Barbaric, Mystical, Bored

Poetry From Bombay - Volume 5

2012-01-29T19:05:00.003+05:30

I was at the zoo today.

I could relate.

............................................................

A great white hand

Waved goodnight

Another one

Came closer,

Called.

I drew my gun

I didn’t know

That

It fires backwards

The next thing

I remember:

The Black hand

Waving goodnight

The White one

Coming closer,

Calling.

.............................................................................

The first time i went to school

I was scared

The first time i went to a whorehouse

I was scared

The first time i shot myself

I was scared

The first time i woke up

I wasn’t

I don’t know why i’m saying this

Maybe too much of the same shit fucks the brain –

And roses freeze up

in November.

.....................................................................

I want a window – one bigger than the world

One from which i can see the moving lights

And i can see the owl staring at me for i don’t know how long

And i can see the city turning into a leopard at midnight

With dark black spots in the yellow blaze

And pouncing at the midnight

And pouncing at the sea

And pouncing at the ships in horizon

And pouncing at endlessness

And pouncing at me

but the window is to be stronger than the city

and i am to survive the city

and i am to survive its yellow blaze and dark spots

and i want it to see me surviving

but for all these to happen

i need a window – bigger than the world

and sadder than the dusk

and lonelier than the owl outside

and more aimless than the shooting lights

because when i am sad and lonely and out of shit which i quite often am

i want to look at it,

and outside –

at the owl and at the lights.

.............................................................................................

Sparrows fly in to my brain

Every night

They chirp

They have things to say i guess

And the cat sitting close to the clock

stares at the sparrows in my brain

Will it jump at them?

And the huge black dog at the door

Rests its jaws at its paws

And stares at the cat

For an eternity

Through the fog

Will it jump at the cat?

And one by one

The stars disappear

And there are little holes in the sky now

Blacker than the night

And from each hole

A gun comes out

And each gun

Points at the dog

Will they shoot at the dog?

I am God so i need to save them

And so i drive the sparrows away

The cat walks away, disgusted

The dog falls asleep, bored

And the guns move back – out of the holes, relieved

And now the sky is dark and blank

And so is my brain

And i think – they are one and the same.

...............................................................

Words are life

With raging flames,

With heroes riding out against the storm

With clocks fighting for a piece of time

With trains asking stations to back off

With the boozers asking flowers to bloom

With the madness waiting in fear

At laundry rooms and cafes and volcanoes and at the great beyond

With speedboats cutting through the heart of the sea and shooting straight

At the horizon

With rats peeping out of the sewers

And looking at the great big city.

Words are life

Words can look at the awe in the rats’ eyes as they look out

Words can breathe the sadness away from the mountains

And can bring more sadness to the death of poets and cougars

Words can piss at the eyes of god and can cower under flophouse beds fearing the thunderbolts once the act is done

Words can roar out the glory of Lord and wait for some favour from the great one as He tramples out the vintage

I’m not saying anything new and i’m not saying them in any new way either

All of these have been said and done before

Words have often been used to pat their own backs and scratch their own bums

Nevertheless, without them i would have been way worse off than i am

And the skies and the earth would have chewed me up and have shit me out and i would have been flushed down into a putrid sewer – one that would have been far closer to hell and away from the soothing sea-breeze than the one in which i am rotting now.

So, i am writing these words, and these words are life,

And they don’t care if you approve of them or not. And as i write, i hear the dogs barking

I hear a car screeching. i hear the whistle of the ghostwalkers and this woman (whom i knew from when she was a girl and i like her though i liked her more when she was a girl and now she’s doing her best to resist the shit that the world’s been trying to put between her ears like the world always does and i won’t say that she’s doing a good job but i am sure that she’ll learn with time) texts me and asks: “what do we do ‘bout the void?”.

Had i had a reply, i would have given that to her.

But this is where i stop and this is where words and life must stop and are forbidden to go beyond. I can’t use words to answer the question and i feel imbecile powerless and dishonest.

Or maybe someday i’ll learn to use words and shapes and symbols and characters and syllables and forms and all other lookable-hearable-thinkables as weapons and wage my war against the void. And then i’ll get my reply for her ready. I hope she waits. I hope words wait.

..........................................................................................................

After typing out the previous poem

I was thinking of how much i love poetry and of how much i can give everything away for it

When all of a sudden i realised that i needed to take a piss

And so i took out the key to my room removed my luggage and opened the door and was locking it from outside when a great grandfatherly voice from inside my head asked me:

“if you have to choose between dying of this pain in your urinary bladder and poetry which one would you take?”

I said,

“poetry, any given day”

Now the voice asked:

“are you sure?”

I realised that my urge to pee has increased at least fivefold and that it’s really hurting now

I said

“yes”

and i really was sure

and as i entered the washroom (which, by the way, is one i have to share with all the other boarders here and is at the other end of the corridor from where my room is) and as i let myself go and felt the pleasure of the pain going away, the voice asked me again:

“and would you choose poetry over this joy?”

and i said

“yes, trust me, i mean it and sincerely so”

the voice smiled (i wonder, can voices smile? That one surely did)

and said:

“it’s okay. Take it smooth and easy, let life be; things will fall in place”

to this i said:

“no, poetry isn’t smooth and easy and it’s not out there to let life be and it’s not something that falls in place and it’s meant to remain out of place forever. Poetry is cruel and i am ready for its cruelty.”

The voice has not said anything in return yet.

(Or maybe it said “We shall see”. I don’t clearly remember)

It was a warm lonely voice.

I don’t know how the speaker looks like, but he seemed to be just like the voice: warm, lonely and placid.

.....................................................................................................

It was a relatively quieter day than most

I didn’t drink last night which i mostly do before holidays

I woke up at nine in the morning which is way earlier than the usual time i wake up on holidays

And i took long walks by the sea and felt the breeze against my face

It soothed and cajoled me a lot and i felt at ease and at peace with the world at which

i didn’t have to take my claws out and gnash – something i have done so often that’s not even a thing to write or think about now.

And when i was returning home, the skies had gone from faint red to dark

My hotel’s at the second floor of a very cold old rundown mansion

And i had to walk up the rickety wooden staircase

It was then that I came across a middle aged man, more old than middleaged

with what seemed to be a six day stubble

at the landing.

He was pale and thin, with a slight hunch and the grains of his stubble were mostly white.

His clothes were dirty enough for him to avoid the tag of affluence

But clean enough to dodge that of rubblehood.

And he was trying to open the lock of the collapsible gate of the first floor

With a bunch of keys that jingled out their rebellion

Even the lock was resilient and stubbornly silent.

But he managed to unlock the gate with some effort and did to it what Moses had supposedly done to a sea once

and entered the first floor lobby and locked the gate from inside

It was a cold, damp and dark lobby just like the one at my hotel on the floor above, except for the darkness

and it had doors on both sides, just like this one

but unlike the one at my hotel, all those doors were locked from the outside with what seemed to be really heavy and rusty locks, and, evidently, the rooms which were hiding behind those deathlike masks had not been inhabited by any human being in the recent past.

The other major difference was that unlike the hotel lobby which has the bright blessing of electricity, the one downstairs had got only one bulb and that too at the far end, and it gave out a faint yellow haze

So this man, who, at that point, seemed to be as lost and as faint as the bulb, entered the lobby and he disappeared inside the dying yellow.

