Paradoxical Living

Can I just pull this day off by sleeping
Sleeping till the time when the world gets over
Over and beyond the system it has created
Created from the ashes of previous systems that have died too—
Too much of the restraints on humans.
Humans have a tendency to create a world which is unhealthy for them
Themselves then becoming the creator, forbearer, manipulator, rebel, and victim of it
It is now seen that nothing of what humans tend to indulge in has a sense of permanence
Permanence that resides in truth and real happiness
Happiness, however, we have learnt to devalue, give away
Away to the suckers of our happiness
Happiness is seen as a selfish act
Act then we do to show how happy are we
We live in contradictions and paradoxes
Paradoxes such as humans are good and virtuous
Virtuous person has to live his life going against the flow of the system
System to which we all are bind
Bind then we are to our fate that tells
Tells us to remain in sufferings all our lives.
Lives a man with no will to live
Live, if you can, live
Live like nobody has ever lived
Live and keep on living
Living like nobody can ever live
Live for the sake of living
Living till we die.

A Great Missing

Being an artist is a tough job
And the toughest part of it isn't that you create art
Or that you earn well from it
Or get fame and be photographed
Gossiped about in the magazines
Called for the seminars, invited to the finest dines.
No, this ain't the tough part.
The tough part is to remain true to your heart
To remain genuine, honest, humble, dignified
To value the integrity of your art, even before your own esteem
To know that there is no other life
Worth living.
The life devoid of embracing the journey, good and bad, tough and easy, valued and not valued
The whole of it—
Isn't worth living as long as
You are not doing your best
Not the best in the relative terms of the other artists
But the best of your self, where every cell of your body is working towards
Your very purpose of life.

And today we have lost one such artist
The finest actor, the greatest gift to the Indian cinema
A man of honour, a man of perseverance, a man of humility
A man who had stayed true to his art
A man whose good humour and humbleness extends out to even those who had never met him
A man who has touched the heart of each one of his audience like a perfect gentleman
Always reflecting the truth of whichever character he played in his gentle eyes
Imitating only his inner reflections
A man who came to us in many forms
Each one of which will be missed, cherished and remembered forever.

Leaving us heart-wrenched, what we feel remains scarce of enough words
Even the sky was once jealous of the star we had on our earth
Difficult as it is, but now maybe it's time to say
"Wo jo tha khwaab sa, kya kahein jaane de... "

RIP.

The Travelers

There are places that once and often had crept into my mind
Through the crevices of the voids which always exist in each of my present moment
Whenever I ain't traveling.

I am so fond of traveling that when I ain't doing the places,
I do the thoughts, the people, the interests, and the perceptions
So much so that people have waited too long enough to see my stabilized and static state
Before turning disappointed and making a decision to leave or stay.

And whenever I am on any travel
I carry a pocketful of dreams
And at every stop I collect wings of hope
To carry them back with me
Which I nurture in return, and use them to flutter myself away
From the futile shadows of the past.

And with those pocketful of dreams, I seek out for
An uttermost and distantly beautiful mountain top
Entering the voyeurism of admiring
How sunrays embrace those snow-capped peaks
Creating a perfect union of scorching hot and frosty cold
Letting their emotions, their love flow through the melting glaciers
Turning into the spilling of over-brinked emotions as waterfalls
Causing an endless flow of rivers and seas
Not stopping until the love reaches its eternal mergence

Where another set of my dreams
Sit on the rim of the earth
And gaze into the imperceivable depths
From the place which you call centre of the horizon.

A Calling

They say that
If you want to see how you have been living through the years,
   go on an unplanned trip.

I don't choose my places to travel,
   they choose me.

I hear a calling, deep into my heart
Until I pack my bag, and just walk
   to a place unknown.

You know, how you see a place is how
   that place prefers to reveal itself to you.

And all that goes inside your heart
Reflects through your experiences in the outer world;
How you deal with it
   is the crux of how you deal with your life in general.

And what you take with you—
   the learnings, wisdom, memories, bondings
Stays with you forever.

Lessons on Love

"Places you can find love
It sits around lurking in places"
Such like crevices and abysses
Or on either sides of it.

Love is a walk over an edge
And crossing over the bridge
Reaching out to another heart
While carefully treading your speed.

Some people love too fast, some I have seen loving too slowly
And before you can make any room for love in your mind,
Lust already seeps in.
And for the fast ones, they have already caught the train
Which takes their ride to a fantastical world 
Without their lover's stains.
And you end up loving one
Who's far from the real face
You end up having an imaginary love affair
With someone who ain't ready to stay.

And so while you fall, befriend your heart with your mind
Lest your mind clouds your vision
From distinguishing left from right
And you'd be muddled up and be lost in the
Wrong direction.

And don't lose the sight of whoever it is you are chasing
Be aware of how much of you they are tolerating
And keep your mind open to the possibility of
Things and people turning to cheating.

