14/06/2012

I miss home today. I have never had a 'home' home owing to the transferable nature of Dad's postings. I never had a place where I 'grew up'. So I guess I grew up with just that familiar protective nest of family, no aangans, no summer gardens, no permanent neighbourhood chachas and gubbare wallahs, no ageless neem trees. I have always felt the absence of these things, and the helplessness of a life being shut and reopened every three years, change of schools, change of friends, till the point that I began to suspect that it didn't affect me any more. But I have never missed an anchor in life. They have always been there; the two firm pillars of my existence who hand-made a picture perfect family with love, sweat and immense patience. I didn't know strife in a family. I never heard a raised adult voice directed at another. I want to go back to that. That innocence and that complete devotion to the idea of a family. We were family, and we didn't know any other way to be.
I miss them. I want to be with them and show them the beauty that I see, because they raised me to appreciate it. Because they smiled at my first ever ridiculous poem and said it was brilliant. Because they encouraged me to re-draw a sketch that I had unfairly traced, and made me believe that the honest one was the more beautiful one. 
I miss nana nani and dadi. I miss those houses where time never advances. Just that the number of people in them reduces significantly over the years. I miss that tradition of calling out people's names from the third floor to the ground floor, and that running around on those endless stairs. I miss Dadi's prayers and her intoxicating voice and devotion. I am not doing justice here, because these are not things you write about. They are not relevant. In fact, when is perfection ever relevant? This was not supposed to be about nostalgia though. This was supposed to be about now. About wanting to go back and be with them. All of us fragments at one place, on one large bed under one razaai on a winter night playing antaakshari. 
I am very tired. Dadi's bhajan is playing, not in my head, but somewhere deep, really deep inside my chest.

Love and Hope

Only love has given us this thread
that we so proudly tie around us


All places, all ages have tangled and untangled
in the unhappiness and joy that we know

Only hope has brought us this cup
that we drink so joyously from

All sadness, all loss, we swallow
in this elixir of unknowing

We are made of crystal cups
strewn together with silken threads

Fragile. Beautiful.

I thought you'd never come

"She doesn't like that word." I explain hurriedly to the bewildered man.


She is still standing there, breathing fast, the rage has subsided, giving way to tears. I still remember the first time I saw this happen. The first time I saw those eyes that seemed unaware of the stream flowing out of them, the nothingness in them had struck me as something completely unknown. In that moment, she was never the woman whose soul I had made my own in the village church, whose eyes I had drunk to and then broken the glass.


She is still holding the broken glass in her hand. I take it from her and keep it on the bar. My instinct is to hold her in my arms, but I know she doesn't need that. I hold her hand and take her away. She lets me lead her through the rows of uncomfortable, sarcastic and sympathetic glances like an obedient child. Her eyes are still elsewhere. She is not yet my wife, someone I can hug and stroke on the head and assure that everything will be ok. Even when she is back to being that person though, I can not tell her that with much conviction. Not anymore.


She has been sleeping for hours now. I like it when she sleeps, but it makes me feel guilty. I like her sleeping because it is a relief, because she sleeps for the most part of the day, even though the doctors say it might not be good for her. I don't think she knows it now when she is awake. I mean, I don't know if she is able to differentiate anymore. Sometimes, she picks up a conversation we had when we were young and met surreptitiously amidst the rye in the fields, and she continues it. I treasure that. Although I shouldn't. I am supposed to discourage that. But those are the only moments when I have her back. She looks at me as though she knows me as that boy I once was. I almost want to climb into her dreams and stay there. In the rye field. As two pairs of eyes that laughed and dreamed.


She is awake now, and shivering. The moonlight shines on her bare back. Her thick hair flies slightly in the soft breeze as she looks at something imaginary on the tree outside the window. I touch her spine warily. She turns and looks at me. Her eyes smile a soft smile. I had almost forgotten that soft dimple.


"I thought you'd never come." she says, gleaming.


I smile back. I don't know what she means. Or may be, I do.

