Once Upon a Time

Today I rang up some old memories,

Flames and words, kindled from dead ashes,

Resurrected some dead friends,

And gave them, a bear hug.

 

What a strange feeling,

Meeting strange old acquaintances anew,

Feeling a little hope, a little trepidation,

As a cold mug of coffee sighs of silence, on my desk.

Her, lying in my arms, in an unknown hotel bed,

Wandering down a dark alley with salvation,

A blue strappy dress over a stolen dinner,

Pinpricks of light, in a muddled past.

Today, when meeting, in person, in life,

Is a thing of unreal memory,

It is fun to reminisce with them, and ask,

Do you remember, when we burned down together?

Lust

It oozes out of my skin these days.
Pure.
Unadulterated.
Tempered by age, forged by years
of suppression.

It lives and breathes on the tip of my tongue.
Sweet.
Salacious.
Tangy in anticipation, bitterness churned
out of its core.

It undresses, feeding my voyeuristic gaze.
Tempting.
Toe-curling.
Wanton in want, hunger stoked on fumes
rising off naked flesh.

It is devilish, it is sinful in my heart.
Angelic.
Pleasurable.
Blessed in bliss, and blinded by a force
of ancient kin.

It is falls, hardens, it rises in my self.
Unsheathed.
Vulgar.
Uncontrolled in words, unconquered
in death.

Hallucinations

She walked up to me
looking dissatisfied,
Hair impeccebaly held straight
A gait, tested and tried.

She wanted to say something
and not appear rude,
My greys bristled with my black
when she didn't begin with, 'dude.'

Her skirt didn't know where to end
White on black, her cropped top did,
Eyes that laughed, lips not so
Smiles or sarcasm, all under a lid.

Before I knew, she had turned around
Pirouette, and a wavy hand,
A curvy back walked away
Taking my gaze, from where I stand.

Recap

Last year was dismal for my writing.  On the blog.

For everything else, it was quite nice.

Let's see...

I learned a martial art. And I have not dropped out yet

I travelled. To eight states and two different countries.

I met, talked to and befriended some amazing women.

I stayed financially solvent.

I got myself more work than I can handle.

I tried to not get angry. Did not always suceed. Still trying.

I am a five year old father now. Amazing.

I had great sex.

I  started and finished the Wheel of Time - all 15 books! Robert Jordan - incredible.

I bought more books than I can read. I bought more graphic novels.

I sketched.

I ran. 10km. More than once!

I swam. And now I can do a respectable freestyle.

I saw Spiderman - Into the Spider-verse.

I wrote impromptu poetry. And prose. Not much of it has made it here. That should change.

I discovered Sarah Kay and spoken word poetry.

I am sure I have forgotten some stuff, but that's ok too, isn't it.

And here we are again, luv.

Here's to a fascinating year ahead.

I am not writing to you anymore

I am not writing to you anymore

I wrote in words, in verse
however terse,
or out of shape, I opened up.

I gave us names, in hope
let my ideas elope,
into fantastical lands afar.

I painted hues, in time
borrowed, a crime,
from others who demanded more.

I dressed up, crossed cities,
booked a bloody restaurant too,
just an okay, so few?
what gives you the right!

to be miserly with words.

I am not writing to you anymore.

--

I breathe a sigh, heavy air
sit on a rickety chair,
look up and look kind.

I want say, slow and less
is a caress
of a different paintbrush.

I did not write, or fly 
a solitary, mundane, hi
I agree, is a weak stand-in.

Though in thought, and in mind
of an uncountable kind
you have lingered 
like clouds on the Kanchenjunga.

seen from valleys of Darjeeling.

I wish you do not write to me anymore.

You make me write, for you, instead.

Gaaner Opare

Dandiye aacho tumi amaar, 
gaaner opare.

Words.
A sea of shame,
A prayer gone awry,
Silences, shouting, the same.

Amaar shur guli paaye choron,
Aami payini tomare.