For what is worse than being jilted
Is living with false assurances of love
Let the truth fall out like the leaves in autumn
So that the tree may stand bare and forlorn.
But that, my dear, is a beautiful sight, don't despair
Marvel how you have grown inside by the break of light
After this tremendous repair.
And one day you shall then perhaps
Walk gently into the love, my dear.

The Perfect Window

There was a window leading into the paradise
With lush greens around, marble-sand, and restless stillness of the river
Where the bed was as carefully made in the tent as the weather had shielded us from the storms
Of mountains which may surprise us any moment,
But not tonight.

We made fire, washed our dishes, made tea, time and again
Had some sausages, veggies, rice and food cans
Our heart floated in poetry and songs
We talked about things deep down in our throats
It was a valley of love, the love of nature
The wind carried the freshness of flowers in its currents
And where we sat contained the deep understanding of what makes the earth
And everything that lives on it.

Towards the evening we would go and collect more wood,
Make the fire dance in jolly
Cook a feast for the dinner
Add ganges water in our inebriant 
Clank glasses to our oneness with the mother earth
Let the fire mark its reflection in our pupils and illuminate the darkness of our hearts
While the night around seeped the bright of moon and stars. 

Mercy of an Axe

Lesterday I received a yetter from an axe
He said he was borry for all his sad intent
He fished to be friends and hissed how we tranced
Together in our company, how innocently we pranced
And uplifted our spirits howards the teights of delight
Mocked for hours from norning till the might
And de-spite how he lied in-spite his lofty love of
His heart which he blamed to have belonged to mine
Is asking foe for friendship with no guilt on his face,
And has flamed me for the fallacy I felt for his another dame
Is looking out for mercy he hasn't sought an apology for
Thinking I shall remain crooked just for his fake sake.

Your Beautiful Spirit

Have you ever looked upon yourself proudly
Like maybe your parents would have done it to you sometime?
Have you ever admired yourself, look yourself in the eye
Like you remember your childhood lover doing it to you in those times?
Have you ever looked as fresh as a morning dew
As blossoming as a flower
As bright as the full moon
As resourceful as the sun
As expressive as the ocean in its high tide
As excited as the chirruping birds?
Have you ever compared your mood swings to the waning or waxing moon
Looked into your darkness like you look into the night sky
And find the stars?
Have you ever traveled light years ahead in your thoughts?
Have you ever gone back in time
And hugged your younger self tight
Remembering the days when you had needed it the most and nobody was around?
Have you ever stayed as loyal to yourself as to your friends whom you had promised a drink party after a movie night?
Have you ever run fast enough to catch yourself from losing a part of you for the sake of some other person?
Have you ever convinced yourself into understanding what is right for you like you do to your best friend?
Have you hugged yourself, kissed your hand, and looked yourself in the eye to tell
That you are just as beautiful as any terrific thing you have ever seen or known?
As beautiful as you were when you were born.
When you didn't care about how you look, what you wear, or if you are carrying any scar of birth mark.
Did you not see how bravely you came out into this world
Which you now judge to be full of bad people and evil things,
Do you remember how it felt when you were first able to look around
And see the birds, the plants, the sunshine refracting through the window in myriad hues?
Do you remember the soft touch of that comfortable pillow beneath your head, and the touch of graceful, most beautiful hand in the world — on your forehead
Cradling you to sleep
With a soft humming melody
Of the voice you had felt deep down into each vein and every artery coming in and going out of your heart?
Do you remember the first time you ever felt your own heartbeat, counted your own pulse
Looked at your own smile, for the first time in the mirror? And then smiled at yourself back again?
Do you not see and remember all these while looking at your own reflection?
How often do you forget how wonderful you are?
How graceful you are?
And how more loving you can be?

Unfits of the Cityscape

For whom are these places built
Where one can live with a family and friends, go to schools
Swing in the parks
Ride a bike or a wooden horse
Find a job, save in the banks, and invest in the market
Have festivals, the mainstream ones, and feast about it
Have a culture, a lifestyle, a clothing, a marriage,
An occasion, pregnancies, and discuss politics over the drinks?
Building concepts such as socialising
And anti-concepts like social distancing?
And who are these rest of the people
Lying at the suburbs, the boundaries, the peripheries of these kind of places?
Hardly having even a blanket to live by for the rest of their lives,
Or be born with some heterosexual deformities
The ones whose cultures don't take part in the mainstream
Their ceremonies, foods, music, clothing, and traditions
Everything differs from rest of the history written in the books
The people who roam around unrecognized, unacknowledged
With no homes, or sophistication
But a heart full of emotions and a mind of wisdom
Bequeathed down from ages
Which sometimes reaches the threshold of forgiveness and negligence
On being tortured and disrespected.
What are these cities, and these people
That never happen to merge in one whole identity?
And where on one side the over-populated and over-ambitious cities
Are built over the foundations of some dark kept secrets
Causing its incompleteness,
There is another side
Where people live on the edge of the sword of hypocrisy
Guarding their principles that nobody understands, and
Living as fragmented, non-humanised, incomplete
Structures of human species
Camouflaging their identities into disappearance.