Love

Let me write it down and put it in words. Because that will solemnize it. It will make it sacrosanct, until I touch it again and violate it, only to make it more surreal. Isn't that what words do? They immortalize things, places, people, smells, laughters, the ochre of an ordinary evening, the emptiness of the heart, pride, prejudice(I have to use these two together), and love. I've known the deepest form of love ever since I was a kid. Of course, we all do, you'd say. But I am talking about that passionate love, that hungry, fervent love that most people know in their teenage or adulthood. But I knew it. Ever since I wrote that first rhyme. Ever since I read those first poems that rhymed so beautifully, they made my heart flutter. I would always perfect the way I held the pen, the way I curled up the alphabets. I have had so many different handwritings till I settled for the classic cursive one that I have now. It defines me. Yes it does. In the roundness of that a, in the curve of the f, the swirl of the t, I slip in a little bit of me. I haven't been much of a reader till very late, and I have always been conscious that it shows in my writing. But I have been a writer, always. Ever since I had ideas, I wrote. And to write, I had ideas. I've always had ideas.


I am a bit of a hypocrite, in the sense that I hate when someone messes up with grammar. But I take all possible liberties with it when I write. It annoys me if you ask me to give you a line break or a paragraph change. I need words to flow. Sometimes neatly, but sometimes, in a downhill stream, unrestricted, forceful. And to see them flow is the biggest joy you could ask for. Do you know that feeling? Of being lost and feeling small amidst the rows of a bookstore, and of that immersive smell that inundates your senses, that makes everything beautiful and sacred? That smell of yellow pages? Have you ever bought a book only because it looks old and used and it has on the cover a beautiful, regular handwriting of someone called Nafeesa who read it in 1965? Have you ever had that craving to spend all your weekend dug under piles in an innocuous corner of a large, old library that smells of stories and wars and travel and love and life? Do you know what it is to love? To read a book and then dream about it for nights together? To read a book and then have an urge to share, and to preserve and to just hold it close to your chest for a while and smell it? Do you write your name on the cover in cursive after you've read it? Not to ensure it comes back to you if it's lost, but to make sure it retains a bit of you wherever it goes? Do you?


Right now, I do not write for a purpose, I write for the sake of love, for words, for the sounds and images they will create in your head when you read them. For the sounds and images and smells and ebbs that they cause in my heart as I type them. I write this because I need to. I could carry on with why I need this, but that would defy the point. It's a need, a pulsating ache that will calm me down when I type that final full stop.

Have a Wonderful New Year

When the day dawns on January 1, what would really have changed? It will be another day that comes after the night, birds will chirp, animals will wake up and go about looking for food, pretty much everything will be the same, except us, the advanced beings that need celebrations and a sense of newness to keep us going. Why is it that we constantly need change? Why do we need a year-end and a new year to renew our spirits? I guess too many of us don't live the way we were intended to live. Boredom is the most underrated menace to existence. We as a civilization have tried very hard to downplay it and portray it as something harmless, but sometimes I think, boredom is a sign. It is a sign that as we spoil ourselves with multifold and complex choices, we lose a bit of what we were intended to be: adventurers. We have reached this far because of the spirit of adventure, because there were men who set out for the unknown on ships onto unfathomed waters, because they cared to climb the Everest, because they believed there was something more, to be seen, experienced, lived, acquired. 

If we look deep enough, we all have that adventurer within us. There is, at least one thing on this earth for each of us that triggers that adventure, that makes us want to know more, and push limits to learn it and do it. But there are too many distractions, too many mirages along the path until we lose sight of what we had set out out for, and give in to boredom. 

This year, find your adventure. Find something that excites you not only for the outcome but also for the effort. Find the one thing that can speed up your heartbeat and make you lose sleep over it. It can be owning a grocery shop or exploring the Tibetan valley,if it gives you the thrill, that is it. Fight for it. Be proud. Be glorious and beautiful. Be passionate. Give it your best because it will bring out the best in you. Because it will show you love and beauty of the greatest form. This year, fight boredom. Create something, learn something, and live freely. Speak your mind, ask questions, find answers, express love. Just this one year, give the habit of life a chance.

Have a wonderful year in the sense of the word, a year full of wonders.

Someone like her

He watched her as she hurriedly baked chapattis to pack his lunch, her wet black hair dripping on her saree.  A perfume of incense sticks filled the air. It was unbelievable sometimes, the fact that she was here, in his house, in their house, packing his lunch, running his household like a typical Malayali wife. He still remembers the day he had first seen her draped in a Saree. She looked beautiful, both in the elegance of her attire, and the clumsiness of her steps. It was their convocation day. She had been talking to him excitedly, asking him from time to time, if she looked okay. He was just reassuring her for the nth time that she looked breathtaking, when S had arrived and made a dramatic gasp looking at her. All uncertainties vanished from her face in that moment as she beamed and moved towards him. He noticed the unmistakable pink of her cheeks, when she told S he looked wonderful too. Those were the days of transition. They were days of political unrest and liberation movements, of strong opinions and feminism, and of rainy nights when his heart had started to secretly whisper her name, fully aware that she was deeply in love with S.