Distance.
A path across time,
Hesitation. Doubt. Dust.
Stories told in mime.

Batash bohe mori mori,
Aar bendhe rekhona tori,
Esho, Esho paar hoye mor,
hridoye majhaare.

Time.
Born to her timeless touch,
Old. Soft. Incessant.
Indulgent, sometimes too much.

Tomar shaathe gaaner khaela
durer khaela je
bedona te baanshi bajaye
shokol bela je.

Love.
Elusive, yet incandescent,
Alien in my reality,
Threaded, mending my every dent.

Kobe niye aamar baanshi
bajabe ko aapni aashi
aonondomoye nirob raate
nibid aandhare.

Silence.
A bridge across my heart,
lined in bloody thorns,
every day, prior art.


Note: The Bangla verses are by Tagore. The dry English is mine. Nothing more is to be said on the subject.

तो बेशर्मी होगी

अगर छुपी बैठी हो
शर्म की चादर लपेट कर ।

और झिझक रही हो यह सोच कर
बात करोगी
तो बेशर्मी होगी ।

अलफ़ाज़ जो बह गए
उम्मीद के इंतज़ार मे

उनको सन्नाटों में
डूबने से न बचाया
तो बेशर्मी होगी ।

नज़रें जो उठी नहीं
इशारों के बहकाने से

उनको आगोश में
ना सुलाया
तो बेशर्मी होगी ।

हाथ जो कांपते हैं
छूने की याद में तन्हा

उनको तन्हाई मे
गले ना लगाया
तो बेशर्मी होगी ।

Murky

the sky sings in drops
of dripping pain,
come, get wet with me
in this boisterous rain.

the ground coughs in fits
of squelching mud,
come, get murky with me
in desire's sultry crud.

the skin murmurs in fatigue
of ceaseless want,
come, get in with me
for a dark, lusty jaunt.

the mind mad in quiet
of revolting cries,
come, get down with me
in a valley of muffled sighs.

Consume

Hurried glances, a passing touch
Eyes that look away and say
so much.

Palpable tension in a shared space
Condensed lust packed
in a suitcase.

A stolen kiss, a picture bait
Tingling skin, restless
to satiate.

Private rooms abet a stormy thresh
Broken beds, and sweaty
flesh.

Tender goodbyes, lives resume
Till it again gives in,
to consume.

Reaction

I broke
me,
And I broke
us,
When you broke
free of
us.

The shards still
rankle,
and bleed the nimble feet
of my memory of
us.

We are together now
in body and spirit
and child,
Ghosts of your great love
haunt
every jaunt we
inhabit, as
us.

I write this, smiling
at the rain that
pours and lines
my skin
as you exist in you lover's
thoughts and lust
and in real life, in
us.

Tu kisi rail si

Sarmistha coughed with abandon. After all what were a few more germs in this smog filled city. Propriety be damned. She was covered with grime and dirt, that accompanied a visit to the local supermarket these past few weeks. The supermarket premises were undergoing some sort of bridal renovation in anticipation of Diwali. It involved much concrete breaking apart and old bricks being taken out to make way for new ones.

"Typical," thought Sarmistha. "Celebration preceded by breaking, followed by a bevy of bills."

The walkway leading up to the supermarket had parted to reveal the precariously dangling electric mains, just beside the leaking pipe mains, waiting to come together in a very municipal blaze of glory. Sarmistha had managed to walk around this dystopian ditch with two bags laden with groceries.

Just as the bout of coughing ended, an auto-rickshaw pulled over beside her. She haggled and got the fare down to its usual rate - 20 rupees more than it actually cost. The auto started off with fervour, only to be held hostage by the traffic cop's outstretched hand.

"Damn, I am going to be late again."

Tu kisi rail si guzarti hai,
Mai kisi pul saa... thartharata hoon.