Cities and their Politics

There are broken cities
Lying around in the house of man and woman
Who had drunk-fucked each other at night
And in the morning, fought over it—
Over who holds more power
In the house, on the other's mind
Judging each other for their moves
Dissatisfied, laying bare their ugliness
And temperament that now holds no bounds,
Soon enough convert the whole house
Into some crashing sounds, broken pieces
A dump yard, this place is.
One by one each leave the house
And one at a time they come back with a different lover
Drunk-fucking them
And throwing these visitors out after few hours
Of still-no-satisfactory experience.
The cities, like objects are hung around their house
As mantles, flowered vases, doorknobs, suitcases et al
And day by day the occupants—
After losing their hearts over each other in some
Once-upon-a-time kinda passionate love
And later their minds in each other's overbearing company—
Have unleashed each other off the commitment,
Unhooked their desires and insecurities
Dumped off the broken bits of leftover trust
Yet lived together still, like some karma that keeps hanging over your shoulder
From one lifetime to another.
But they aren't bothered
And when they do get bothered
They start losing a part of their body, the organs, the structure
And the whole plot of their body gets deframed
Into some unrecognizable absurdity
Of these fragmented relationship
In whose house, these broken cities reside.

Prayer

Open the wings of your heart
Open its sky, let it shine bright with love
And empathy
Before you raise your voice
To the Almighty
Remember all his children
Your brothers and sisters
Sans any confines
Remember them in your words
And with your arms up higher,
Higher up extended in the air
Pray, oh beauty!
Pray with your soul bare.

My Poetic Journey

On discovering that I can write too
Like rest of the poets in the world
I'd jump up in excitement and choose my audience
And recite to them all my written stuff.
They applauded and I swelled with more motivation
To make them read more and more
They were just being kind, I later got to know
When I couldn't stop my laugh after reading what I then wrote.

With time I sunk in deeper layers of imagination
People told me that I write about the unsaid things
Some were mesmerised and some were awed
They either understood my writings or absolutely did not.
One of them even came out to tell me
That he has been stealing ideas from my poetry.
I was a little disturbed, there was no way to track
But I knew he couldn't get it written with the same meaning as I had.

Soon the life turned complicated
Since poetry was the direct expression of all my thoughts and feelings
Now I wanted to be read, but not seen through
So I started encoding my poetry with undecipherable cues.
And thence came the readers with interpretations more wilder
What I meant and what they inferred was entirely unrelated
But a new section of responses got added in my treasure
They asked me how I am able to write which only their mind has reflected.

And no sooner I got trapped in the weirder side of life
Despite everything being fine, I was losing myself slice by slice
The truth became too blunt, the lies were charming
The truth became ugly, the lies were embalming.
Though I was prospering, I was losing my poetic side
And now with this quarantine, I confronted the truth I'd been keeping aside
I've lost most of my previous readers now, but have gained some new
Many of them are amazing poets themselves, but it seems pleased are very few.

The Human Judgement

In the duly hollow privileges
Of a tantrum-hit city
A raven, a Cheshire cat, and a pesky rat
Collected on an amphitheater stage—
They brought their own seating.

They wondered what to do with the world
Now that the humans are losing power
And probably die in number of lacs
Leaving the planet to their likes
And so, now, on them the responsibility lies.

The cat led, the raven judged, and the rat had all the chance to speak but
The rat, he said, we must first learn what brought the human
To the demise of their race
So the mistake may be refrained from being
Repeated again
The cat nod.
Raven only said, "nevermore".

And so the rat began
With no control ove' his mind or tongue
And judged the humans for being greedy—
"Losing their minds in the black hole of their systematized cities
They are getting consumed in their own insanity
Ready to lose the ones dearest to their hearts even."
The cat just nod.
The raven only said, "nevermore"

And so continued the rat
Reminding an old tale of greed
But their ain't no pied piper of Hamelin anymore
Who'd ease the pain again or take away this Covid-whateve'
And even if there was one, the humans won't bother to live still
They survive merely, doomed for their creed.
The cat merely nod.
But the raven said, "nevermore"

Continuing, the rat told, how the rich seek the Figaro olive oil, or Baskin Robbins's ice-cream or Nik Baker's bread
And is ready to sue the government for not providing their stomach-filled hungers with strawberries and kiwis
And on the other hand, the poorest of the poor find no meal, and the lesser poors need a variety in their meal
With more of free veggies and different skins and meat.
There is a sandwiched class also, having faith in the country or politicians more than they have it in the doctors even
—I wonder what they mean when they say country though (added the raven)—
That's right, said the cat, the humans are humans and they remain the same everywhere, like always, ill-bred and inhumane
—"Yeah, but nevermore"

