip
tide

over.

Dawn

It stops suddenly. All around you activity ceases. No sound of breathing, no whirr of some neighbour's creaky table fan. No recalcitrant child throwing tantrums outside your window. Even the computer has decided to show mercy on you and not gasp and moan as it prints out your documents for tomorrow's assignment.

The music swells slowly, sweetly. In your head at first, then gathering courage and painting sun patterns on the wall. Poorvikalyani soaring out to greet the dawn, shaking the sun out of its slumber. Stopping my heart with its haunting memories.

In gold and crimson tones the sun strides into my room and stops for those infinite minutes to listen. Just..listen.

The notes fade out as the raaagam decides to move on to someone else. Leaving me alone in a vacuum. Filled suddenly by the resumption of the whirr of the cranky fan, the screams of a colicky child and a groaning world embarking on an another day-chivvying me along.

Rain in a desert

I talked to him today. A random call; out of the blue. Very unexpected like a shower in the middle of the desert. Refreshing too, to be honest with someone. Is it easier being honest with someone you don't know all that well? I think I know him a bit better now. He's fascinating, strong, and reserved.

He keeps a lot bottled up. That is not a good thing. It can't be for someone who is so passionate about his life. Or maybe i'm just being presumptuous. I hope not. It's not nice to be presumptuous. It means one is impinging on someone else's integrity. THAT is not a nice thing to do.

I think integrity means a lot to him. It structures his life. I am not so sure about that myself. Yes I have to be true to who I am and what I do, but who am I and what am I supposed to do? if those questions remain fundamentally unanswerable where does integrity step in? Strange logic if I may say so myself.

He needs to be held. Close and compassionately. He feels compassion is a sign of weakness. I cannot think so. It means being vulnerable yes, but, it also means a certain strength of mind and heart that allow one to give unconditionally. Don't fight it when someone gives you the space in which to break down and cry. It gives you strength.

Don't fight the sharing someone offers you. It clears your mind, takes the weight off your chest. Don't be afraid to feel. It IS hard but it's worth it in the end. You atually see the world in technicolour..I can vouch for that. And to behold colour in this world is marvellous, a gift. Don't deny that gift. It comes with love.

Loving is not easy for you and me. It takes courage and the humility to take great pain and grief. But it's a kaleidoscope for us when we love and THAT makes all the difference in the world. No I will not be a single parent because of you. Because I have seen others like you, and I will not allow my children to suffer. Because I want to reach out and heal you.

Wounded man, at a cross road in life. Succour awaits.

The "Knot"ty Question of Marriage.

My mother was here, talking about marriage. For the first time in a long time, she seemed very insistent that I really think about marriage and getting married. It started me thinking( not something I have done for a long long time.)

What does it mean to get married? In a world of feviquik solutions, where divorce and estrangement are pretty much the norm, what has marriage come to mean? Who will I choose to spend the rest of my life with? and...why would I want to do something like that?

Is it to have children? To experience motherhood in all its glory and its frustrations? Is it to share a life with some one you trust? Is it because one is afraid of growing old alone, or growing apart from your partner? Is it because one wants a lifetime supply of free sex(no guarantee it's going to be good anyway)?

I can have children without getting married? Adopting a child is not such an issue anymore. Plus I don't think I would mind being a single mother! harrying yes, but still...I trust my parents and I have a lot of good friends who understand me and love me for who I am. Why then do I need to get married? I will not grow old alone because I know for a fact ( given the examples of my predecessors) that I will never lack for companionship. I like people too much. In anycase it is far more agreeable to me to have lots of people in my life rather than having to centre it around just one person.
Free sex? Yup can do. Not a problem.

Then why marriage? I have never been one to follow social convention blindly and I will not do so only to create havoc in my life.

I suppose I have too many expectations.

I can live with that.

Star

To touch a falling star, shrieking havoc
As it plunges through a fragile atmosphere
-keening, blazing, incandescently running amok,
Until, rending protesting oxygen, it falls clear-
Is suicide. Madness! Creates one helluva shock
It screams up your arm, your brain, fear
Fully yelling,"Duck you idiot! Duck!"