D and S were made for each other. They could take up an issue and debate all day, over ilaichi chai and bakery bisuits in her apartment. And at nights, tired of all the disagreement, they would have a slow, quiet dinner on the terrace and watch the lights of the sleepless city under them, and the twinkle of the stars above. She would often fall asleep in his arms under a shared blanket. And he would watch her for a long time before he tucked her in bed and left. They would take off to unseen destinations on instinct, only to come back with animated stories about their experiences. It was as if they had a thirst, to explore and stretch the limits of life, as if there was no tomorrow, as if they could never have enough of each other. He watched them with a mix of envy and awe. He knew S deserved her. Because S was not ordinary like him. He did not spend solitary evenings writing poetry dipped in nature. He did not prefer to remain quiet on controversial issues. S was not like P. For P dreamt of a small life with a scooter, a 2-bedroom apartment, and a loving wife, someone like D. Someone pristine and beautiful like D. Someone passionate and intelligent, and ever understanding, like D. Someone who twitched her nose like D when he talked about his ordinary dreams, but then touched his hand gently to smile and say, "You will have it all.". Someone who could laugh off annoying habits as idiosyncrasies, someone who would question, but always have faith, someone who would bring to his heart a feeling of coming home, every time he saw her. Someone like D. But not D. D was for S. She deserved S. And he deserved her. More than anyone else. The brilliant sparkle of the ring on her finger was a proof of that.


That chilly morning of 3rd February is still etched in his mind. He had rushed when he heard the news. S's parents were standing in a corner, with D's father consoling them. He could see a never-ending haze of known faces, as he looked for D, with desperate concern. There she was, with a bandage on her head from the accident and a stony look in her eyes. He stood there. Fixed to the spot. He did not go near her. He didn't know what to do or say. He backed away from the scene like a horror-struck man.


The days that passed were a haze. D had started to spend more and more time indoors. She had sent her parents back, saying she was okay. P would visit her sometimes, but she did not like to be disturbed, although she never said it. Her dad visited every weekend, just to take her out forcibly for meals, ensuring she got some fresh air. That evening, when he visited her apartment, he saw her sitting in the terrace, gazing at the city lights.This is all she had done for the past few months. Her father slept on the couch in the living room. He went and sat next to her.
"How are you?"
She didn't reply. He exhaled and sat there for what seemed to be an hour when she said, "P, will you marry me?". He turned towards her with a start. Her eyes were still fixed on the lights below, a tear glistening in them.
He turned to look at her father, still sleeping on the couch, looking fatigued, as if he had been running for ages.
"Of course I will.", he replied, and sat beside her in silence for the rest of the night.


D has only vague memories of the wedding and of the many days that followed. P took care of every detail of her time table. He would wake up early to cook for her, run the water down for her bath, make the bed, clean the 2 bedroom house, and then leave for his office on his scooter. The only conversation she had with him were answers she gave to his mundane questions, like, "Did you eat?", "Shall I get you a book?", "I will be in the other room. Call me if you want anything, ok?". She always wanted the lights on.


It was on midnight of 19th October when she was woken up by the ringing of the phone. She heard P's steps in the hall, and his voice saying "Thank you", after which he returned to his room. She remembered then, that it was his birthday. That must be M, his best friend of college, she thought. She noticed in the morning that he had kept the receiver aside.


"I am going to the temple. You want to come?", he had asked the following morning, knowing she did not believe much in 'worship'.
"Ok", she had replied.
She had come back looking breathtaking, draped in a traditional Kasavu. He thought he saw a faint smile in her eyes when she said, "Lets go."
That night, as he lay awake in his bed, he heard her footsteps entering the room. He shut his eyes. She climbed on the bed next to him, and he heard stifled sobs for the next few hours feeling every corner of his heart melt away. Then, he felt her breath on his face, as she kissed his cheek, and whispered, "Happy Birthday, P". He is not sure if she saw the tear that ran sideways to his pillow. She was still sleeping there when he woke up the next day.