But, said the cat, they got a spirit to survive well
I'm sure they'll find a way out of this too
And even if they get to die in lacs
They'll use their religion or the fear of other religions to reproduce more and more
And those new ones, will be filled with more hate maybe
More prejudices, more disgusts, more egos, more impatience, and more minds than the hearts
Humans always come up with a new system, if the previous one fails
But I have hardly seen them dying for sure
They'd kill rather, if they're dying
But they don't die alone.
"Hmm," raven reacted, "nevermore"

Then we got not to worry, excitedly jumped up the rat from his seat of foamy rotten bread
(which he'd got from the trash lying outside and near the dustbin lying unattended in that premises only,
Swarming with insects of different breeds
And of course, complemented with an uneasy smell of pungency)
We got not to worry at all, the rat said giving a dancing motion to his words and waving his arms up in the air,
We ain't like them
None of it of what we discussed
And hence when this race perishes forever and ever and ever,
We wouldn't have to worry a bit
The nature will take care of us
Having saved the planet for us
And we shall survive with our capability and fate and the nature's design
Which we wouldn't have to question but merely to live by
And now we only got to wait for all the humans to die
From their own faults and ill-humor and misconceptions and hatred and greed and selfishness and lack of wisdom or kindness or love or empathy
"Don't get too excited, rat!" the cat said with a poker face
"I've lived with the humans closely.
If God doesn't help them, they stop believing in Him.
And if they find it is nature's doing
They might end up attacking more fervently
Leaving not just their kind, but not a single one of our kind alive either
So be glad things ain't that bad still as of yet"
And the raven added, "nevermore"

All three got quietened with a "phew".
And just while these questions swirled and whirled around them
The answer was somewhere blowing in the wind too.

Fluttering Hope

Wait, dear blue butterfly! Take no flight.
Sit upon my palm
And hear my prayer
Carry the burden of my hope
Upon your fluttering wing
I got some words to say
Take them away with the wind.
Sprint to the nearest flower
Bring me its nectar and make a bond of vow
Promise me you shall take away with you
This smile I am carrying on my lips
Deliver it across all the boundaries of politics
And let all the men and women carry it to their death.
May not a child move his crayon without a smile
And no beggar shall stay devoid of it either
And may the doctors come with one each
Out of the operation theater.

May the farmers smile on seeing
The rain and sun on time
And let a smile play on every lover's face
Despite the separation of any kind.
May everyone appreciate each one
On the delight of their progress and prosperity
Let their be no jealousy,
Make smile play on every lip.

May a smile reach out to
Anybody whose day has gone bad
And dispatch one smile to anyone who is
Disheartened by the God's plan.
Sprinkle some smiles in the dreams
Of every person who's fast asleep
As like a flurry onto
A man sweating in hot summer steam.

Chastened Being

Seeing your face in bits and pieces
Reflecting through shattered mirror lying all around
You let its trenchant and shabby corners
Prick you in your heart
Where you have kept your mortifications
Averted and concealed
Clumping through the ages
All instances of indignity

Falling into the crooked delights
In the hollow conglomerate of night and day
Sitting cross-legged, blind-eyed, love-chased
Right across the obscenity of your infidel

Face-palmed you sat in a dreamless state
Across your manifested reveries
Seeing them hollow-eyed yet you remained
In the desert you thought fancy-filled

You sought adventures in your nocuous friendships
And clanked glasses to all afflictions
The time of your life flushed out through tubes
Into the reeking gutters

You condoned all the wrong-doings
But self-reproached for your impuissant being
And let the selfish world prey on you
When you treated them with undeserving esteem

The child in you was hid in a corner
The writer in you cached all the writings
The lover in you has turned to atheism
And your youthful spirit has died a few times already

And yet you seek no apology is a shame
Your reflection through shattered glass hold no remorse
But since you hold the confessions in your heart
Your higher being has forgiven you through the course.

Storm of the Mighty Red Desert

Hail! O Storm
Of the mighty Red Desert!
Glorious you! How benign
In your splendrous ousia
Your vastness stretches to reach an afterworld alliance
Making a good old Captain Praxis
Disinherit his eudaimonia.
You who have bequeathed the humanity
With unperturbed ataraxia.
The backhanded cloud stand no chance
To climb that mountain
Where inhabits the pious elements of your sand
In its agathon rocks.
You, who cause a determined outcome
In writing off an apocalyptic fate.
Oh Unlimited! What it takes
To attempt a conciliation
With my mind if it ever cease to belaud
My astronomic Lord?!
May I be deprived of my matronymic prestige
If I ever breach the misology by expound,
And if I ever still commit such a sin
Grant my apology with only the runaround.