You dont, of course. It would be sheer
Stupidity on my part to think of you as wise
Woman you never care to look out
for yourself. It's become a game
Charades. Russian roulette cannot exercise
As much attraction as this, there's no doubt.
It's become your one way ticket to fame.

Blank

Where does it all end? The pain, the sorrow, the bleak notion of tomorrow...where does it all end?

What causes it all to explode finally, in a rainbow of flesh and gristle, raining down on blind men who can only smell the fear but not see it reflected in those blank eyes? What gives this rabid fear birth in an expulsion of life-breath? What causes it all?

Where does it gain momentum? In the heart, in the scurrying mind or in the jumpy nerve endings behind the knees and eyes that cause the body to spin and fall in nervous anxiety?
Where does it come alive?

Mnemosyne

"Aasai mugham maranda poche idhai
Yaaridam sholvenadi thozhi"

I cannot remember your face. I cannot remember your face! It's...lost, blurred, undefined now.After all these years of carrying you with me-my very own taveez-you've relinquished your hold on me. Your death grip has loosened and I can breathe again.

But I cannot remember your face anymore. Your laughter haunts my ears, resounding waves in a conch, the soft sussurations of foam on the sand, but your face eludes me. Your silences are a part of my breath, structuring its beat, controlling my life but your face...is gone.

Your touch remains embossed on my skin, against my shoulder, a finger caressed in passing; that fire has not died down yet. Your face, though, is now submerged under a tide of forgetfulness, sweeping shores clean of broken shells luminescent in the dawn light-heartlight.

Love's driftwood, becomes stone in the end.

Arc Lights

The lights came on, washing the wooden stage in a shimmer of violet and indigo, lighting up the spires of the cathedral-making them glow. All of a sudden, the stage turns to stone and the lights stab out into the darkness-searchlights, strong, unwavering, waiting for its next victim.

A girl all in black, steps out from the arch and stands there, right in the middle of those twin beams. A half murmur, half gasp runs through a rustling hall. Her face is hidden by the shadow of a man.Abruptly all murmurs cease, switched off by the simple motion of her now uplifted face. Pale, pure and proud she stands, unafraid and unmoved. Only she knows of the telltale beads of salt dotting her knees and back, pulsing with the restrained thunder of her racing heart.

There were no microphones, that first time. Just her voice.Ringing out true and clear amidst the misty shadows that wreathed eager faces in white scarves of fog. Her voice, rising and falling with cadences as old as stories. It talked to them about pain, grief and despair-the eternal human condition- and they could not help but be caught up in the retelling of their sorrow.

They watched her hands weave another world for them, where the mountains rose so high they shut the sun out from her world. They watched her eyes weary of dreams being trampled under the dusty boots of travellers to her inn. They saw her body crumple under the weight of her thwarted ambitions and then...the lights went out.

But she stood there, glowing now under the light of the applause shimmering over her, radiant face in its hues of ivory, now pink, now smoky gray .....now iridescent purple and blue, absorbing and reflecting the shadows of the audience intensity.

For her, the arclights don't ever fade out.

Meeting

Shuttered light spills gold
Banked-afterglow spins web-light
Lovers greet the night.

Still pools of memory
reflect
gray visions-
death, defiance
silence.
Burst out-black
explosion mute-
engulf, gulp down
Peppercorns burn
in my veins.

Reflections

Still pools of memory
reflect
gray visions-
death, defiance
silence.
Burst out-black
explosion mute-
engulf, gulp down
Peppercorns burn
in my veins.