That was when it came to me – Mindfuck

It followed me to my room

And since then, it has been staying with me

and from the look of things, it doesn’t seem to be in any hurry to make me renounce my position as the host

it has been here for what seems like an eternity now and we have become good friends without sharing a single word or sigh or cigarette and we have been looking straight into each other’s eyes. I can’t read anything from its gaze and i don’t think it can read anything from mine either and each pair of eyes is as fixed and as stony as the other. It’s as if both of us are looking into a mirror.

...............................................................................................................

Strange algorithm attached

A lover got his wrist slashed

A pig flew to heaven

The road to coolblue is uneven

The robin sang to the train

Reptiles ate his brain

Eliot caught a moth

The lonely and their wrath

Strange algorithm attached

The winner wins unmatched

The loser loved his mother

The God is the Other.

The robin sang to the train

Broken bits remain

Your eyes are in your head

Bills best left unpaid

Strange algorithm attached

The doors are safely latched

But you are mortal, Effendi!

Wherever the fuck she is, do send me.

................................................................................

Everything you do

Stems from

A feeling

Of loneliness

Everything you don’t

Are children

Of the sacred

Mother

You never knew

You had.

The circle of light

Is small

All you see

Are faces in the valley

Rotting

Like dead fishes

And you do whatever you do

Because you want to

Look away.

And things you don’t do

Are for the trashcans to store up

For when the heavens open up

And the circle of light becomes redundant

You will be charged less for your symmetries

And extra for your shit

You believe in this

Because they told you to do so

And you believe in them

Because they are sitting on the other side

And you must obey the ones

On the other side

Because those on the other side know things

which you don’t.

The candle burns out

The circle is gone now

And now the ants crawl to your bedsheet

And now the wolves come closer

And now you know why.

.........................................................................................................

didn’t

tell her,

but that night

i dreamt of zebras.

The moon was

shining

over the forest. The moon was

N A K E D

because she doesn’t need her robes

in wilderness.

A snake

sprang out

my head

and went for

the dahlias

Flowers

were

burning

(and contrary to popular belief, they don’t smell good when they burn)

A red line

moved

across the sky

A hunter shot

an arrow

at a deer

but he missed

A sailor

F U C K E D

a fisherwoman

A night

died

in the cold

A snowflake

glistened

A city

shed

a tear

for the night

which wrapped me

as i slept

and dreamt

of the zebras.

By the time

i woke up

The night

had died

The arrow

was stuck

an oaktrunk

The hunter

was walking

H O M E

dejected

The deer

was

lost

in mist

The sailor

had sailed

A W A Y

from

the fisherwoman

The flowers

were burnt.

I won’t tell her

but

still

have her earrings.

hidden

safely

from

the world

in a drawer

And I had

never

dreamt of the zebras

again

And

i won’t

ever

dream of them

again.

The next dream I had was of me sleeping

inside

M O T H E R

And dreaming

of the

F L E S H.

(A dream within another, a life inside another’s. There’s a sense of security in all these for the inner ones.)

Maybe i will tell this to her

someday,

That the zebras

have gone away

That the earrings are the relic of

a red line

that had

passed

through

a city

which had

cried

because

a snowflake had

told her that a night was

D Y I N G

while the

moon

had gone to

the

W I L D E R N E S S

and a snake

was

approaching

the

D A H L I A S.

And maybe

i will tell her

that

my mother

still wears the bitter robe

D E T A C H M E N T.

.............................................................................................

Poetry From Bombay - Volume 4

2012-01-26T16:58:00.003+05:30

As for the winners out there – they’re so fucking used to winning

That they can’t stomach the real shit when it comes shooting straight at their guts

The losers are more used to this. They take their share of punches and then they stand up again

Because they have got no option but to.

And thus, through millions of years of evolution and stuff

It’s inside their genes, and they survive everything.

As the winners get extinct, put out like the stars at dawn.

I remember that hour – i had morning classes to attend when i was a kid

Father used to take me to the busstop and we used to wait for the bus

And i used to observe those stars getting put out,

And i used to think that they are the losers and the morning sun is the real hero of this story

But now i know that it’s the stars and the darkness and everything that trumps the sun every night

But the sun being the real scum has no choice but to get up and blaze through the day.

It takes all the shit –

Clouds, rains storms hail

And worst of all, the night which punches it off every time it gets close to the eastern horizon

But it gets up again alright what other choice has it got?

............................................

My room’s at the far end of this long corridor

And there are several rooms on both sides – each with white walls and each as tiny as the other

And inside, each room has pale yellow walls and each has a vacuous man inside –

Who stares at their television set or at their newspaper or their paperback or laptop screen with the same blankness with which they walk and talk. And each one has to get up early in the morning and Monday mornings are like hell to each. Each has a woman they want but can’t get because had they had the option to get her, they wouldn’t have stayed in this semi-flophouse.

It’s like this hall of death, and it’s really no different from any other place.

.....................................................................

Back in my city at every crossroad below every signal at every zebra crossing a recorded voice says that we must cross the streets carefully because there’s someone waiting for us at home.

I don’t know whose bright idea was it to play this shit but if i ever get hold of the motherfucker, i would just grip his collars give him a good shake or two and say:

“listen you sonofabitch, you dumbfuck moron, everyone’s not like you. You have a house and a family and all that load, but there’re people, and many of them who don’t have anyone waiting for them at home and they cross the streets all the time!”

But back there i have a family too who wait for me at home.

Down here where I am staying there’s no one to wait when i get back to my hotelroom

But they don’t play that shit at crossings here, and whenever i have to cross the streets i remember that recorded voice and i smile.

...........................................................................

At the end of the day

all you can trust

as your own

Are your instincts.

Because–

They are the very first things you get –

You get them before your sex-drive your ego your hunger your greed your love

Your dope your words your job your house your friends your intellect your ideals your enemies your boredom the stuff you do to kill your enemies and your boredom and everything else.

You get these instincts from inside your mother’s body which is the first thing you get to know –

And that is your only sacred. You defend it against every shit that comes by – and for that you need your instincts –

the only stuff that belong to you

to defend

the only sacred you know of.

The funny part is that it’s that sacred that gifts you those things –

It’s self-preservation i guess.

And you don’t need Freud or Foucault or the others who belong to the dreary world of books and maddening numb intelligence and not to the world you inhabit to get to this.

The idea is to look straight and not get distracted by all that shine. And this is what we suck at – avoiding distractions.

.....................................................................................................................

There’s a similarity between my hotelroom and languages and ideas and expressions and thoughts and feelings and love and the capacity to think or feel or love. All these are so small that you seek to break free every moment and this smallness becomes unbearable with time.

You start with rebellion –

You kick and punch the walls.

But the walls are strong and solid

And you are weak.