Epilogue to an Unwritten Book

With the closing book cover, who all shall seek its end?
The greatest of stories are lived through, they don't become obsolete or dead.
The characters still aspire big,
They haven't turned strong, they are still weak
And as you became a witness to the stronger bonds
Some follies in their nature still lives.
Happy are not the endings, sad are not the deaths
All you have lost along the book
Will have to remain in your head
Those who stayed alive by the writer's mercy
Are only but walking on the edge of their demise
And if this book hasn't yet stirred some controversy
In your heads and talks, is but a surprise.

And I shall take your leave for now
Writing is tedious,
And the protagonist still makes me raise my brow.

I ain't hinting on any sequel
Stay in restless peace, my dear reader.

On One Fine Day With a Friend

He was sitting right in front, a god damn friend
There was a table in between, and two cups of tea, diary, and pen
He asked me to write then and there
I asked him why
He asked instead why you shouldn't, in fact?
I didn't want to write then and gave a myriad of reasons
However he made me realize that those were excuses mere.
And when I lost all my defenses to his reasons
He asked me to write.
He took away my cup of coffee and phone
And pushed my diary towards my side
I was cleansed of every reason,
Thought, desire, and need
There was nothing left but words on diary to wreathe
He asked me to write, again.
And just as I held the pen in my hand, I tried making one last excuse
But he didn't let it escape my mouth
Before I could come up with another of my obtuse
He asked me to write. Again.
I picked up the pen, pulled my diary and got in the mood.
He asked me if I need anything else.
No, I said. I have my diary and pen.

He told me to write everything that comes to me
Everything that I've reckoned and esteemed
Everything that is mine. Everything I had misspent or was depleted of.
Every person I have chanced upon.
Every fancy I had beheld.
Every lore I have constellated.
Every actuality I have perceived.
He asked me to write about me
About him.
About the person I love.
Write the words I want to say to that person.
Write my hugger-muggers.
Write the desires I have held close to my heart.
Write my discomfitures, my infirmities.
My flusters, my pleadings
He asked me to write, write nonetheless
Bewitched, I kept on writing
As the words directly flowed out through my mind
And I tumbled myself into
Some other person's mind
I wrote enormously about that person, all his in and outs
But got stuck at a point, where my ethical mind created a doubt
And I felt I needed that person's permission
To delve further into his heart
I made my pen stop
I need to stop here, I remarked.

I Stole a Cigarette for my Teddy Bear

I stole a cigarette for my teddy bear
Which I had kept soft and sound for years.
Lying at the side of my bed, crawling to my floor, hiding in my drawer
Reading my books
Carrying my bag
And doing my homeworks.
When I grew up, the teddy, growing old, worn and torn, but soft and sound
Demanded a cigarette for some old times' sake of his.
Stupefied, I asked, why do you need?
I am growing older, you see - I have seen days and times that no longer exist.
I have seen the wise turn into fools
I have seen the departure of the carefree days
I have seen neglect and ignorance
No insects come to cheer me up
I miss the company of my own kind.
When you were small, you kept me amongst other toys
They were fond of me. They grew fond of me.
I was better than any new toy you bought.
And I was your favourite.
Everybody knew that I was your favourite.
Perhaps that's why you still keep me around.
But you leave me alone
Most of the times I am stuck in my solitude
I seek attention. I am dismayed.
I don't get kissed.
Even when you hug me to sleep
You throw me off once you are in your slumber.
I am not complaining, I am just...
I feel nostalgic.
I need a cigarette
To think it all through.
His words moved me.
After all the love and affection I have got from him all through these years
This is the only demand he has ever made.
So I went out to steal a cigarette for my lovely little bear.

How to Be a Poet

Writing poem makes you a poet
Sometimes writing poem makes you a poet
Taking a break while writing poem makes you a poet
Eating, sleeping or drinking while writing poem makes you a poet
Not writing but feeling deeply makes you a poet
Not feeling deeply but expressing well makes you a poet
Basking in the sun or climbing up the trees makes you a poet
Reading others' poems and then writing your own makes you a poet.

Eglantine

Meadow Saffron!
When my Musk eyes
Were able to Peach Blossom your Bridal Rose
And your Morning Glory was Alyssum
I was in Amethyst of your Arbor Vitae
And in your embrace I felt no less than an Auricula
But now I Bramble your Candytuft
The Coreopsis Fern for you has turned into Dead Leaves
You are now a Bud of White Rose
And though the Daisy Cudweed of our Harebell to Ivy may remain
As a Motherwort in my Osmunda
My Cloves will henceforth be my Cranberry.

A Hay(na)ku

A
Peculiar face
Staring at me

I
Acutely afraid
Shut my eyes

Heartbeats
Get intense
I feel stroke

Headache
Is blocking
Clarity of thoughts

Trapped
No escape
I approach fate

Boom!
I felt
My veins blasting

Opening
My eye
I slightly peek

Face
Still there
Smell my fear

Shit!
His hands
Encircle my throat

I
Scream loud
But no sound

Sweat—
The temperature
Is getting hot

Fear
Is making
My blood cold

God!
Dear lord!
Please! I pray

But
Death instead
Heard my say

My
Soul may
Now depart anytime

My
Whole body
Is going numb

Splash!
Get up!
Adjured my mum.