It has been five years now. S is still the unmentionable subject in the house, and P thinks, sometimes, she still sobs in the shower when he can hear all the taps opened. P has never aspired to be S. P can not be S. He is ordinary, and safe, like he always was. He buys D little gifts from time to time, that she smiles and accepts. He took her to Coorg last summer, and she petted a rabbit there and brought it home. She laughs sometimes, while playing with the rabbit. She still leaves her hair loose, almost all the time, and sometimes, she  still sits in the small balcony of the 2 BHK apartment to watch the city lights.


"Something on the left cheek", she said, touching his cheek to remove a flake, as she handed him the lunch box.

Confessions

Sometimes, I turn around on my heels
in a public place
Just to feel small again
and rejoice when I find no one paying attention.


Sometimes, I cook with just a little oil and very little salt
to let all the vegetables have their natural flavour
comparing them, in my mind, to people
young, impressionable and wishing them the freedom
to be.


Sometimes, I read multiple books
one after the other
alternating identities, between Hermione and Jane
David and Celie, Gandhi and Gulzar
My version of a literary peek-a-boo


Sometimes, I cover my face
with all my hair
and open my eyes only a little
to watch ordinary sunlight
transform into marvelous shiny fractals
- hexagonal boxes with mystical secrets
cut by the magician's sword
but still intact
like stubborn, residual, unyielding hope


Sometimes, I still
talk to myself and write self-addressed letters
in order to discover
things I forgot to tell myself.

Reasons

‎"I don't love you only for who you are. I love you for all that you are not but you so badly want to be. I love you for all those dreams that give your eyes that glint. I love you because you laugh so easily. I will never understand how anyone can laugh so easily. I love you because you are crazy. You would stick out your hand to shake hands with a child on the adjacent vehicle, you'd make faces at and wave at kids on a school bus, you meet people as if you've known them for ages, you make friends with shopkeepers, you smile at everyone that you can smile at. Its insane. It can get you in trouble. But you are you. I love you because when I had put everything at stake, you stood like a rock beside me. Because when we sip Chocoberry together, you make funny satisfied noises and laugh. Every single time. I love you because you are never about mediocrity. You are always analysing, improving, yourself and the world. I love you because when you talk about something that you feel strongly about, everyone shuts up. I love you coz you screw up, so often. And I love how you never pity yourself but fight back. I love how you can be extremely lethargic for days and then completely in charge of your life for the next few days. I love that you are able to forgive, so easily. Its impossible for me to fathom. I don't quite believe in forgiveness, but it goes with you, with who you are. I know I will never understand a large part of you that resides in verses and stories, but I love how you make a complete fool of yourself just to make it sound alright, as if your talent is something abnormal. Well, of course, it is. But I love that you pretend to accept it."
"I think you are much more than you seem to be on the surface. Like a marshmellow."
"That's it?"
"Well, I love you for the companion that you are. I love you because you laugh along, because you want to see and feel and hear and touch and live and love as much as I do. And I love that you never pretend to be who you are not. I guess I love the child in you that you have managed to keep intact despite gaining all the skills and management one needs to face the world. I will never understand this paradox of your personality. As you will never understand why I spend hours writing and listening to old sad songs even when I am not sad. I wish that you weren't a lot of things that you are, but never that you were what you aren't."
"I always knew we were very different :)"

Sometimes

Sometimes
I float above us
and watch
tangled fingers
lazy afternoons
filtered sunlight
and tiny fractions
of hopefulness
warming
our entwined
bohemian souls
finding home
in each other


Sometimes
I float above us
when we sleep
and just watch
figments of you and I
strewn together
into the total
of a 'we'
and
I weep
softly
so as not to
wake us up

What do you want to be?

