Leave me alone here,
Where the shadows of the sun tickle my feet,
Where sequestered moons of my twenty years,
They rub their silver scales against lonely wounds.
Here, where the night skies wallow in my smallness.

I will worship my own gods
I will fight my own demons
Here, the evening prayer chants carry my soul
Here, the temple’s inner sanctum beckons
Oh, can’t you just leave me alone
You don’t belong

You have not known me
For I have not known myself
I have only caught glimpses
Glimpses of that elusive creature
Of a silken slippery smoke
Feral in her hollow arrogance
Fierce in her empty words

Darkness flows from the dusts you breathe out
Dusts of my own mistake
Trampled by your spiked shoes
Won’t you go, go back into the faraway horizons?
The obscurity from where you came

I shall stay here and brood
Here, where the night skies marvel at my ineptitude
And the deep blue ink blots fitfully over lies uttered
The smell of burnt raw toasts clambers up
Over the antique cloistered walls of rented sorrow

Wait for me by the canopy of orchids on the hills
When I reach there at the very end of my journey
When these roads hide away from my myopia
I shall tell you stories

I shall tell you stories
Of a life lived in absolute futility
Of an eternity spent in waiting
Of incorrigible impracticality
Of unmatched stupidity

I remember, I remember clearly
Those feeble paper boats that drowned in muddy floodwaters
Those earthen cups that exploded in storms of cold white rage
Those rice saplings planted with innocent hopes that never ripened
Those colored popsicles that dissolved before they reached my tongue

You must leave me alone
Here and now
So we can meet within the silent liquid depths of Ganges
Its sacred waters carrying my conversations
And finally, our ashes united in the glory of immortality.

The blind drunk night comes creeping down

Throat heavy with the darkness of moon’s weeping

Silvery tears of estrangement from daylight falling through sleepy trees

It slithers past those solitary swirls of grapevine

Stuck to the walls around my window

I know now how they make wine

The deep red nectar of a night’s loneliness

Stored in curved containment of sad fermenting barrels

I know now how they make wine

The solitary night drowning within the flesh of sour new grapes

It fills them up with the sorrowed sweet poetry of old wisdom

So when you crush them under your tired weathered feet

They empty out

They empty out into the streets of your own memories, your own losses

The kingdoms of your banished ghosts swirl about in liquid depths

An alibi for living with the hollow blankness of failures

A fallen soul cries, cries among the ruins of ancient buildings

It doesn’t hope for help, but it hopes for a whiff of fine wine.

I put my cheeks against the cold window panes

And I feel the outside sinking inside me

Diamond studded skies sparkling with ruby stars

They melt away slowly in my loving gaze of longing

Little drops of red raining down into the crystal glasses

Those crystal glasses held between long fingers

Wet with kisses from lips trembling with pained silence

I know now how they make wine

I know now why they drink wine

It makes amnesia fashionable

It brings the elusive happiness just a little bit closer

And suddenly all evil and sin is swept under the rug

Everything disappears, at least for a while.  

The wine of night’s tragedy sleeps in the crevices of my mind

I dream of it often and it flows out from the slits of my eyes

I know about the stubborn red wine stains that refuse to go away

No, I know they just won’t yield.

The wines of night’s ugly mistakes crawl with the shadows of your skin.

And then the blind drunk night comes creeping down yet again.

I see it clearly silhouetted against my own blindness.

It had been building over time.

The fire collapsing into the water pulling it upwards till the difference blurred.

And then the heavens opened up with deluge of an eternity’s wait, awakening the parched earth.

Thus she was born.

“So, its true. It is a she.” Her father smirked, replacing the speck of pink flesh back into the cradle. 

“Yes.” Her mother answered, head bowed in acceptance of an unforgivable transgression perpetrated in her womb.

As ‘Sita’ grew up, the seed of light burst out of her in brilliant flashes of innocence, briefly illuminating the murk around. It worried her mother to know that ‘Sita’ was destined to fly. And fly so high that even if she stretched her hands and tried to hold ‘Sita’ in her arms, she wouldn’t succeed. She felt a sense of duty and reverence towards this curious fruit of providence. So in her own quiet determined way she attempted to hide ‘Sita’ from the evil eyes of the predators surrounding her.

Besides, her own life had been snatched away from her and held hostage to the whims of men. She didn’t want the vicious cycle to be repeated again for she knew how precious ‘Sita’ was.  She remembered the day when she first learnt that her dignity of existence could be ripped to shreds for no reason. It was the day she felt the searing hot hollow of nothingness, as she was accused of being a sinner, a rotten characterless whore bound to sleep with the entire village, a slut without any respect for the family name. All this because she had flying kites with some boys and had been better at it than them.

....To be continued...

WINTER DAYS:

Winter mornings and honeydew memories sheathed in fraying coats of lost moments.

I am reminded of my grandfather; his graying hair fast loosing ground, a dim amber halo around him as he treaded slowly into the demure sun. And I am reminded of our long walks together. His soft wet palms wrapped firmly around my fingers whilst he led me through the dense mists towards the school bus. The look of finality on his face as he waved goodbye, like I would never come back.  

Winter mornings and chatoyant epiphanies mingled with dilute happiness.

I am reminded of my grandfather; he smelt of soap and burnt tobacco, an indulgent smile playing on his lips even as he blew smoke into the air. And I am reminded of the gentle creaking sound of wood while he sat rocking in his chair. Those horn-rimmed glasses lay gently on his nose as he turned the pages of an ancient mythology with his sluggish fingers.

Winter mornings and mellow light filtering through clouds in sequined marginal smudges.