Laid & Rested

All Poets Are Liars

Lovers' paradise, eternal longings, heightened desires, heart's rekindled fires!
Hence the notion found early in ancient thought that all poets are liars.

The truth remains there is no gain in any fulfillment of our comprehension
And all affairs somehow ends much before life's suspension.

Once the honeymoon phase has passed, the lovers seem tensed, and it becomes a play of attention

The needs are done,
The fools we become
Dangling onto each other's obsession.

He once loved me well and I loved him too
In this trap I fell
He wore a mask, I ignored his faults
And I called this love true.

Poet's talked about virtues in love
And loving beyond distances and time
I'd rather say we only love, nothing more than
What's right in front of our sight.

Had I never known him, nor he me, we would have never faultly loved
But here comes the poet again saying we only meet each other with luck.

And luck is such a futile chance
We meet, we love, but never with mutual intention.
And this luck bores nothing more
Than some momentary display of affection.

Which of course ends,
And everything is only left to be mend—
From our insecurities, disappointments to our egos and defense.
And we choose to loose (our commitment)
In order to seduce
The girl in the office, or even someone we've never met.

The poets talk about erotic passions
Lustful wildfires
Sparkling eyes
And orgasmic delights.
But how many of you end up having
Every love making
With mutual interest
And not eventually on their terms?
The kisses turn stale
Love in the eyes has gone pale
And the lofty sighs become irritating to your eardrums.

And so I say
Love is just a life lived in some hypocritical way
With no muse or sense—
An affair of pretense!

Remains of Rainforest Discovered in Antarctica

The other day when I read that the 'Remains of
90-million-year-old Rainforest (has been) Discovered in Antarctica'
Which probably was the age of more heat in the air
As the levels of carbon dioxide were usually high then
Sustaining the life and growth of flora and fauna.
In that land devoid for 4 months of any sunlight
I wondered then how must have the world died?
Recalling the age long clash between
The dominance of fire and ice.

What made the heated lush-green rain-forested land,
Probably full of life and all the liveliness
Turn into a cold-blooded reign of snow
Which only melts its way towards the catastrophic slope
Just like the glaciers are now melting at much higher degree there
And ozone is far from recovering the hole in its layer
Probably it shall all eventually melt away
With induced carbon dioxide at man-made rate
And this time the earth may burn in fire
Unlike how it happened in the good old days.

And all then will turn to ash
The rest of it will all melt
And the earth will again look alike
As when it was born with only the water in sight
And before we might just come to sing—
"Water water everywhere" in high string
We'll first burn ourselves in hate
Fight and kill — just like we've been doing
Whereas more forests will burn for a while
As Amazon and Australian bushfires akin
Until all is dead — burnt and killed.

And then all will be dead — killed and burnt
A new life will have its next turn.

Bosch's Garden of Earthly Delights

And when O Master daubed the garden
With joy and blush and lusty gaze
The eyes of God seduced in itself
With the intent He had for Adam and Eve
I knew the heaven that O Master painted
Too surreal for the Earthly Delights
Has got to go wrong somewhere
I secretly planted fear in Eve's hidden eyes.

When O Master moved to the central canvas
He filled it up with trees and fruits and luring sights
The humans all naked and captivating
Were joyous and fetching with no consequences
I saw the dances, I saw the loves, I saw the endearments, I saw no blush
I saw an earmarked freedom prevailing
In the absence of any God or Devil
The humans were at best in their co-living spaces
Playfully flirting with all existences.
There was no death, or any dearth of benison
The sun shined bright, all day and night
And love was made in full sight
And in unison.

Still carrying the blush in my bristles
I picked up on the darker side of pallette
And soon began a game on
The right side of the canvas' panel.
It was horrific, gruesome, and imbecile
What I was made to paint now had no good thrill
O Master! O Master! Why did you do?
That's how the God wish, mate.
What God O Master? Who his own creation blew?
A sadist one, O Master states.

They did no wrong, they got nothing to do else
Why are they undergoing this horrendous treatment?
If you had your share of pleasure, you've got to repent
That's the whole game of existence.

Who decides what pleasure is moral or immoral
That lust must be immobile, who decides?
If one isn't supposed to indulge in earthly pleasure
Why then have the varied genitiles?
What then of the other sins that need consequences
The killings and unkindness, manipulation and stealths?
Where shall one suffer the punishment for them
If the hell would be full for just doing a simple thing?