Before long, you knuckles and toes start aching and in the worst cases, bleeding

And you realise that you have no option in reality

Now you start believing in miracles. You start banging the walls with your head

And before long you get a lump on your forehead and it aches as much as your knuckles and toes

And now with your bruised head and knuckles and toes, you give up – and you start waiting –

For some more miracle – a stronger one this time

But no miracle happens and the walls remain as they are – strong

enough to bear the weight of time through ages and centuries

And now, you start getting tired of waiting, and your faith in the miracle withers away

Now there are three distinct possibilities that might happen to you at this stage, one of these three does indeed happen to you:

1) you go crazy and start behaving that the walls never existed at all

2) you seek refuge in things such as ambition and religion and ideals and fairy tales and intoxication and family – all those hollow stuff that squirm around in the dark of your skull – waiting to seduce you and to pounce on you at the first signs of weakness.

3) you get bored of everything. Plain fucking bored.

As for me, i belong to the third category and boredom i tell you is a ghastly disease and it spreads fast, very fast. When it infects it eats up everything – first it gets at the center and gets you empty, and then it gets at the cover and you cease to be anything at all

Such, my friends, is the deal with captivity. It remains.

...............................................................................................................................

There are times when things change so fast that you have little time to

Realise where you’re hurt when you get the kick

And then there are times when time runs slow and you have all the time in the world

To build yourself a nice warm cocoon and wrap yourself up with all the warmth

You can afford.

But there’s the catch –

It all boils down to what you can afford

It’s like you have the choice between sleeping through all of tomorrow

Or else you can wake up,

Take a nice warm stroll by the sea

Treat yourself to a mugful of beer and a movie

If you can afford.

If not, then stop whining about how unjust everything is and

just sleep

Well things are unjust –

Both of us know that

So what’s the use in complaining?

You can’t change the world

You are no superman and you are no messiah

So accept the deal and survive through it

The idea is to survive, and just that.

Everything else – ideals, ambitions,

Missionary zeal and jealous missions

(not my pun mind you) –

They come from boredom, ennui and

Warped intelligence.

They are there

And you,

With all your shit

Are here. Right here –

Busy surviving

And that’s about it.

...................................................................

And this is for all of you out there who write or want to write –

Stop theorizing.

It’ll take the life out of your words

Like a sharp switchblade

Takes blood out of heart and the guts.

It’ll trap you to the valley of the thirsty dead

Who can see the stream flowing by and who can hear it too

But can’t get any closer.

Take pride in the fact that

You are the God of the empire you create out of your words.

But stop calling it names –

For words, i tell you, hate being called names

They are meant to be just that – words

And nothing more.

And once they get pissed off with you

They’ll depart you

Forever.

So for heaven’s sake, get real and stop borrowing overcoats from other people, other times,

other worlds and other lives –

And just be honest to your words.

That’s the only thing they ask from you – honesty.

..........................................................................

There was one whom i loved and who loved me back so much that i couldn’t take it

And then there was one whom i loved and who i thought loved me but today i doubt

And then there is one whom i love and who loves me too but from behind strange a haze of colours and shadows i can never reach.

Gah i’m running out of bullets fast and soon i’ll be heading for doom or surrender or oblivion or maybe the valleys..

But i think i will stop thinking of this and shut my eyes and fall asleep – fast asleep

And i’ll dream of forests where the lions roar

And of rivers where the piranhas await supper

And of children who play from dawn till dusk without worrying about these damn bullets and this damn pain.

Why the fuck does it not go?

........................................................................................................

In order to survive

You need to sell whatever sells

And to look out for your back

There’re people ready to stab you. And angry mob.

A hell in fury.

Sell whatever sells – your life

means more to you.

Sell your dream, sell the cold feast

Sell your friends and enemies

To those on the other side –

Cold people, they’ll buy if you advertise well

They’ll eat if you cook well

And your prayers will be heard

(of course, for a reasonable fee, duly levied, to be duly paid.)

(and, given that there are so many things you pray for, don’t expect all your prayers to be heard)

Roses bloom in gardens

You see the guru dancing

You see birds getting shot

You see the redeyed red

It’s coming for you.

Evade it.

Run faster than the mob

And don’t trust anyone – all are assholes –

ready to gut you out.

Just sell whatever sells.

And you’ll get through.

.....................................................................

It’s strange how different you feel with the lights switched on than when they are out.

You’re a slave of your senses

And they are the only weapon

With which you fight with boredom and the blue

And your eyes are the king of them all –

They can win you kingdoms and take you places

But once you take the light off them –

You feel too helpless to deal with devil and the waves,

To save you from drowning.

..................................................................................................................

She says i can eat up the yellow void

I can’t seem to see much of it –

Just yellow walls and yellow shades

And that’s about it.

There’s a yellow who’s going abroad and one who deals fast

And there’s one that hangs from the walls,

A Van Gogh imitation that can’t hide much pain with the curtain of beauty

They’re all down today and so is the moon

As we live from one station to the next –

Both having their names painted in black on yellow boards

And God who is supposed to be yellow

Strides from shore to shore in yellow slippers and the sands are yellow too

And she who sees yellow in the void i supposedly eat up

Is going to find a way out soon –

Through the mountains of dawn

And she’ll see much yellow but not much of the void

Thank heavens that i don’t get these visions like she does

And i see things the way they are

And i eat things the way they are

And i shit things the way they are

And i screw things the way they are –

And i pretend to be the holy of my world –

With my yellow kingdom in the concrete yellow zone

Between mist and the mercy of starlings –

What splendid yellow beaks they have! –

Birds, supposedly, of the void.

...............................................................................................................

Neon in the streets

Soldiers in heat

Rats in trashcans

Praying for the love

As i settle for the crumbs

From follies

And

Bad investments –

“he was too rash

But he couldn’t have hurt a fly”

They say.

Banal saints – too lonely for words

Too silent for the world

Centuries in

mud.

We wait.

Rain – rain –

“He ran for his life”

Thus the story goes

Of the knights of these nights

As devils chip through the bulwark

And perfection – with its velvet sabretooth –

It’s there.

Monstrous reptiles crawling through the night

Dead girls walking the sidewalks of historyland

Priests chanting the carnage-hymn

Pale nuns of the dark stripping down

before the unicorn

Gladiators striding the clouds between thunders

Skeletons clapping as the flesh shows its final trick

before the stage vanishes.

Burrows glowing in strange green

Everything catching fire.

There’s a big round hole

In the sky

Where the moon was supposed to be.

And a couple more

In the skull

Where the eyes were supposed to be.

THE HOUR OF THE FORMLESS TIGER APPROACHES.

I stitch no fairytale

Of games lost and won

Of People in the alley

To sleep the deepest dream

And seize the endless time

Rain – rain –

They made it to my brain

It was an Autumn Leaf

It was the Chariot of God

I stole

I lied

I was real.

Flames leapt up and grasped my throat

I saw flowers in the flame

I saw moths by the lantern

I was chained

It rained

And it rained more.

.................................................................................................

Poetry From Bombay - Volume 3

2012-01-21T20:02:00.005+05:30

And there i was

In a train

Seated beside a stained window

With broken panes

While another one was crossing through

In the opposite direction.

Till i saw it, and felt the first kick of air against my face

i had laundry bills to pay and dirty linen to wash in private

i needed food, some money to see me through, a kiss,

God, and i badly needed a shave -

all these

until the other train passed by,

And i looked at it. I could see through.