I am reminded of my grandfather; the smooth illogicality of all his assurances, where everything fit. And I am reminded of the things he used to say. That life is always about the little things. A steaming cup of sweet tea and some challenging crossword puzzles. The pink roses in our garden and tassels of some mundane conversations with me. Simple stuff like that, nothing profound or complex. 

Winters and the prescient rustling of leaves with the impatient winds.

I am reminded of my grandfather; his starched crisp white cotton pajamas, the musty scent of old spice cologne that lingered wherever he went. And I am reminded of how he always helped me with my homework. He made everything seem so easy. Mathematics was no longer an impossible knot to untangle and History was no longer a bleary desert possessed of ghosts and shadows.   


Winters and pristine whiteness sprinkled in butterfly abandon.

I am reminded of my grandfather. I miss him, a lot. I made huge mistakes with him. I pulled away. I took him for granted. I thought he wasn’t cool enough to be my friend anymore. I live with the guilt of not having said goodbye. I live with the guilt of not having cared enough. I regret that I couldn’t show gratitude to a man who showed me what being a man is all about.


 

Grandpa, I hope you can forgive me. I am old and still alive but already forgotten. I guess I now know what you went through. Life has a way of going around in circles, teaching you lessons, till death spreads its wings and you fly away with it.

When she was young, she would pry glass jars open, releasing the ugly caterpillars inside, watching them break the cocoon and metamorphose into pretty butterflies that fluttered away free into the wide blue skies.

She yearned to be a butterfly.

When she was young, she discovered that butterflies are the quintessential migrants, traveling extensively, carrying the souls of people, spreading the nectar of life that diffuses into the fragrant air.

She yearned to be a butterfly.

When she was young, she found that butterflies don’t live long, attacked as they were by ruthless predators- hunger on their depraved tongues, a retribution suffered for being blessed with grace and dignity.

She yearned to be a butterfly.

************************************************************************

Then she got a little older and stopped thinking of butterflies.

Soon, darkness came looking for her.

It was a stormy night. She was alone, in her squalid room, possessed of grimy dampness.

And then she felt,

Shadows bursting in flames,

White-hot inside of her,

Smoke-filled soot,

Clogging and cloying,

Fighting for space,

When there was none.

And then she felt,

Pain exploding in spasms,

An eternity’s electric bitterness,

Spreading its tentacles,

Crude carnal thirst,

Draining her blood,

When there was none. 

And then she felt,

Her modesty burning in fits,

Within the forests of peeling plasters,

The vortex of misery,

Spiraling into great depths,

Wrecking her life,

When there was none.

Thus, she learnt to hate, that night, with a passion so strong, it never dissipated. It shattered her mind, her heart, and her spirit.

Those wounds festered and never healed. She became a slave to them, and they became her masters. Often, they came hunting, as the walls closed in, the roof crumbled, and the floor dissolved into a liquid mess. They protected her from a self-destructive desire to live in denial.  

But she realized one day that she preferred mirages to realities.

And so she ran away.

*******************************************************************

She became a gypsy. She liked that nobody knew her and she knew nobody. She felt pure and austere. She felt like an ascetic who had renounced everything to profound solitude.

She didn’t want to rest, now. Not ever. And through the windows of time frozen, she observed faces, and people—there was an eerie simplicity about them. She tried to anchor herself in the hazy blurriness of a few moments she had spent with them. She couldn’t. She had no roots.

However, she would always carry the root of darkness with her. After all, it was her only shelter. ************************************************************************

“Ah! Sunday mornings...” He thought.

And the day broke demurely through folds of satin over her face, the fluid contours of light and dark, disappearing into her skin. She slept peacefully, that angel of innocence. The velvety pinkness of her nightgown spilling over like lathered waves into the crisp white linen beneath. He had made love to her, the night before, passionately. As if there would be no end, everything fast fading into a trembling haze of liquid oblivion. Eventually, however,  exhaustion had crept in and they had drifted into gentle slumber, their fingers entwined, deep fulfillment gushing through their being, dissolving boundaries into faint silhouettes.

They were like fresh dewdrops on a leaf-blade flowing calmly into each other, glistening as one with the sun etherized in it.

“Ah! Sunday mornings and paradise...” He thought.  

And he reclined languidly in bed. Watching the ceiling fan swirl slowly in serene circles over his head. Listening to the sporadic melodious tinkle of the wind chime as it danced with the soft breeze. Drowning shadows of the week’s disappointments in moldy pages of novels he re-read. Drinking the sounds of people as they wandered to the streets wearing happiness on their sleeves. Observing the moths flutter against the dim glow of corner lamps covered with silk scarves. Feeling the sudden emptiness in the pit of his stomach after sipping umpteen cups of hot brown coffee. And swaying to the soothing beats of classic mush rock on the old stereo in low volume.

 “Ah! Sunday mornings and her, here, now...” He thought.

And she woke up to the lingering wet aroma of his lips on hers, her entangled hair forming a limp wispy canopy on the pillow. The unlatched frosted glass windows basking in the bluish tinged gold of the skies, restlessly moved in and out. She looked in that direction to the green grass outside, oozing sweet sticky sweat through seams of lost time. Resting her slender manicured fingers delicately on his face, she traced a long curve leading to his chest, pushing him down, flat on the cold marble floor. Her alluring laughter in thin teasing raspy voice, echoed inside the closed concrete walls. Shoulders thrown outwards in puerile defiance of his intentions, she called him to her.  

“Ah! Sunday mornings and eternities…” He thought.

“Ah! Sunday mornings and the kiss of death…” He thought.