----

"Yahan pe cigarette peena mana hai... "

The six foot two giant glared at him. "I am going to get punched. Again," thought Vidyut. As his hands instinctively went up to protect his face, the man stubbed out the cigarette, threw it on the floor and walked away. Vidyut picked the stub up and looked at it. It was yellow, bent and warm. "A measure of personal rebellion or a glamourized suicide note? Maybe both. After all, rebellion is often suicidal."

Vidyut threw the stub away and checked the time. The bus was no where to be seen. The chaotic jumble of people at the bus stand was pulsating with mundane life. The enveloping cacophony of car horns, rumbling engines, hawker calls, cell phone conversations were all its bastard offsprings - begot without thinking and  cast off the next moment. 

Vidyut elbowed his way into the crowd of people waiting to board the bus, as it appeared at the horizon. The mad rush for that first foothold on the bus steps left him panting. At least, he had boarded.  He checked his cellphone again.

"Late by 30 minutes. Still no message."

Tu kisi rail si guzarti hai,
Mai kisi pul saa... thartharata hoon.

----

... to be continued ...

Kano megh aashe

Moner janala dhore oonki diye gaeche
Jaar chok taake aar mone pode na,
Chey chey koto raat din kete gaeche
Aar kono mookh tobu mone dhore na.

I saw you once, just that time
bathed in the simple light
singing what madenning tune,
my heart, mad, in flight
dancing to your soulful rhyme.


Baatash bohe mori mori
Aar bedhe rekhona tori
Esho esho paar hoye mor 
hridoy maajhaare,
Dnadiye aacho, tumi aamar, 
gaaner opare.

The lilting song, that mesmer
of your parting gaze
lifts and are you still
present
in my synchronous daze?


Jaro laage phiri aeka aeka,
Aankhi pipashito nahi dekha.
Taari baanshi, ogo taari banshi,
Taari banshi baaje hiya bhori,
Jaagorane jaaye bibhabori.

Now you haunt my blood,
flit in my sighs and form
my desire to love more
your bequeathed, flood,
in rebellion to the norm.


Thak thak nijo mone doore te
Aami shudhu baanshoriro shoore te
Porosho koribo or prano mon, okaron,
Mayabono biharini.

Distances dwell in space, you
are sewn into the ether.
Strung in my wordy whims,
are your memories, so new.


I touch those memories on days like this.

You give me rain

You give me
rain
in the raging calm
of my dry heart.

You give me
shivers
in the sweaty lines
meandering on my palm.

You give me
dimples
in the sunk haggard
recess of my skeleton jaw.

You give me
kisses
in the curt, edgy creases
wasting on my shirtless self.

You give me
breath
in gasping crimson veins
pulsing around my choking throat

You give me
ideas
in the curled, gooey folds
of my jagged simmering heart.

You give me
fears
in the lively, playful sins
dripping from distant dreams.

You give me
time
to wait in dark aisles
circling shadows of lust.

You give me
rain
in the dry heart
of my raging calm.

Teri Galiyaan

I am writing this to the void. I am writing this to you. You are the void.

Yenhi doobe din mere 

Yenhi hote hai savere

Yenhi marna aur jeena

Yenhi mandir aur madina

Teri Galiyaan.

Shored up somewhere deep inside is a very naive me who is getting a breather as I type this. What is this? Nothing that makes any particular sense. Between taking care of so many people - you, him and her, and him, and me, taking care that it all makes sense is quite secondary.

What is it about intense melancholy that can spur words? It is a family trait, you say, this strain of melancholic euphoria. It got me writing, and it got me to you. Pretty useful trait, if you ask me, even if it is self-deprecating.

There is much to say, and there is so little lost in translation. Yet, you and me hanker for that little. The part of you I do not get, and the part of me you do not need. 

Bhalobasha baaki aache tomaro aamar kaache

Ja cheycho deete aami parina

Aamaro shomoye daale phooriye esheche paata

Aeto prem kaache eshe, elona.