Faces, mostly

Soiled and rusted with care and servitude

Drunk and dry, with arteries and veins throbbing with

all sorts of stuff required to maintain the motion

faces seeking tender touches, eyes needing pure sights

and fingers dying to touch petals, velvets, thighs, and whatnot

and soon it was all smoke and skulls gaping at the madness

and the other world. Not death, mind you

just the place which is not this. The that we know but we can’t speak of,

because our vocab stretches till the furthest end of similarity

and likelihood, and nowhere beyond.

The beyond was there, hurtling through with severe vengeance, striking me off the this

And off the that. And it lasted for the eerie 5 seconds in which i had no laundry or hunger or unemployment to worry about. It was there, and i was there too.

But it passed, and before long, i found myself trapped once again.

...........................................................................

At the end of the day,

It all boils down to

Blinking idols close to the hummingbird

Who know that you can’t feel beyond yourself

And everything else you do is just a part of the curtain

To hide your void.

.........................................................................................

His Majesty the Ego – well preserved, well nourished

And now that i’m all alone and mostly naked inside this tiny room

It’s stronger than ever. And It’s getting stronger and rock solid every passing day

It preserves Itself well and It lashes like a wild cobra when hurt

It finds Its way out through my words, mostly

And It glistens like a knifeblade in moonlight

And soon enough, It shall break through these sickly sweet walls and the roof

And It shall find Its way out to the mad world – all ready to take on other

Formidable rivals – other Egos, other Narcissuses other Dreams.

........................................................................................................

I’m struggling hard to prove

To those sons of bitches

That i’m just better than them

And i don’t care what they think of me.

I talk to them and i be with them

And i pretend to empathise

And i pretend to agree when they say how unlucky they are

And how lame the guy who could have given them the job but didn’t

Or how arrogant the chick who could have given them the fuck but didn’t

Were. They think that i understand. Or maybe they think that i don’t –

But honestly, you morons – it’s neither theirs nor luck’s fault.

And the worst part is that they think that they’re right

That they are the smartest kids in the block

And that they will get their food stuck in their mouth

And their dicks will get stuck in some tight wet soft pussy

By itself.

I wish i could have the guts to let them know

That they are the sore scum who think that they are

The ones who will rule one day. They care about ruling this shithole

Unlike me. And they overestimate themselves too.

I am trying my best to prove them wrong.

But maybe if i stop trying, i’ll succeed.

Or maybe i’ll never succeed, because the two worst features of sore farts are that

They are sore farts

And they don’t know that they are sore farts

..............................................................................

A sick rose

Made its way

To the machine’s heart

And the machine got to know

That it was just as empty

As the one next to it.

The dawn was pink

The rose was sick

The shadow was a reptile

The day was a disease

The sick rose

made its way

Out of the machine

And into to the saddest street

The street picked it up

And gifted it

To the pink dawn.

the reptile-shadow

and the diseased day.

The rose told them

of the machine

and of the invisible worm

They told the rose

not to bother –

It’s just Blake toying

with eternity and damnation,

With the paleness of being,

With strange lights that burn the mind at times

And chains of flesh that are here to stay.

And Charlie Chaplin sitting

At the twilit haze

Between the dark and the light

and watching

and smiling –

both with his sad eyes.

It’s just that

And nothing else.

And now the rose knows

But the machine needn’t know

So the machine didn’t know.

........................................................

This is where

Every orgy

Leads to the snow

Every monster

Gets a nightmare

Of bright love

Every sonnet

Breaches the pact

Between bodies and forms

This is where

We imagine

That we imagine

This is where

My mother and i

Perished in the dark.

...................................................

I hear the guy in the next room snoring

I don’t know him, and our paths shall never cross

I think he too makes boxer-fists while climbing up

The crowded stairways of railway stations

And thinks that rain is thicker than life

And he has fought the demons as well

Before kneeling before eyes that glow in the dark

And all the reconciliation you need

Before you forget how to smile except for courtesy and plastic

Is closer to his being here than mine

And just like me, his closest companion rests in his brain for a while

Before the trumpets blow

And before the moths get fire in their wings.

His sweat is not for soft hands, it’ not meant to be jewels for the

Nightingale through his restless nine to five

And he knows that deep inside it doesn’t mean anything or to his own self – this

Self, the teachings of the guru. Balzac leaning out against the sky – he doesn’t know of Balzac or of the magic of the senses or of wet wings that prevent the flight. He wades through muck, his muscles get ready for the next hammer, he dreams of angels descending from paradise and his eyeballs roll inside his eyelids. He knows of the treasure much more than i do. He leans against the dark, his pillars speak of all the splendid jewellery

yet to be stolen.

She smiled. It could’ve been a section from hell or voices and eyes that mean kindness through flight. Loud voices in the corridor. He shall don the robe of dawn’s emperor and order the death of the saint and pillows while signing the book of questions & validating the pacts.

He’s there snoring his way to glory

And i’m here dousing the week’s lifelessness with the last drop of beer

And the damp wall between us – it observes us with cold precision

I think the wall knows it all.

..........................................................................................

The lady in the counter

Knows of your hapless sorrow

She nods her head as you pass by the counter

She is not pretty but she’s plump

Her lipstick is too loud for her mundane face

which has the candour of a hermit

But she knows of the falseness of the loud lipsticks

And the truth of rents and electricity bills

And so, if in names uttered through trusty lips

And in faith through strange violins of sad jesters

You find yourself chained to the rocks

If you think of Hydra or of the goats

If you think that truth will come to you through sadness and failure

Look out for plump ladies in counters with mundane faces and loud lipsticks

They know about the pain

And when they nod at you,

Though it’s not the Sybil revealing to you the contours of history

On a much lower scale – it’s the truth of grocery and electricity bills

Of trudging through the sidewalks which are wearier than you

Of employment exchanges

Of being shot down by the sun the moon the stars and the world

Of broke players by broken pianos

Of hopeless climbers of broken ladders

Of this intelligent design of gut-belly-dick/pussy-heart-and-brain

Of urges desires and pangs bookmarking your loneliness

Of smiles slithering like plastic snakes

Of the sudden warm alcoholic rush of happy amnesia and greatness

Of trains stopping on empty stations

And of a million other cheap brittle bricks that make you up

And of the rusted old beams that support your pillars though you don’t know for how long

That she nods at. Try and nod back when you can –

For you too know of her falsity and truth the same way she knows of yours

...........................................................................

It’s five past eleven in the morning and i have just woken up

It’s a Saturday today, and i was drunk in my room last night

My room has no window and so i can’t say if there’s bright sunshine in the world beyond

I have a massive hangover and i can feel the blood rushing through my temples

And there’s not a drop of water to drink. This pain, like many others, is real

I had a hectic week. I am trying hard to impress the ones behind the desk

So that i get a job through this internship. And so i drank a lot last night

Alcohol takes me away from the plasticity and brings me closer to the elusive crazyass blackbirds

Close enough to try and touch their beaks and wings before they fly away to the next branch

I called up the one i truly love and we were having a nice conversation before my phone ran out of balance. That’s the trick of the world. You can communicate only if you have enough money, and there’s no exception even when it comes to the one you truly love.

