Vox

For a long, long time, a private voice had echoed
In the phone; a voice that had set something in me
Free; a voice that sounded like bliss; a voice that
Reeked of a secret language; a voice that talked and
Talked and talked, never pausing to listen, never…
How long has it been, since then? A summer and a
Winter? Will you be back this summer? For a while?
I do nothing these days; I read in the mornings, and
Then write for long hours perched at the dining table…
Mother says, it’s a long life, sixty years for everyone.
Drop a Hello, once in a while; a long tired breath for
Every call… it’s a long, long life darling and I do nothing
These days… at nights, I fancy the phone ringing, and
When I answer, it’s your punctuated breaths again…


Now Playing:: Iktara........Wake up Sid

Maazi

I could never lure him into loving me,
His taste in women was odd;
Emaciated cleavage with the bone
Sticking out, seldom made his gut rot.

You’re too much in love with me;
Shed it; undress; take charge of the skin;
Be a furry creature; ape the apes;
Please me, the way you please words…

That was once upon a time,
And I’ve loved other men since then,
Loved them the way I wanted to;
Loved without shame or rage.

Today, the equality of sexes bore me,
I long for my maazi, whose desire
Made me female, and my shy panicky
Submission that rendered him, male…

Yes, it breaks my heart to see others in love,
Yes, it breaks my heart to see myself
No longer awake, even in dreams…


Now Playing::Woh shaam kuch ajeeb thi...........Kishore

February Muse

During one of his kinky streaks, he asks me if
I could work the lather on his five o’clock shadow;
An ordinary man with saggy man-breasts and
Hirsute complexion and a brutally loveless face (that
brought me to him), how often, he seems so unattainable.
What am I growing into? A woman who can no longer find love?
I agree. Therefore, I try harder every day.
As I shunt in closer I feel his heat getting stitched
Into my breath, buzzing a dull fever in the folds of my anatomy.
Come to me. Stay.
The day wanes in the summer dust of his slurping slippers,
And the future unfolds like a Faustian bargain…


Now Playing::Om namaha............Gitanjali

Love

What time is it now?
Since when?
All the poetry there has been...


Now Playing:: Om namaha...........Gitanjali

Clichéd Heart

Day by day winter is coming to an end; soon
It would be spring and the singing birds would
Stay for a while swirling their songs with anger
In the fragile crucible of my body…the heart is
Bitter, all it seeks is the brutal indifference of summer…

The heart, like a flat-chested prostitute
Looks for love in small exchanges;
Nothing to barter, it waits for rest and
Peace and a silent sunny dream to make friends
In dark crannies, once again.


Now Playing:: Kabhi Kabhi sapna lagta hai...Kishore & Asha

Then & Now

From The Vicar of Wakefield by Oliver Goldsmith

When a lovely woman stoops to folly
And finds too late that men betray,
What charm can soothe her melancholy,
What art can wash her guilt away?
The only art her guilt to cover,
To hide her shame from every eye,
To give repentance to her lover
And wring his bosom is to die.


From The Fire Sermon of The Waste Land by T S Eliot

She turns and looks a moment in the glass,
Hardly aware of her departed lover;
Her brain allows one half-formed thought to
pass:
'Well now that's done: and I'm glad it's over.'
When lovely woman stoops to folly and
Paces about her room again, alone,
She smoothes her hair with automatic hand,
And puts a record on the gramophone.

Not far away

Just the night,
That brings with it,
A long and distant sound
From the streets; of lanky frames
Beating the shuttlecock
In careful vengeance:
Pick, pack, pock, puck…


Now Playing::Aanewala pal.........Kishore Kumar

Mood Music

I had posted this one, as my Facebook status, yesterday evening and it continued to play all through the night along with Dil dhoondta hai phir wohi fursat ke raat din. The reserved longing and the subtle tendency of the lyrics, to hark back to the past, in order to clarify present events, is well nigh orgasmic for long winter nights.

I'm in for yet another long night and I know how to flow through it!

Dil na-umeed toh nahi, na-kaam hi toh hai
Lambi hai gham ki shaam, magar shaam hi toh hai!

Sepia

This evening when I fixed my
Hair and draped myself in one
Of mother’s sarees, the circle was
Completed, as mother and daughter
Greeted each other in mutual confusion
And the house later echoed with some
Mild laughter.


Now Playing:: Bhai batur.........Lata

The Prelude

How often,
At this hour of the night,
I’m reminded of a
Private fantasy;
Of being driven mad
With love,
When held
By the length of
My unruly tresses…


Now Playing:: Jajabara........Akhaya Mohanty

Among other things, December

There’s only the distant dream of sleeping too late and rising slowly around this time of the year. While life interrupts in its ever irritating pettiness throughout the year, December, however, is meant to make an unthinking stab at the proceedings, reeling everything back, as you wait for the cold ghost of the sun to swamp all over your body. But then, the lonely, belong to the wretched kind; they ask for too much too soon or for too little when it’s too late. Sometime in this month, a birthday would be remembered, amidst cakes, confetti, and lots of casual greetings, and a party that would stretch itself till January pulls out a new sun.

Winter is a lot less golden for me. It rings of distant bells, mostly that of longing, and a waiting that gets extended and extended. Lying in bed, curled up all afternoon reading an occasional classic, anticipating a phone call until a cold conversation with an imaginary friend begins to blur the lines and the eyes heavy with sleep. No longer the shrill cry of insects or the vexing flutter of the sparrows (if that’s what the brown ones are known by) when I sit by the window trying to see as much as I can, in what I believe are the last few months at a place where, I’ve seen the sun rising and setting, setting and rising for more than eighteen years now.

Nothing’s coming back;
Long walks are inevitable,
But seasons from now on,
Shall render memories,
Coherent.


Now Playing:: Dikhayi diye yun.............Lata

An End Like This

There’s a place, not too far away from my house,
Where runs a lonely stretch of concrete; so lonely
That you can hear the grunting and choking whine
Of mongrels, sniffing again and again at clichéd places,
Looking for absent morsels. When the darkness closes
In, all you can see is pairs of shining eyes and the sound
Of racing wheels lurking in the distance. How horrible
Would it be to die now! To die thinking about the absent!
Alone. Unwanted. Uncared. How horrible would it be, to
Watch the little one take short, bouncy steps towards a
Blind, lethargic wheel! How horrible would it be to die
On this concrete, without footprints, like the million
Mongrels that die without collars…


Now Playing: Aate jate.........SPB & Lata

Stranger and I

Always the same craving that leads us
To the same one-night cheap hotel, where
Certain floors smell of human urine; offensive,
But not offended, we hasten to the usual.

Sometime later, still lying on the wet sheets,
He inquires, if I remember the story of how
He was molested at the tender age of
Fourteen on a rain filled afternoon?

Laughing out loud, he gives my shin a savage
Tweak. My eyes follow him through the
Length of the room, and for the first time I
Notice his feminine hands on the door knob.


Now Playing:: Aye hairathe aashiqui..........Guru

Untitled

Today, a fellow blogger signed off saying, “its better we stick sharing our creativity, chatting isn’t a great idea, take care and hope you go on with your blog very well.”

What preceded it is a long story… I’m not surprised or shocked. I might have expected it at some level.

Meeting poets I am disconcerted sometimes
………………
Best to meet in poems:
Cool speckled shells
In which one hears
A sad but distant sea.
(Eunice de Souza)