Jodi kono din toomi, 
Du haath diye jhinook kodao nei aami, 
shei olpo bhaanga golpo guloye, kaar shaathe, 

bolo shobdo choode phirbo baadi maajh raate

Aami tomar kotha bolbo kaake.

There was once an urgency to be understood, a dire need to convey the music of words that sang to me. I find that urgency in me fading. Suddenly, as if, it does not matter if one is understood or not. Why?

I find a tiring cynicism replacing a ceaseless wonder of things, filling up realms of possibility with reams of mundane.

Even as I see wonder take birth before my eyes, every day.

Slightly broken

Scratches of colour

pencil scraps

chalk out heartstrings
rendered on muted

pages.

Shreds of light

year pasts

return my leftover love
smeared on broken

plates.

Walks of sound

less kisses

ride roller-coaster stories

dripping on fungal
sills.

Touches of your

carnal pauses

echo in home-bound corridors

broken in dissoluble

sighs.

It Rains

It rains.
In beads held captive on
a sweaty brow, meandering
between hesitant creases.

It rains.
In drops trickling down
dimpled cheeks, tripping
over murmuring lips.

It rains.
In streams forming at
the corner of eyes, awash
with new born hope.

It rains.
In puddles splashed over
a pristine white, stained
with muddy expectations.

It rains.
In sheets of a sky washed
breathless face, gulping
in the sound of your name.

It rains.

It rains.

It pours.

It tickles, trickles and washes over.
It batters, and soothes and drowns,
It chokes, it chides, it chastises,
It plays, it pricks, it pleasures.

It rains.

Akhon Onek Raat

Words found in a limbo of languages,
Extinct dialects of the heart,
Forced cacophony of the world around,
Sounds that mean what we make them mean.

Akhon onek raat,
Tomar kaandhe amaar nishshash,
Aami benche aachi, tomar bhalobashaye.

Simple lines, spoken a million times over,
in many love stories, like ours,
Beaten to death by authors, and burnt to ash,
by poets and blurred off paper by painters.

Chuye dile haath,
Aamar briddho booke tomar maatha chepe dhore,
Dolchi kamon neshaye.


Drunk in meaning, of eons of stories,
Heavy with the weight of so many souls,
Lines, still just lines of words after all,
in an alien language.

Kano je oshonkoche ondho gaaner koli,
Pakhar blade-er taale shojashuji kotha boli.


Nonsense and sense, churned like buttermilk,
Indistinguishable anguish of the once loved,
Unfathomable logic of the still loved,
Hopeless hope of a still to be loved. 

Ami bhabte parini tumi buker bhetor phatcho
amaar shorir jure tomar premer beej.


Yet surprise they do, sometimes, all the time,
How well they say my mind,
Your mind, this effervescent syntax of ink on paper,
forced to breathe, somewhere on our common ground. 

Ami thamte parini tomar gale norom dukkho
aamaye duhaat diye munchte diyo please.




Note: The Bangla lyrics are from a fantastic song from the film Hemlock Society (listen to it here). It has been written and sung by Anupam Roy.

Self Deception

Does someone else feel it too? A vacuum? Of words that one once used to speak? To loved ones, to strangers, to confidantes? Why do I feel that the words are ebbing away slowly. From my fibre, inch by inch, gram by gram.

This is what comes of reading a book made of letters. I read one a few days before, and I wanted to write about it. But I guess I am even more of a wallflower than Charlie. Epistolary. And now it is this one. It is curious, the path that has led to this book. Or led this book to me. Curious, to say the least.

I once used to write long letters. To friends and lovers alike. Even when they would not write back. Most of those friends have morphed into silent curtains. And lovers have been sucked in by reality. My devotion to the written word has thus suffered a severe lack in companionship.

I once used to write long emails. I can still manage a few. My earlier abandon though, lies spent somewhere, whimpering at having been kicked in the gut. It has shrunk, like a rejected lover's self-esteem, to cover only the bare essentials.