The place I am staying in has a washroom which you need to share with fifty other boarders

It reeks of their sweat and excreta, its floors are black with all the dirt of the holy world

I’m cool with all that, but when i’m drunk at midnight, it seems miles away

So i decided to pee in an empty bottle, but i got the laws of physics all mixed up and sprayed all over the 7 by 5 by 10 feet room.

And so the floor, the luggage, the unwashed pile of laundries and even the bedsheet is wet.

Even the plate i ate my kebabs from got its fill. And somehow during my complex manoeuvre

I have managed to turn the dustbin upside down and now there are cigarette butts and bits of rotten onion from last week’s salad and random pieces of paper and ash all over the place.

The bottle i tried to pee in is rolling over the unwashed laundry like a sombre proof of crime – infallible and always there – observing my every little movement, judging me in silence

i guess Pandora’s box might just look like this when it runs out of shit. I’m running out of shit too and i’m running out of it pretty fast.

I just wish i would have sprayed my piss all over the world instead of just my petty confine.

And now i’m sitting on my bed which seems like an island cut off from the rest of the world by a vast ocean of lonely filth. I’m lonelier than ever now.

I had to give my clothes to the local drycleaner

i had some urgent work at the local bank which will close in two hours because it’s Saturday today

and i had to go to the local cybercafé to shoot a few necessary mails and catch up with the virtual society i inhabit at times.

But the drycleaner the bank and the empire of photons seem far far away from me know. My head is aching like hell and i can’t do anything about it. It’s as lonely as it can get.

I am pounding on my laptop keyboard with mad vengeance now, and i don’t know who or what i am warring against. Or maybe it’s just the intoxication of words and of spaces between words that keeps me going in times like these. This madness doesn’t help me to escape from or to forget the pain. On the contrary, it brings me closer to the pain, it helps me to accept and reconcile.

And this shit, i tell you, is bloody real shit. I know.

And there’s nothing much you can do against reality once you know. You can fight with the wolves, the moon, the world, and even with the gods. But this stuff – it’s just there and that’s about it. And you can’t escape because it comes chasing after you everywhere.

Victory and defeat are for fools and philosophers.

................................................................................

I have decided that i’ll spend the rest of the day

Inside this room.

They’re renovating the place. Drill-machines are roaring out loud and clear

For Hemmingway to wake up where mountains roll out against the sky

And thunder his canons out to the breast of eternity.

I don’t know of all these. Breasts to me are things to

Suck when you have a couple in front of you and to think of and masturbate

When you don’t have.

But i’m not in the mood for fleshy thoughts. My body is wearing me out

And i feel like i am thirty years older then what i really am.

An i am not in the mood of the tiger or the horse –

Or, for that matter, of the swan or the dove.

Cats and moles and mice are closer to me now.

And outside, there’s a world

And there’s anarchy.

Automobile engines bursting out,

Rifles and machine guns blazing through the noonfire

Waves and ripples in the ocean of people – talking, walking

Buying, selling.

I can’t make the fake out from the real

And i’ll feel worse if i throw myself out into the middle of all these

with the sickening headache i have now. I don’t know whether it’s the cold or the hangover

But it’s getting worse every moment. And i can’t do much about it i guess.

I lack the wrath of God or the placidity of monks. I fear the Furies and i tend my blackbile

I live and i survive and i exist and that’s pretty much the dead-end of me. Nothing beyond. There’s no phantom, phantasm or phantasmagoria involved.

It’s all too blank to be untrue now and at this hour

And so be it, then.

I won’t move an inch outside the room for the rest of today

And if solitude chokes me or if the angels of angst find me writhing in this shit

I’ll tell them to fuck off. I’m just not in the mood for them today.

I’ll just ‘be’.

.................................................................................................

Poetry From Bombay - Volume 2

2012-01-15T15:48:00.003+05:30

There are times i feel like i have hated enough hatred

And i have burned enough burns

And then there are these times when i feel like i am lying flat on my belly

Beside a great white sea, and the sea knows me like no one has ever known me before

And among all the billions of oysters out there there’s one which has a pearl meant for me.

Or maybe a treasure trove, one which carries the secret medicine for my cure is right out there

For me. And these are the times when i feel hollow. And i feel the insects deep inside.

Fuck, it’s so hard to believe in all these things, hard enough for one to stop trying

And to roll up inside the nice warm cocoon of hatred – conjured up purely for the sake of survival.

And to dream of getting cured someday, of all the pain to disappear one fine morning.

Pure thoughts that keep us moving. I am just like you. My wrath is no weaker and my love is no stronger than yours baby. I kiss you goodnight now. I kiss all my dark children goodnight.

..............................................

Observe the multitude flocking down. They are the average ones.

Like rats and epidemics. They are there.

The meek who shall inherit the earth

And who shall survive wars, famines, riots, nymphomania, heartbreaks,

Erectile dysfunctions, rainbows – every damn thing.

They’re the real genius, because they know how to survive

And most of them shall learn soon enough

To get through all this shit without much distress.

And to get through life by paying their bills, premiums and loans.

They learn fast.

Observe the multitude – each carries an invisible white flag

To avoid hostility. They don’t fight, and thus they don’t grow stronger, except in numbers.

They don’t know how to break stuff, and thus they don’t create anything.

They don’t have dreams any higher than those of the ones around them, and thus they are easily satisfied

And they shall inherit the earth through recreation and procreation, and, by simple law of averages

The average man and the average woman

Holds the ace. And are happy with that.

.......................................................................

I told her that it’s easy to live; all we need is to breathe

She remembers

I also told her that we all need to take our shots and that doesn’t

Make us good or bad people. That just makes us people.

She remembers that too, i am sure.

She was good, and she was kind to me

And when we parted, we maintained our mutual polite indifference

And there were no heartbreaks or inconveniences involved

And there was not much love or hatred involved either.

And now, we are walking down different roads and trampling different shit

Like we all do, and this is not much of an uncommon story.

Feelings beget complicacy and burdens, and it’s really easy to do away with the extra load.

Maybe someday we’ll bump into each other in some pub and we’ll have a good laugh over a few glasses of whiskey. Or maybe we won’t. Whichever way it is, the point is that it’s not difficult to avoid the roadbumps and potholes – all you need is to do away with the journey.

................................................................................

Flesh melts away. Faces and bodies melt away. In 0s and 1s our minds and feelings and consciousness and the great unconscious slither through the channels of being

To reach out and to share, to communicate, to know and to live. And soon we will get to touch and breathe and eat and excrete and screw through 0s and 1s. The fun part is that we don’t need curtains and masks to hide behind anymore. And we don’t need to throb. It’s all in 0s and 1s.

..............................................................................

I move closer to words and letters

With little white spaces between them.

I move closer to the mortuary and further away from the mountains.

I remember the mole above my mother’s left eyebrow

I remember the snake that poked its head from inside the lid of my trashbin and showed it’s great black eyes and a little forked tongue in one of my many dreams. I walk through streets and alleys

The streets are mostly named after famous people – with their 99 discomfort forgotten and 1 glory remembered by us – the ones with 99 shit and 1 libido. I remember that the essence is to survive and i was taught the same. Everything they told me inside and outside classrooms meant one and only one thing – that the trick lies in surviving, that they won’t teach me the trick coz we all need to find our own shit out and no one can teach that. I remember darkness from alleys and coffins and horrible smelling coffees and stale beer-breath of my co-boarders and of my father. I remember my father, and of all his compromises. I am supposed to get ready for some more compromising. “All or nothing” is for people who get streets named after them. “At least something” is for us who walk these streets looking for ways and means to procure the least bit we can. And so i walk. I smell sweat from the fleshy breasts of whores and i smell rotting flowers and insects and chimney smoke.

