...

All I would steal from you is a kiss
Not the night, nor a part of it
Not furtive embraces under the quilt
Definitely not love, nor its pretense

I am flighty
I cannot hold on to anything
Longer than a kiss

I am whimsical
I could cry when you hold me
And laugh when you touch

I am nobody's sweetheart
I am in the gray zone
I linger at the edges of your dreams
Yet I can gaze at the sky
And hide the stars in my eyes
And with a kiss I could
Soak you deep under my skin.

Who teaches us to love like this
As if caught in a silent storm
To flutter and fall; To rise and drown
To be swept along; To lose all hold
I break open at your shore; I shatter

And hurt descends like a many clawed thing
Its dull leaden weight upon my chest
Like a bird of prey; her wings are shadows
Swiftly she alights; And darkness settles

I huddle beneath the open sky
I shiver under my many blankets
The storm has passed
The morning's gray
The sun is but a yellow smudge
The perennial winter has come to stay

In love, I want to be like a vessel seized by storm

Moorings lost and sails cut loose.

Passion, the salty taste that clings on to each grain.

To be tossed high up and back into the tide's arm

Weightless, yet, drenched deep.

Silence

Silence
Like a thin cling film
wrapped over the heart
Stretching painfully with
each beat, desperate

16/05/2014

The darkest hour
       Fear
       Such as never known before
       Seeping into the veins
       Gaseous; poison blue
       The silent suffocation

...

I remember a memory that was yours

A pencil drawn sketch from your everyday
Upon a notebook sheet we flipped through

A monochrome stich in the tapestry
Of long-winding talks woven into the nights

And that is where I remember you now
Inside a memory
Tossed over to me

On Making Love

If it pleases Your Highness
Please have a seat!
We were about to start but
Thought should wait thee
We have read the law books
And have memorized the lines
For foreplay we recited them
To each other twice
Yet being mere citizenry
We are bound to err
Love, (Pardon me!
I said it out loud)
Advises our counsel
Is still running loose
Shall we budge up a little
Are we blocking thy gaze?
Oh,yes..We plead guilty
If  ever to passion we deviate

Have I ever told you ? ;
That, when I shake off the sleep from my eyes,
I wish you would hold me and lull me back to dreams.
That, I thought to tell you how the rain fell on my face
As I left the shade of a sole tree on the slope.
That, how it is that I want you to know
I curl up in my bed just as you do.
That ecstasy is a bicycle ride
with the night in your hair and stars in your eyes.
That we were on a path that briefly met
And I abandoned it for a hike up the hills.

She cannot anchor where her heart belongs
Her love catches the wind like sails
Can never steer clear off the storm
She rips open on jagged rock edges
And among the sea weeds she is entangled
White crystals of salt settle on her scalp
As the ocean breeze tousles
Her gray and black curls..

Ghost of smiles

Of love and other demons
Of a gray long - winding road
Of whispers in the night
Of the ghost of smiles
growing less opaque with days
Of longing and hatred
Of sharp fingernails drawing lines
a little too deep as if to hurt
Of jealousy that clenches
tight upon the chest.
Of a thickly spun web of tales
and to be trapped by its sticky threads
Seduced, Repulsed, Enamoured.

Random

I was on fire
My body
Outside; inside
Starting as timid orange flames
Nurtured by whose desire?
The flames of passion
Leaping out
Again and then again
Now confident, deep red
Caressing and swift.
Fires…destructive, undesirable
Fires… repulsive, formless
Stamped out by a careless feet
A yellow glint
And then the dull gray ash remains

Random

Love,
As I slept among the spring flowers
Last night; I dreamt of our summers
I felt the heat touch my eyelids
And parch my lips ever so slightly.
And anticipated the kiss that would
Wet them back to an easy smile

"In view of the world cup...."

For the first time, i was all alone in my support at the Brazil - Portuguese match. I watched the game in the parlour of a youth hostel at the heart of Lisbon, surrounded by a bunch of Portuguese supporters. The excitement of me and my companions built and waned in exactly opposite rhythms.A loud lady kept harping about the referee being partial to Brazil as I swore under my breath.

I had come to Lisbon to seek an appointment at the consulate of Brazil. The people waiting outside the consulado formed a yellow and green line of anticipation. Along the street and in the metro people rushed to their work dressed in red or yellow with flags and scarves of the team they supported (I sinned by wearing a purple T shirt. Interstingely, Brazil seemed to have more supporters in the streets of Lisbon. The Lisbon branch of Banco do Brazil had put up a notice at its entrance "In view of the world cup during these days the bank ill not function after 2:30".

Well, the game did not offer much to the supporters. Yellow and red flags hung limp on their shoulders as, in loosely knit groups they went about their way. I am back at the youth hostel living room. A larger croud has gathered to watch the Spain - Chile match. As the Spanish suppoters thump the table shouting "Espanha Espanha" i think how easy it is this time- to join the cheer or choose not to!

Random

I.

Me…
Fat girl…
Sweaty and oily- faced
I pant on walking
The world is an eye that crawls over my fleshy bosom
As I sit there under the sky;
Too scared to lie down
For fear of exposure

I dream of foot ball boots
Of air whizzing past my ears
As I run; with the ease of a gazelle
The muscles rippling in my thigh…
In my bicycle kicks I defy gravity…
I aim at the horizon and pay no penalty…

(July 2006)


II.

There aint nothing in these streets anymore
No wild fire flames
No shattered glass panes
For never once these wretched church bells
Ring out the time wrong
With a single hand movement
They shut out all voices
Bless them, but I want back
My city of noises

(June 2010)

Laughter

On the whole, in our classroom laughter is a very calculated thing- a response to an academic joke, a note of sarcasm, genuine surprise on why the Palaeolithic deer looks like a fish! And usually the laughter flies over my head, due to my ignorance of the language. To be fair there is a bit of uncalculated laughter too that flies over my head.

One Saturday afternoon, during one of the ten minutes breaks in the daylong lecture, the class gathered around the little pond outside the museum. Sleet of ice had covered the pond. The last few autumn leaves lay still just beneath the surface. I don’t remember who started it.