And so now is it only the perfidious sms that one gets. Terse to read and cumbersome to write, it conveys no emotion to me except an desperate, unreal urgency to exhale.

I wanted to write a letter in this post, and look what I ended up writing. And though it is quite unclear why anybody reads this blog at all, surprisingly, people do. And even more surprisingly, they write in sometimes, telling me how they passed an evening reading this electronic reflection of me. Sustenance for my narcissistic writerly self it is. Written morsels that reveal an interested person behind them. Such luxuries.

Luxuries one can always dream of indulging in. So now, my anonymous reader, be a dear, and write to me.

Cat Smoking (Part 4/4)

The bright lights of the road to airport snapped Pushmeet out of his frantic typing. He stared stupefied at the screen. The words he had typed were staring at him. The soft white glow of the screen lit his face, which he saw reflected in the car window. It had an expression of veiled fright. The look on his face changed as he realized what he was looking at. His phone buzzed.

He checked the inbox to see a sms from Trina saying, “Waiting for you at the departure lounge. How far off are you? Want to cancel the flight back and check-in into a hotel for the night?” He felt a longing to feel Tri's fingers on his stubble. They made it seem more like a Monet brush stroke than an ugly outgrowth of his lethargy. The first time he had met her at an airport, he was coming back from his first book tour. She was coming back from a meeting with clients. The idea of giving the flight a miss had been his. She had resisted the change from schedule initially, even insisted that they check-in into separate rooms. Later that night she had told him her entire travel schedule for the month. He had coordinated his book tours to match her tours. Airport hotels became erotic stopovers for a month. By the time the book tours became infrequent, her visits to his apartment had become a habit both had become used to. He had barely finished typing an emphatic yes, when his phone buzzed again.

With a message from Veronica that read, “Waiting in your apartment with Cat.” His mind played back images from the evening when he had walked into Ron's apartment with the stray cat he found on his way back home from the pub the night before. Ron simply called her Cat. He had hungrily dug into Ron's half finished cup of instant noodles before hitting the shower. He remembered how he had come out of the shower to find Ron crouched on the floor, talking to Cat in hushed whispers. He could not decide who looked more cat-like between the two of them. That night, their lovemaking had been infused with a feline energy interspersed with subdued mewls from Cat. It felt exhibitionistic to be making love in front of Cat. That only made him crave it more.

His hand wavered on his phone buttons. Not knowing who to reply to as the car drew into the airport departure porch. Getting out the car seemed more like the end of an expedition than the end of a road trip to get to the airport. The journey had been a revelation. The journey of listening to them tell their stories. Of letting them talk without his thoughts moderating the conversation. He showed his driving license and ticket to the airport security as he walked into the departure terminal. He was still standing their undecided about who to answer to when his phone buzzed again.

Without looking at the message, he walked to the flight ticket counter and cancelled his flight ticket. He walked out of the airport terminal, hailed a cab and headed back to Hampi. The journey held the promise of a story that had to play out itself in his head. The cab turned away from the airport as his fingers embraced the backlit keyboard of his laptop. He had to know his story. The story of what he wanted more. Lovemaking or stories? Who he wanted more. His lovers or himself?

The journey was essential. The story was necessary. The questions were undeniable. The women were merely characters.

He Just Touched Her

He just touched her.

Tip of his finger, slowly grazed
the back of her flowing neck
Rising tides, churned far away
kept deep down in check


He just touched her.

A rumbling echoed beneath
her ribs, stoked alive in a pit
The moment his skin touched hers
like a sentence in flames, writ.


He just touched her.

Winds changed their song
A howl and a sigh of the dead
When a bead of sweat slid down
to meet his hesitant tread.


He just touched her.

Threads unravelled in her fabric
falling apart in the face of pure
Desire slicing veils and walls
erected by her, so firm, so sure.


He just touched her.

Helpless. So helpless in broad daylight,
between crowds, a prison of solitary
Delight coursing through veins,
betraying a self, wild in her, free.


He just touched her.