And there’s a picnic out there. And there’s an engagement party there. They exchange rings, words, communications, letters, saliva, statements of work, infections, understandings, happiness, sorrow, smiles, frowns, love, hatred, glances, fuck, and whatnot. There’s a man whose guts dropped out of his wide open asshole while he was facing something he wouldn’t have faced had he had the option. And that’s another thing. We don’t have the luxury to choose. That is for the “all or nothing” folks and for the rich sons of bitches whose farts smell of Chanel Number Five. And yes, there are roads named after revolutionaries and days named after revolutions. And I was taught about those names, those dates and the stuff those names did and the stuff that happened on those days all with the disclaimer: “you are not like them, you are weak enough; don’t you dare put any mark on the calendar”. It’s all about intelligent designs and intelligently designed designs. And if some smartass quips that it’s the historians’, or worse, history’s fault that we are not there, they put some extra potent stuff on the injection meant for him.

And a few more petals for my blood. A few more flies for my open wounds. I see my eyeballs hanging down from hooks stuck on the grey wall of centuries. My eyeballs are red. I am leaning against the weight of time. I see the empire in her navel. And wolves leap out of her vagina. And their eyeballs are red too, red enough to glow in darkness. And a bit of eternity stretches beyond the white and the red and the yellow. And wombs and graves and mortuaries fill up. And offices, prisons, hospitals, bars, brothels, cafes, latrines, madhouses, schools, airports, taverns, bottles, glasses, stomachs, shapes, lights, darks, forms et cetera et cetera fill up. Mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, others, balloons and shops fill up. Dust gathers. I walk. I feel my backbone rotting away, guileless, cold, ugly – like me. If i die, nothing will change. I think of death often. It’s like a caterpillar.

And suddenly, i throw it all away. Now, i find myself alone, i find myself howling at the moon. And then i realise that i am naked, and they can see my warts and wounds in the sharp shrill scream of electricity. It’s all there. Right in my sack, and there’s no way i can get rid of it. I cower. I walk.

................................................................

Wish i had a knife – one whose edges are sharper than the bitterness of memories

And whose blades are longer than the trail of dust that follows the haunted wagon in the hamlet of the dead where a carnation blooms by each grave and where the lame play of rebirth of flesh and imprisonment is never re-enacted.

Wish the knife would go deep into the heart of silence and make it bleed all its dark poison out

Wish i could drive the knife inside all these nosey pricks who are worms and vermin – just like me,

But unlike me, shall never accept that or reconcile to their lack of spine, all those who think that their digging through the dung is something special and unique and that they can be worshipped as heroes if they pee on others who are not like them. These creatures deserve a taste of the real knife instead of the mutual pretence and bumkissing. Had i had the knife, i would surely have given them some ideas about the real shit and instead of the second hand one they are fed through books, teevees, websites, movies and music. Alas, i am fed on the second hand same shit and i am no more a loser and no less a lifeless piece of junk than them, and hence i can never have the knife. It’s for the ones who wade through the real muck, and not for fake lousy dickheads like me or them.

..........................................................................................................................

Mother, could you fend me from the sharks?

Could you teach me how to fend myself from the sharks?

Mother, were we apolitical enough when i sucked your nipples?

Did we know where we stood?

Mother, were we far away from the edge of the cliff?

Were we far away from the kingdom of vultures?

Mother, did it snow inside you when i was blind?

Was it cold enough for the nine moons to pale away?

Mother, was there music when i climbed my throne?

What tune were they playing?

Mother, what’s the link between the void and the flesh?

And what happens when it snaps?

Please don’t mind the questions

And there’s no compulsion to answer

It’s just the wind wheezing through reeds,

just a shadow of my self.

Sincerely

Yours.

.............................................................

Poetry From Bombay - Volume 1

2012-01-15T15:45:00.000+05:30

The worst day of your life is

The day

You realise

That you are not a genius

And nothing close to one.

You sit in this little room in a cheap hotel

With the lights off

And your laptop spread out in front of you

All wired out and lonely, just like you

You pour the last drop of beer

And bite the last bit of whatever you have

As some asshole in the room next to you –

Mind you, a loser, no less than you

And a rebel, no more than you –

He/she/it – gazes straight at his/her/its teevee and its blurts out loud

And he/she/it is watching and gaping at the same shit that

Will never happen to his/her/its life, namely, a movie

Where the rich girl lets a poor guy struggle for her,

Prove to her and to the whole world

That he’s a hero, a superman, The One -

And so she marries him and lets him screw her whenever he wishes to –

(Of course, the screwing part is implied)

Whatever. The poor asshole guzzling this shit down

Knows that this will never happen to him

And yet he/she/it watches the rot.

And he/she/it rots

Every day, melts away

And no one remembers the misery

Of being

Of the other.

I’ve never met a genius, a prophet or anything like that

All the boarders here,

And all the people i meet

Are made of the same shit

And will rot away all the same

You know it, and so do i.

But the worst day

Is when

You know

That you are no better

Than just this –

A being that eats from his/her/its mouth

And shits (and farts too) from his/her/its anus

And spends the rest of the day to gather sufficient resources to indulge in

All these activities, and in a few others,

Such as sleeping, fucking, being the other one

And not The One.

And you are stuck. Here.

Right in here. And so am I.

..............................................

I have noticed

That the majority of life

Comprises of waiting.

And I suck at this

And so do you

So let’s drink to that.

...................................................

From inside my room

I can’t communicate with the world

No internet, the phone’s fucked up

So it’s like this ancient cave

The only difference being

That i can’t look at the stars rolling out their dumb prophesies

If i go out

Because the moment i step outside

Its people and mannequins and waves and everything which

I can’t communicate with.

........................................................

So I went out with this broad

And we checked into this hotel

We fucked and we sucked

And when it was over

She got dressed. She looked out of the window.

And she said “the sun’s rising”

I was hard. I heard her.

And my thing went down

And the sun rose.

......................................................

I’m sorry

I couldn’t send you my half-baked revolution

Like i would have liked to

I couldn’t wear my hat

Or climb mount everest like

You have wished me to

So i smile the sad smile of failure

Like i have seen my father smile

When he couldn’t afford mutton on Sunday mornings

And had to settle for chicken

I have practiced that smile so many times

That its reflex action to me now

And i settle for

Compromises

Instead of the revolution.

......................................................................

You have never lived until

The moon breaks you down

And you see your mother in the flames

And the stars speak to you

And the stars speak to you.

And you have never lived

Until you feel your guts

Clotting up in blood and shit

Inside you. You feel, and you think

And you chase the dogs to horizons

Until that time

You have never lived.

..............................................

Real steel comes to you

In flood

And in murderous fits of rage

And i wonder about life and death

Knowing, and fully aware

That i have neither.