I have had a very traditional, middle class and conscientious upbringing. My mother decided never to work to raise us, and she did a great job at it. When I was growing up, we had limited resources, but plenty of love and laughter. My parents never fought. Not in front of us, at least. We could take them for granted, and I am thankful for that. I grew up being loved and pampered by the whole of the extended family. Two big vans and jeeps full of relatives would arrive at our house around our birthdays, and the party would last a week. Most of the times, they would come for my birthday on December 30 and leave after my brother's on January 26. Everyone would stay in the two bedroom houses we lived in and my mother would be completely unreachable and out of sight, always in the kitchen, with her salwar-kameez and a pink cardigan over it, dough on her hands, but never without a smile on her face. My father is the epitome of principles. He would live with days of troubles and threats from local goons but refuse to sanction a bad loan, he would not save a penny but never refuse to meet the needs of his immediate as well as paternal family, which was tragedy-stricken, disease-ridden, big, and had only him to depend on. My father was the perfect son, my mother the perfect daughter-in-law. My brother was the blue-eyed first born on both sides of the family, I, the lucky second. I would carefully observe everything my brother would do and try to be like him all the time. He was a quiet and observant child, inquisitive, intelligent, and respectful. I tried to be him. But I was not born to fit in. I was defiant, talkative and I would always want to judge wrong and right on my own. 'Rules' never made much sense to me. But we were looked at as the perfect kids to have. We loved each other ardently, protected each other fiercely, and never fought.

But this is not about my childhood. This is about my dreams. But to know someone's dreams, to understand them truly, you need to know who the person is. I have very early memories of myself. I remember being all of three or four, conversing with 'God' when my mother took her afternoon naps. I would close my eyes and talk silently, and pray to grow up to be someone who would make my parents proud. I remember believing that I did not need to speak it out for him to listen, for he is supposed to be everywhere, even within me. I don't know how I had that idea at that age. Perhaps it was the number of stories I had heard while having my meals. I would always ask questions about God, about who was right in the story and why. I remember having given my mother a hard time after I heard about Sita's 'Agni Pariksha'.

My parents believed in not sending kids to school till they were at least five. So we were taught our initial lessons by Mom and Dad. I would insist on learning everything my brother learnt, and in that enthusiasm, even before I could actually read the words properly, I knew all his lessons by heart. Once, when a friend of Dad's was visiting, I sat on the chair opposite to him, and started to read a chapter on 'Gai'(Cow) putting my fingers on the lines and speaking out the words that I had heard my brother read so many times. Dad's friend was amazed, because I was too small to even know alphabets properly. He started to express his amazement when my Dad smiled and asked him to make me read a random sentence. At this, I laughed and ran inside. When he came to know that I couldn't read and was just reciting it from memory, he was more impressed; by the pronunciation and the confidence. I guess it had already begun then, the love for words, and for the way they were pronounced.

Another time, at a family wedding, a relative asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. "Hindi teacher", I had replied. The whole big family had laughed a hearty laugh. Some had said, "She is already so preachy, she could do a good job at it." I was confused. I didn't know what exactly was so amusing about wanting to be a language teacher. Then, I was told that everybody would like me to be a doctor. I thought about the job of a doctor, and thought it was a noble profession. So my answer to "What do you want to be" changed, to everybody's satisfaction.

Growing up was difficult, as it is expected to be for any independent spirit in a highly traditional family. But growing up, my dreams changed from those of just being successful to make my family happy, to those of travel, and a dream home, and leisure. In those days if you asked me what I wanted to be, I would probably just say 'a successful software engineer' which would imply being able to fulfill all other dreams.

When I was twenty, I was on a bus one night with my best friend, when I told her, "I don't like the idea of being twenty. I am not sure I am everything I wanted to be when I was twenty".
"Why do you say that?" she asked.
"All the wrong choices and mistakes I've made."
"But they make you who you are. They're going to make you a better person of twenty-one or twenty-two, or seventy-eight. And, you still have your dreams." she had told me.
Just the words I needed to hear at the time. So her.

I am twenty-three now. Am I who I wanted to be when I was twenty-three? Yes Sir, I am. It took me many mistakes and downfalls to be here. But I am here, and I am happy. Not because I have attained a perfect job, or because I have fallen in love. But because I have lived every day of my life for the past few years. I have laughed, I have traveled, I have made friends, I have risked being hurt, I have been hurt, and then I have received love and friendship. I have lived like a child, bruised my knees, and I have grown immensely in the process. I have lived in the mountains, listened to fireflies in the wild, tasted the sea water and witnessed the life under it, I have listened to the whispers of history in ancient ruins, I have been to war museums and ancient churches, and I have coloured myself with different cultures and cities. This was exactly my dream. This is still my dream. To always have wheels on my feet. To never stop exploring. To never miss the opportunity to play with an animal or a child, to never miss an opportunity to make a difference, and to always, always learn. Thankfully, the world is large enough to fuel this dream for a lifetime and still leave a lot to be done.