The greatest sin of all is seeking the pleasure
From the fruits and resources available on the earth
The rest of actions are a mere task
Borne out of the human subconscious.
Pleasure needs taming, pleasure is to be bound
Pleasure is not we live for
Pleasure got to be silenced, it must not sound.
Scream you rather, shriek in pain
Call out loud, call the God's name
Let the God know that you need Him most
But on seeking pleasure, you forget him
And you your own pride boast.

What then are you doing? — Sorry O Master for what I say.
But ain't you also seeking pleasure, somehow in your own way?
Of painting and no paining, of being prideful of your art
Are you not then obviously, not missing the God?

Artists' delight is internal, it remains a fantasy, dear mate
We are helpless in what we do, we repent already for our sake
The art got no bound, the art is unearthly but remains on ground.
And yet we make the pride of God, suffer somewhere in different states
The head of Master, the God of all Delights
When seeing small artists boasting in their pride
Remains in dilemma for what to say
As the artist will anyway suffer for as he remains.

On River Seine I Sat Down and Said

He is to me what a Paris is to an artist
Like a place to love and live, but never to die at
Melodiously vibrant, yet poignantly loud and sour
Making my heart run round the entire block in its restlessness,
Sweating through my nose
I wish to sit reciting Neruda's love poems along the banks of Seine
Until the break of dawn when the feeling of Paris perishes
And I reach atop the hill admiring the Himalayan stretches
And my snatching looking bae
In a wisp of a second turns into a digressed foggy space
Whispering the mild 'bing bang dung da' thundering of the cloud
Causing the tingling in my ears of despair
The empty vastness of the sky fills up with dense insanity
And the foggy being around me visibly takes the form of dark shadow—
Saying in baritone, "Hey tiks. You acting weird, huh?"
In sudden concussion I foresee myself turning into a maze.
In my dialectic infatuation of him
I decide it ain't no good, I must die now and here—
Mors mihi lucrum (death to me is reward)
And the sky gets filled with big-eyed snowflakes saying out, "Now's the time. Here it's come."
When with sudden repercussion I return to the bank of Seine, "I can't do it here, Paris is no place to die."

...

This poem above has got 20 little poetry projects which goes as follows—
Begin the poem with a metaphor.
Say something specific but utterly preposterous.
Use at least one image for each of the five senses, either in succession or scattered randomly throughout the poem.
Use one example of synesthesia (mixing the senses).
Use the proper name of a person and the proper name of a place.
Contradict something you said earlier in the poem.
Change direction or digress from the last thing you said.
Use a word (slang?) you’ve never seen in a poem.
Use an example of false cause-effect logic.
Use a piece of talk you’ve actually heard (preferably in dialect and/or which you don’t understand).
Create a metaphor using the following construction: “The (adjective) (concrete noun) of (abstract noun) . . .”
Use an image in such a way as to reverse its usual associative qualities.
Make the persona or character in the poem do something he or she could not do in “real life.”
Refer to yourself by nickname and in the third person.
Write in the future tense, such that part of the poem seems to be a prediction.
Modify a noun with an unlikely adjective.
Make a declarative assertion that sounds convincing but that finally makes no sense.
Use a phrase from a language other than English.
Make a non-human object say or do something human (personification).
Close the poem with a vivid image that makes no statement, but that “echoes” an image from earlier in the poem.

The One and Only

I once had an extraordinarily peculiar dream —
A retired master, I lived in a forgotten house under a beautiful spree
With just one house-help,
And two lizards as pets.
I was once a famous reptile-trainer
With no other matching brainer
However, it was only rarest that I'd now find any visitor
It seemed they have lost faith in me and my wisdom
Perhaps some years back, I had disappointed the world somewhere
I thought of this, while my lizards performed stunts everywhere
They jumped across the walls,
And somersaulted their way through the floor
My helper meanwhile brought
A plate of mosquito-korma for the duo
As I loitered around the sleep, somebody rang the doorbell
There is a visitor for you, returned the helper and said.
Dazed and doped I looked on with no merit
Searching for what, I saw the visitor's eyes through me ferret.
Yeah? - I asked. Whom fo' yo' ere?
You, master! He replied with a visible flair.

Astounded I assured him I ain't of any help
He has a task for me, must for the old times' sake — I felt.
I ain't capable anymore, I lost touch with any practice
He said if I don't accept it, there ain't any other apprentice.
I fine-d, and okay-ed, and took the job
Because I was too tired for  argument of any sort.
He left visibly happy, my helper and my pets — we sat
Looking at the two snakes now, we broke into the sweat.
He really thinks I can do this — teach them how to sting?
Well that's absurd in all the ways I could think.

Few days past, months grew thinner
The snakes still haven't yet turned into a winner
I and my pets we made well sure
The training in all ways remains strict and pure
The helper made all the stuff that enchants a snake's hormones
To secrete the golden-black sting from their malicious tongues.
And yet of no avail remained all our efforts
I felt again my uselessness, I ain't anymore an expert.