So,

I trust the flood

It brings honey and mirth

And when

It’s all over

It’s time for the wolves to bite their teeth in

And solitude bleeds from the constricted heavens

You know of. With things getting easy

And priests, in their white robes

Robbing the horizon

Of its sprightly contours

Real steel comes to you

In waves that floods the numbers

In waves that hide the truth

And in completion of marks of silence

And so, you wait

For the gates to open, and for the fangs to glisten

In dreams.

.....................................................

Is the tide too high?

Switch the lights off

Let the cigars burn their tips out

In the reddish haze of dreams

I wade through the murk

And i dream of Indian nights

By Turkish lights of fire

And all the claptraps of professional efficacy

And calculated romance

That i live through

I can’t leave

And i can’t love

And that’s the truth of triumph

Which the multitudes pass through

As each day

And each night

Speaking of attainment

Through mediocrity and bullcrap.

...................................................................................

The angels exist

In nothingness

As they hope

That the humans

Could do the same.

The angels have seen the ocean

And they wish

That the humans were

Fast enough

To catch up with them.

As the humans exist

In bubbles and rainbows

And build up stuff

Such as empires and civilizations

Between the first fuck and the next

And then, it’s time for the jokers

To undo

Whatever. And clap the moon

Going down

With the stars

As whores gather by the froth that smells like

The best fragrance you’ve ever sniffed

Before it’s done

And then like shit

once it’s done.

And all that shine

attract the passersby.

And horses ride

And doves fly

And you feel too inconsequential

To be true

To the fact

That you too can live and get

Half of all you want

If not more.

Ah, for the Angels

Their life is truer than that of the priests

As we profit from our follies

And little drops of dew

Gather by lips

We had never kissed

Because we feared

Life

And loathed

Living.

.......................................................................

Desire to Kill

2012-01-14T13:55:00.000+05:30

i cower a lot, and i pee on walls where i ought not to have

i fear many things:

eyes, love, retribution, attachment,

cold winters, cold people,

care, lack of care, loneliness

i fear them all

and they strike me down with their wrathful vengeance

i shiver and i await my turn

because one day, it will come

and i'll be strong and i'll kill them all

and i won't tremble anymore.

The Asshole Speaks of Assholes

2012-01-14T13:54:00.001+05:30

i trust folks, and i don't lie.

i am not like an Angel, i am an Angel myself,

and when i fight the assholes who call me asshole

i can draw a few punches as well

and so i fought, like i have fought many times

and i always knew that i was on the right side,

and so did the ones who landed their fists on my skull and jaws

i guess each time, all of us were right and wrong.

and after spilling my guts out many a times

i have learned that

each asshole has one who hits harder than him

and one worse off than him.

Okay, Mr. Bukowski, I am shit tired of pretending to be

trampling the sidewalks wearing your pair of shoes

just be my god

and tell me what to do to find my own pair.

Of Relentless Birds, Flatulent Jokers and of Aces of Spades

2012-01-14T13:43:00.002+05:30

There are people who refuse to accept you the way you are

People who sit still and sombre like scary huge statutes

With their scarier and huger shadows looming over the world

you inhabit, the world where you eat and drink and shit and fart and fuck and talk and laugh and cry.

They observe you.

And they wait for you to make your first slip,

which, mind you, has to be one in THEIR eyes.

And once you fail them, they will hack your guts out with their machetes

And walk away in disgust, leaving you in your gooey mess with fresh blood and flesh all around

Beware of them – they are the judges among us.

All of this is fine, but the real shit begins when your sense of what is right and wrong

differs from theirs.

And the worst shit is when you see someone close to you

becoming one of them

because the transition between anger and grief is a bitter one

and the one between grief and void is terrible.

...............................................................

Change amazes me

Everything changes

People, love, hatred, expressions of love and hatred,

dreamlands, ambitions, faces, masks, the colour of the sky, the way one feels et cetera et cetera

obviously, it’s pointless to list all the things that change.

there’s a part of me that loves all the change

but then there’s another that sucks at dealing with so much change

it’s easier to see a flower wilt i guess

and when that part of me that

refuses to accept all this change hits out against

the changing order

it strikes back, and badly so.

Meanwhile, the other part of me breaks into a sinister smile

and the sun rises like it had risen yesterday.

......................................................................................

i am not an animal

so i get hurt at times.

i am obnoxious and pretentious

So i pretend that i am not hurt

and i keep on walking

i am not a machine

so i get tired at times

but my poise is too precious to me

so i pose as the tireless one

and i keep on walking

i am not perfect

so i misunderstand and i get misunderstood at times

but i love my ego way too much to allow it to wield

so i let it kiss my ass and assure me that nothing is wrong

and i keep on walking

i am not a great poet

so i write for catharsis at times

but i have told myself of my poetic glory so often that i believe that i am a great poet

so i fake detachment from the words as i write

and i keep on writing.

............................................................

And a few hours before daybreak the entire neighbourhood woke up to the deafening siren-sound of the ambulance

Before long the police arrived

And then the media

And then politicians

And so on

And so on.

The story spread like wildfire

Even the horses he used to bet on, the cards he used to play, the mugs he used to drink his beer from got to know of his tragedy from the other bettors, players and drunkards.

Earlier that night

The policeman who had investigated him was fucking his girl as their cat purred by their bed

The doctor who had operated on him was fucking his girl as their cat curled up at its rug

The reporter who had covered his story was fucking his girl as their cat crawled out of their room

The politician who had assured his neighbours that everything was alright was fucking his girl as their cat stared stoically at the fireplace

Meanwhile, at the kitchen-floor of his apartment, he was writhing in a pool of blood

His girl and their cat were lying at the bed with their stomachs, guts, intestines and uteri ripped out

And at the kitchen-sink lay a bloodstained knife and a pair of freshly cut balls.

And the next night

The horses slept at their stables

The cards rested at the tables of their owners

The mugs lay dry and upside down at the shelves of the bars

And the policeman, the doctor, the reporter, the politician and their respective cats did what they had done the night before.

..............................................................................................

Bodh-Chit-Anondo

2011-12-29T19:46:00.003+05:30

RajrajeshWorii o tawtshawmbondhiyo Bibidho Pronalii o Prokriya

2011-12-23T22:51:00.005+05:30

2011-12-19T15:38:00.001+05:30

An Elegy for a Friend

2011-12-19T00:09:00.001+05:30

An Ode to ChNaad Sadagar

2011-12-16T04:49:00.004+05:30

The moon is half dead and all the ships are sunk

Returning, like a squirrel in snow – watched closely by the stars,

You listen to the mountains as they sing out your grief

And you listen to the leaves as they chant out your cold wrath.

You are returning home now.

Aware of the inevitability of flesh,

With memories of the empire toppling before your eyes

and recollections of faces that haunt the pale shadow of your feverish dreams,

You feel like a spirit lost in the ancient forest –

trapped by oaks that stand like astute sentries;

You see the last gods departing from the realm which was yours once,

You hear the dirge of your fellow-losers,

You run from the frozen wind as it shoots sharp arrows at your withering ribs,

And you know that all is lost.

And you know that you, who had left home in search of gold,

who had ran wild through the seven seas like forest-fire,

who had sailed beyond where the light meets darkness,

who had the sun and the moon and the world by his side for a while –

had found what you sought to find,

and had gambled it all away.