Ask me again, "What do you want to be when you grow up?". My answer: I do not want to grow up, thank you. But I want to be. I want to be so much that being is looked at as an art. I want to quit my job. Sometime soon. And I want to start something with a difference to make a difference. It will take care of old people, because I love them, more than I love children and animals. I love them because they, who once knew the spring of life, are learning to deal with its fall, and they are trying hard, alone. I love them because they are ours to love, they are stories, they are old buildings and history, they are a bundle of memories. I want to teach. Because education in the true sense is the solution to all our problems. But we never educate people. We make exam-experts and desk-jockeys and perfect corporate slaves. I want to 'educate'. I want to write a book. A marvelous, glorious book that creates history. But before that, I wish to read and travel, a lot. So that I can do justice to my first baby. It needs to be right. I do not like apartments, I wish for a beautiful bungalow, with enough garden space for my kids to grow up in. I would have a lot of pictures and quotes on the walls. I would have a large white room with just a canvas and a glass wall that overlooks a beautiful garden, or a sea. I would have unique furniture in the whole of house. It will be a practical and useful house, with space to walk in, lie in, run in, play hide and seek in, and a lot of light and air. And of course, I would always, always have the wanderlust. I would go to unknown places and experience their cultures, deeply and genuinely. I would taste different types of cuisines, learn languages, traditions, hear stories, listen to the whispers of nature, and continue to grow and share the joy, till the last breath I take in, wherever in the world that is.

Take me

Take me from me
like you'd take 
a poem
and make it your own
with sighs and pauses
under your lukewarm breath

Take me on face value
like a promise
of bright springs 
and sunny mornings
of soft, slow, dry kisses
and of the less than ordinary things
that would make us 
a little more
than ordinary

Take me 
like an opinion
and read me between my silences
Contradict me, shape me
nurture me, mould me
grow on me
till 
I cease to be

To Life

Here's to sleeplessness
and to wide eyed dreams
and also to jobs not challenging enough
and to ennui of extremes

Here's to fucked up relationships
and all the shit they create
to dilemmas and deadlocks
and all the love and hate

Here's to adolescence
and its foolish expectations
and to growing up and letting go
and all its implications

Here's is to the only thing
with no hidden strings
to childhood and its rains
and its marvelous springs

That time of the year

Its that time of the year again . . .
The nights are starry and almost cold
and it is almost the season of love

Its that time of the year again . . .
when people take out their overcoats
and walk on the pavements we had walked.
Once.
With the stars brightening our eager souls
and our hearts fluttering in the breeze . . .

The city is almost dressed up again . . .
with yellow flowers and fragrances
and a few leaves are dying again
to be crushed by couples walking under trees
so that new love can be born . . .

Its that time of the year again . . .
when we had walked the stretches of the city
on foot and heart, and on hopefulness
when we had wished upon stars
and lit candles in old historical churches
for the unknowns and the uncertains . . .

Its that time of the year again . . .
and my heart breathes out
warm dreams that we had weaved
upon a broken star
that no one wished on . . .

I have a dream

I dream of writing songs. I dream of being in the company of musicians and write songs and watch them become music, watch them float in the air, in the sea, and in the pores of the soil and sand. I want my words to add, however infinitesimally small, a meaning, to sunshine and salt, to winter breeze and the taste of sea water. I dream not of a name, no, thats not what I want. I just want my words there, out there in the world, on their own, without my shadows, but with hidden bits and pieces of me, and all that I am, in a secret way. I dream of a day when the sun will shine through a window and someone like me, someone I've never met, in some place I've never been to, would recite a few of those words, with sighs and pauses, with the sun in his face, and gratefulness in his heart.

Tonight.