And soon the owner of the snakes showed up at my gate
We were unprepared, seeing his face we hesitate
He greeted me from afar, with a question on his face
The snakes meanwhile were playing here and there some game of race
As the guest was now about to cross the jamb
The two snakes reached him playfully, and — Oh damn!
Before I could know, move, help, or stop
The snakes had already stung him on both his shoulders' top
He croaked in pain, and fell to the ground
We all rushed to him, my lizards somersaulting their way out;
Applauding my excellence even in his last breath
Here was the one and only, now lying at the steps of my gate — dead!

Covid-ing

This room it seems for me is enough
Where quite often I see my limbs scuff
Surrounded by books, laptop, grocery, and cosmetic stuff
And seeing the lives of people on streets getting tough.

The products in the shops are getting out of stock
Time right now is just circling round the clock
There are friends I can't see who just lives in other block
More of people testing positive is adding to our shock.

I see people doubting their Gods and Lords
Clanking vessels and clap of hands are new sorts of awards
Laid with new 'challenges' we fill our TikToks
'Social distancing' is the new word in our vocal cords.

Bored but stubborn we don't still yet learn
Until we change our actions, the world one day will burn
Anyway, for this Sunday we got a new fun
Of candles, diyas, and torches is the next turn.

Handcuffed

A voice said to me in my dream that I shall be granted my freedom
And that, when I shall wake, I'll see the whole world
Rejoicing in the freedom
Provided that they feel the very sense in their own heart too.
'It is true,' I heard the words ringing in my head.
I woke up, and noticed my body
I was and just a skeleton
I went out of my home, searching for anybody
And saw a lot of others turned to skeletons
Wearing a necklace
There was a key in that necklace
Adjusted just over the place where our hearts usually are
And they all were roaming about
Carrying handcuffs in hands.
I saw two people walking hand in hand, handcuffed, smiling at each other
I saw some children who had made a toy out of a handcuff and throwing and catching it around
I saw somebody walking, wearing it as big earrings
I saw a beggar, collecting more and more of it in his bowl
I saw another person going with a bag full of it, maybe to treasure it in a bank
Some were wearing it as their anklet, fashionably
There was even one who wore it as his glasses
I searched for my handcuff around
And the moment I searched for it, it appeared in my hand
Handcuffed, I felt comfortable
Real comfortable and secure
It seemed all fine
I felt as if I don't have to worry about a lot of things now.

And from then on we lived a life of a comfortable lie
Woven in our strings of attachments, we roamed around with a dutiful sigh
On the street where once stood trees with their heads held up high
The clouds wore a sense of pride
And the rains were a delight
The glee that charmed our hearts once
Was then much brighter than the summer sun
And a wave of hope resided in every sense
Of the air that smoothly ruffled through our hair.

But now on banks we stood intact
Strict and sound, we are much more bound
Adoring the kite in the sky, with a string in sight
We can't look past the ocean, we think the world ends there
Skeleton-ed we remain, with not a mass in our brain
And one by one we remove the key from our necklace
We hold it high up, showing ours to each other
We assure and nod, we think we are there for one another
And with one brisk movement we swayed our arms behind
The ocean and trees and birds and sky are holding their breath in their stomach's tight
Without another thought we are all set in motion
One by one a squash could now be heard in the ocean
Until a thousand such beats are past, the ocean hurls its best
And we see all our keys once more in air till they tumble again in rest
And no sooner we are left handcuffed, with no keys to rebuff
Seeing the demise of freedom, I recalled the dream I saw once
I glanced in horror
Into my eternal sorrow.
And with whatever of the last hope left in my system
I shed it off as a tear, losing the last sense of wisdom.

Quarantined

I've lived my days on earth enraged
Rolling past the terrains of disaster
Bowing seeds in the farms of melancholy
And holding onto the person it was a pain to see.

I was dismayed with non-enchantingness of wildfires
I've hunted down animals on roads with screeching tires
I've lived by the screaming cries coming out from another room
And then I'd waited to see my future in bloom.

I've learnt to ignore and stay in bliss
I've deafened my eyes and yet the luxury I'd see
I've unloved the love and smashed the virtues
I felt I was a true bird in sky, apart from the other few.

The concepts were changed, the beliefs modulated
Only the things that mattered to me were tolerated
With what I am, I had declared myself best
To hell with the others, I couldn't care about the rest

Now quarantined — I am stuck, my ego has been burst
Amazed at how the world continued, coming out of its curse
My window literally has got grills to save me from my own form
And in this confinement I peered to see the streets down

With none of myself out there, the world looked more mindful
The birds were hopping around and teasing each other for the food
I saw one crow tip-toeing to see me in my captivity
Catching me amazed, leaving no room for profanity

And then a sparrow hopped to the sill, just two feet apart
Looked me in the eye, and understood my swaying heart
And for that brief moment I felt rather better this way
Let the birds come and greet you in your cage everyday.