The Bear

I was waltzing down my street, oblivious to the curtains of rain that were seemingly intent on wreaking havoc on my shirt and my fav pair of loafers. Just for the record, I hate loafers. I loathe loafers.hey! The alliteration worked.
Anyway, as I was jauntily strolling down certain half deserted streets, of 'insidious intent' a sudden cascade of water descended with all the force of a sudden torrent released by the opening of a gate and struck me square in the face.
Left gasping like a landed fish, I couldn't help but stare at the beast that emerged briefly from the shadows cast by the flickering light of the sodium lamp, gently creaking in the wind.It didn't help that my eyes were watering so I valiantly tried to wipe the water from my face. That didn't help either because the wind picked that moment to veer in my direction and pound my face with stinging pellets of crystal.
I choked as a rather large hairy appendage detached itself from the gloom and wrapped itself firmly about my waist, picked me up and swung me out of the path of an oncoming spray of murderous brown sludge thrown up by a malevolent specimen of a maruti 800. I was too bothered to scream or even shriek out my gratitude like I usually do. So I had to content myself with trying to determine what manner of creature lay under the layers of hair cascading around its face and neck.
It looked very much like a bear albeit one with a rather adorable pair of spectacles molded to its shaggy head.
Ok he wasn't a bear. Pity. I would have enjoyed my first encounter with an animal.Never met one before in the flesh so to speak you see.
He looked at me and rumbled in a pleasant sort of baritone. I couldn't hear. Too used to my own ultrasonic frequencies I presume. I asked him to repeat himself.
I think he looked rather put out at my lack of comprehension, being a friendly sort of bearish man he patiently rumbled again. I gathered he was asking if I needed a lift. I could only nod, being fascinated by the way his beard seemed to waggle when he spoke. No, not waggled but rather coiled and roiled around some fascinating muscles in his jaw. I wanted to reach out and explore them but instinct warned me he would bite and not gently either. I decided to be prudent and keep my distance. Hopped onto his bike. A nice bike, not overtly male but gleaming with a shine that bespoke of many hours of loving attention from a pair of big, gentle hands. It leaped to life with an oddly satisfying growl that reminded me of my bear man's rumble. Subdued and very sexy.
It moved..smooth and sleek. Predatory almost.
Dammit. I don't even know his name.

Free Fall

Swoop, feather down-float
whisk, twirl
pirouette in
light cream puff swirls

Stop.
weighty, wait.
Feel resistance
tear...
tearing
then plummet

Thump.

Attraction

"Sparks fly, Instant chemistry"
Cliches all
Something happens,
violently sweet, brief,
An eruption of confusion
longing, craving
-fades into a glow
embers stoked to last
a little longer,
warm, content.

Plea

Solitude. It’s a highly underrated feeling these days. There seems to be no space to take time off and listen to the sound of the rain falling in my backyard, on my roof, on my skin. No time to stop and feel the wind rushing through my hair, winnowing it and setting it free. I seem to have no time to stand on the road and watch the traffic whiz past, off to unknown and often disinterested destinations. No time and no space to watch people walk by and wonder where they are all running off to.
No space to stretch out my arms and embrace the stars wheeling overhead in patterns as old as time.
I stopped one day. Just stopped and refused to go any further. They wondered what I was doing. They even stopped and stared but no one had the time or space to ask “why”. The question was unimportant to them. It held no value for them and had no meaning. “What” and “how” were still possibilities but ‘why’ seemed non-existent
He was one of them too. He stopped and stared like everyone else.
They moved on but he remained…looking, watching, assessing.
His eyes were all I noticed-dark brown, deep down shot with golden lights that whirled around and asked me “why”.
A curious smile tilted his lips forward and made him ask “why”.
This is my answer to him.
‘ I stopped because if I hadn’t I would have disappeared and become Everyman. I would have been a motley addition to the rest of the crowd and would have walked into the same rut as everybody else. Another lost soul in the same damn fishbowl as everyone else. If I hadn’t stopped I would have lost my soul and not noticed it was gone… the emptiness would have swallowed me.
If I hadn’t stopped I would have died one kind of death. I would have been dead to the trees, to the wind, to laughter, to your smile. I would have died without tasting intelligence, without tasting love, without feeling your touch on my lips. It would have meant the death of feeling in me.
I cannot go on living without feeling. I cannot go on living and partly living. If I don’t stop the holes will be to deep to be mend again. I need the silence to scar in peace. I need the halt to make sense again. I cannot continue without thinking. I have recognized the fact that my integrity has nothing to do with morals and everything to do with the truth. I need to find that truth again-the truth I see in your eyes, in the way you smile…innocent.
I need to reclaim my innocence. I need you-more than life, more than death, more than pain or joy-only you, your love.’