Tonight, love me not
for the luster of my locks
or the softness of my eyes
Do not compare
to velvet, my voice
or to music, my laughter
Tonight,
take off my pretense
and watch me
naked with my sorrows
Kiss the disillusions on my eyelids
and touch on my trembling lips
the laments of a life
not entirely mine
Find in me the night
that has stagnated in some corner
as an endless wait
and the darkness that smells
of unfulfilled promises
and unfinished songs
Tonight,
drink from the cup
of my regrets
and soak in my solitude
Tonight, lets be solitary
together

Dawn

You fell on me
gently, like a wistful drop of dew
on my million lonely dawns
when sleepy eyed
I had watched the sun rise
and closed my eyes again
to dream of the dusk in your porch
You fell on me
warmly, like the whimsical figment
of morning light that makes its way
through the crevices of our joined bodies
and weighs down my eyes
as I watch you
breathing, sleeping, dreaming

Martha

She stood there watching the drops of rain on the wire outside, some drops joining each other to become one before they fell down and were lost forever. It had been raining all night. At this time in life, everything you see, reminds you of something long gone. Life becomes a sum total of memories and stories. She felt uncomfortable and loosened the shawl around her neck. That night too, it had rained incessantly.

She opened her eyes to a dripping morning in Lubeck. There were birds chirping outside the window, as if it was just another morning. She watched him, the light from the screens refracting on the side of his face as he slept. She ran her fingers on the somewhat grayish stubble. He opened his eyes and smiled at her. "This is the best morning of my life." She closed her eyes and smelled him again. This was disastrous. She started to panic. "I should go." She started to get up when he held her by the shoulder, "It’s a Sunday. It'll be hard to get a taxi now. Let’s have breakfast in bed. I will drop you to your hotel after that." He closed his eyes and decided to feel this dream some more. 

He was in sophomore year then, on a vacation in India. She was studying history at JNU. He remembered being impressed at first, and then bowled over, by her forthright, clear and strong opinions on everything under the sun.

One evening, she took him to show him the Taj Mahal on his insistence.

"I've heard so much about it! It’s marvelous! A symbol of enduring love and everlasting beauty."

"Yes, and of monarchy and ultimate indulgence." She had smiled. He looked at her, surprised. She was glowing in the moonlight, beautiful with her defiant and revolting soul. She looked at him with a smile in her eyes, "It is breathtaking, nonetheless."

The day he was leaving, she appeared unruffled. At the airport, she hugged him and said, "Write to me" and left without turning back. He wrote. She wrote back every time he wrote. He would talk about his plans of moving to Europe and writing a book. She would tell him about the communal tension in India and how angry it made her. Sometimes, she would ask him questions about life in the states like a curious child. Other times, she would chide him for his disconnect from the tradition he belonged to. When he wrote to her about graduation night, he omitted the heavy drinking and making out part. When she wrote about her graduation, she told him about the proposal. He had sat quietly in his balcony for nights, imagining how it would have happened. He wondered if he held her hand as he said it, if he kissed her when she said yes, if he wore spectacles, if he appreciated poetry. He did not write back for months. Finally, he wished her a happy life. That was the last correspondence they had.

Thirteen years later, on a particularly cloudy and foggy evening, she hurried back to her hotel after meeting a museum curator for her research on European war monuments. It was then that she saw him, a tall figure emerging from the mist. It was him, unmistakably. There was that walk. He looked stronger, perhaps. He walked uncertainly towards her.

"Is this a dream?" he had smiled that familiar smile. She felt a thud in her chest.

"I was here for my research. What are you doing here in Lubeck of all the places in the world!" she couldn't hide the excitement in her voice.

"Long story. I live here at the moment." He smiled. "Wow! Where are you staying?

"Alstadt. I am leaving tomorrow afternoon."

"So, we have some time, don't we?"

She nodded.

"You must have already seen all the historical places." He looked at his watch. "Let me be your guide." He smiled.

They walked the pavements for some time when she learnt that he had already published two moderately successful books. The protagonist in one of them was an Indian brought up in the US with identity conflicts. She made a mental note to ask him for a copy. She told him about her son and the life-changing experience of motherhood. It was like finding a long lost friend. She remembered how well he always understood her, how in the letters; she would read his words and identify with almost everything. He stopped at a shop to buy marzipans for her. She watched him as he chitchatted with the shopkeeper in German. 

Later, she smiled, "You know, when I had met you first, I took you for a non-cultural sort of person."

"And I thought you were one of those obedient, cultured kind of woman." "I am just kidding." He smiled again. "I missed you, D. You stopped writing completely after your engagement."

"Yes, wonder why I did that considering how thrilled you were by the news!” He remained silent.

He talked at length about Martha, the protagonist of the novel he was writing. He told her how she had shades of every woman he had been with. He mentioned gently later, that she was heavily inspired by her.

Four hours, a walk by the beach and a few drinks later, he asked her if she would like to see his unfinished novel. It had started to rain heavily as they walked with tipsy steps to his apartment. She felt free, very free, after a very long time.

They sat by the fire with the draft of his book. She was too drunk to read. She just picked a few words and pronounced them again and again, more and more slowly and beautifully, when he kissed her. For a long time. She told him she had not slept well in a very long time and fell asleep on his bed. He watched her sleep for hours, painting the beauty of that moment in his head. Martha would take on unexpected hues tomorrow. He finally fell asleep beside her. It kept raining all night.

It rained all night in that small German town, as it rained in Delhi last night. Only, there was no fireplace and novel in progress. There was no one watching her as she slept, cold and uneasy by the haunting memories of the night. That morning, he had dropped her to her hotel after breakfast as he promised. He had hugged her for a long time and assured her that nothing had happened. But she knew she had been disloyal to her husband that night. It was not about the kiss or sleeping in his bed. It was about the realization that in some corner of her heart, he was still her soul mate. She hated the fact that she believed in that concept. He was the man she dreamt of for nights together in the weeks before her wedding, and then dismissed the dreams as cold feet. She remained a good wife till her husband's death, although she often met him in sonnets and fireplaces, Taj Mahal and Holsten Gate, and on rainy, dreamy nights. She often wondered what could have been had things happened differently. Perhaps she would still be lonely and cold while she slept at night. Or perhaps, they would walk with their frail figures in the woods and talk about Faiz, Ludhiyanvi, or Cummings, in warm togetherness.

Last night, as she flipped the pages of a magazine, she read him, 

"I have not slept in ages love

Let me rest tonight

Like I let you rest 

when you needed

not to be touched

just watched

For once, turn your face away

And let me close my eyes

without the knowledge that you

will never be my own

I, too, need tonight

to go to sleep alone."

'The writer and poet died in his sleep on...' She had shut the magazine and toppled on her bed all night as it rained outside. He never finished that novel he started. She wondered what that novel was all about.

Random Thought

Its like people running with their backs on the present towards the unknown. Everyone seems to be in a frantic attempt to win over the uncertainties of life. Its surprising how many people forget to 'live' in the process, how many people never know love, the magic and the beauty of it, how many people just don't let out a sigh at a beautiful sunrise, how many live their whole lives with a compromise, because their souls were too chained to fly in search for what was best for them.

Ambient Light

[I often narrate in first person, but I am just a story teller. Almost everything I write here is fiction. This poem is from the perspective of a man remembering his wife.]


The light escaping from the screens
falls on our photograph on the side table
You and me, dim shadows
warm candle light
You were high on champagne
and laughed that hearty laugh
and my heart glowed a little brighter
than the ambient light
I had held you by the waist
and you were laughing loud
facing the ceiling
when the camera clicked


"You will have to move on"
you had said, teary eyed
as I had hushed you
and told you about the advances in science
I lived in denial, you said
and showed me the statistics
You saw the seventy percent
I tried desperately for the thirty
That was uncharacteristic of us both


I was painting the porch
for the imminent summer
and watching the butterflies
in the garden
when the doctor had called
He had the reports
Its all too distinct now
the smell of paint
the warm breeze
the exact brightness of the afternoon
All the months that followed are blurry
syringes and wards
disinfectants and phone calls
Identical days of urgent rush
and my solitary tears at night
I often watched that picture of us
to remember your laughter
and the long golden tresses
that chemo took away from you
You still looked beautiful though
Nothing could take away the twinkle
of your hazel eyes


I often sat by the bed
wondering
in what precise moment
the white cells in your blood
decided to mutate
and tip the beginning of our journey
into a cruel terminal
Your pale skin
smelled of lilies that night
when the moon was full
and you had shown me
how the diamond on your finger
glittered
"Preserve me in your poetry
when I am gone"
I have kept that part of the promise
But it feels unnecessary to move on
anywhere away
from your pervasive smell
that dwells in the house
and from our togetherness
that comes alive
in perfect tenses
on full moon nights


Shared with Poets United.

May be

May be we shall meet

only after the moon

has been half asleep

and the heart, sleepless, 

awakes to solitary dreams

May be you will keep searching me

touching me and exploring me

through your words

on such long breezy nights

and go about your life

the next morning

May be that is how we will stay 

in what we call love

deeply, dreamily




Shared with Poets United.