You are returning home –

Naked, burnt and destroyed.

Were the stakes too high?

Did they draw faster than you?

A serpent raises its hood and hisses from inside your hollow,

and the night bleeds for you;

And, as you beat your retreat,

dejected,

waiting, for the thunderbolts to strike you down,

and for all your hatred to engulf the world –

you reach a river – and you see a strange boat

that shall carry you across for a dime.

But you have no dime, and so you kill the boatman

and you row across to the other side –

to realize

that you have not lost.

It back comes to you – like a rapture that floods the veins of a dead man who springs up

from his grave and rushes to light –

the strength to live.

Now you know that you have nothing more left to lose

And you know that your children will grow up to become strong and brave –

And they will gamble once again.

And perhaps, they will win.

And thus, we carry the crosses of our fathers and mothers –

through the squall and the tides,

through a million dazzling strokes of lightning,

through visions of rainbow trapped doom,

through put out candles beside pianos,

through music choked off by gunshots,

through flowers eaten up by black insects,

through revolutions twisting the rubik’s cube time and again,

through hoisted skirts pulling us to the mark,

through silently suffering prisoners bound by blood and chromosome,

through greed, caprice and wisdom,

through toasts raised to the fervent mortality of being,

through the worship of instincts leading to pain and bodhi,

through the cobwebbed void in which we are doomed to keep on swimming,

and through the consummation of acceptance,

we carry them.

And we place our cards, just like our great ancestors did,

hoping to win.

If we win,

we raise the stake and we decide to deal once more.

And if we lose,

we hand out our burden to our children

dreaming of their future victory.

And our children do the same thing when their turn comes.

Chandradhar, I salute you –

Not because of your bravado or vanity,

But because you managed to pull your ace out when it mattered most.

And,

unlike us,

you knew it while you were doing so.

The strange thing is that, in your case, your children actually managed to win.

But that is beside the point.

Troyobingshoti

2011-12-13T00:12:00.002+05:30

On Happiness and Destitution

2011-12-06T17:42:00.003+05:30

This is a wasteful, tiring day, and i have seen many like this

Same old everything, doorbells ringing once a while

Thinking of how my father and mother will always be within whatever i see and how i see it,

given the fact that the i came out of him and swam through her to find my nest inside,

and of how i slept in the darkness – my last unencumbered sleep.

And thinking of faces i have seen before,

Of the desirability of warmth from the senses

Of how i want to watch a soothing movie with Florence Nightingale some day

Of women i love and of women i want to love.

It’s not ennui or staying up all night and drinking that makes me this,

And it’s not carrying time like a crucifix or a pushing gigantic rock uphill only to see it roll down

These things have their strange way of slithering their way in

The worst part of living is just this, ‘being here’

And the worst thing about leaving is to see your faithful dog staring at you until he becomes a part of the horizon.

No new music in the laptop, feeling too lazy to get aroused at anything

And here i am.

And the weatherman just said that it might rain in the evening

That will surely make the night sadder than the day

Just like the moon is sadder than the sun.

..............................................

Are you reading Bukowski right now, just like i am?

Are you scribbling your thoughts down?

Are you gaping at the splendour of ugliness as well?

Are you as ugly as i am?

I haven’t seen you since the day i left you by the fountain

You were reading a book, with pictures of sunflowers in it

And the previous night when you fell asleep after we made love

I saw the moon pouring down on your forehead

I kissed you forehead, i remember

And i slipped a letter inside the book which you had planned to read by the fountain

the next day.

But that day, i.e., the day i left you, you took a different book with you.

I loved your whims.

And so i left you.

One has to leave what one truly loves.

Did you read my letter?

I haven’t seen you for a long long time

I miss you and i miss the tiny mole between your breasts

And i miss the poster of Al Pacino which you had gifted me once and which i have lost.

But the best part is that, i miss your ugliness

That was what drew me to you, because it reminded me of myself

My mother was beautiful, but, unlike her, you were ugly

That’s why i loved you as much i love you.

......................................

Conspicuous, like flesh, we walked down the dark corridors

And we fought with open knives

And we drank, and our remorse was far too great to hang on to

And our heads were filled with every bit of junk we had fed ourselves

And one day, it was time to leave

So we shook hands, and we left

And then, when the entire city got flooded

We met, once again

You were with your girl

I was with my dog.

The girl and the dog died halfway through

And we knew that we had no destination to reach

However, our paths were different.

And so we parted again,

And we shook hands once again.

.....................................................

The light

From my poetry

Revealed to me

your curves.

And what else can i say?

Tell me more.

If you’re my mother, i shall fear my words

If you’re the empress of my adolescence

I shall refuse to bow to you

But if you’re the dark i aim to reach some day

I don’t know what i’ll do.

Maybe i’ll kneel down to pray

Or maybe i’ll attack the stars with my dagger.

......................................................

The germ that caused my illness

can be found everywhere

From bleeding skies, burning cities, from bombers who cry and poets who kill without remorse

From drawn up curtains and from skirts pulled up

From vast and vacuous spaces inside our thoughts

That germ can creep up from anywhere, anytime

And once it infects its victim – things start getting bleak and dry

Words become desires and desires become words

And then, one day, the transformation is complete

And you can’t make one from the other

And things get serious.

And when the great doctor comes, you see him and you know that he can cure you

But you don’t want to get cured

And so, the sight of him standing there and staring at you

repulses

you.

But he persists. It’s his duty to do so.

You expect the doctor to pull out a nasty looking syringe from his bag

But he merely walks up to your window and throws it open

And he points outside –

As you look, despite your reluctance, you see that all the people outside are suffering from the same disease.

you get mad at the doctor

and you get ready to punch him –

But by the time you turn to him

You don’t find him there

He has left the building.

Or maybe he never came.

And then you look out again to find all the people smiling at you

‘surely you are happy, aren’t you?’ – they’ll ask

Surely you are happy, and so are they.

They never had any disease, and neither did you.

In extreme cases, you can blind yourself before the doctor arrives

But the moment everything gets dark, the germ dies out on its own.

So, as you can clearly see, you are bound to get fixed,

one way

or the other.

........................................................................

Ekdin derii-tey Lekha Jawnmodin-er ChiThhi

2011-12-04T22:30:00.002+05:30

A Story About Two Sore Losers

2011-11-28T04:29:00.005+05:30

Another one of those school stories.

I seem to be reminiscing a lot these days though I am not that old

Anyhow, I was a backbencher and so was this other guy

We didn’t use to talk that much,

Neither of us were much the talking type

We had our share of problems each

And both of us sucked in studies and would barely pass the exams – that too by cheating

in various ways.

Anyhow,

we were one of the earliest ones to start smoking,

And after classes we used to light up one cigarette each

as we walked

the bus stop.

Again, without much talk.

During one of those walks we saw this charming lady,

presumably in her early twenties, walking side by side with

what seemed to be her boyfriend.

As we stood and observed,

they entered the fenced compound of a house

And we saw her unlocking the door.

He winked at me, and I said “fuck”

as we resumed our walk.

Both of us had a grin on our faces for a few seconds.

It began to rain that evening and I masturbated in my room thinking of her and of myself in place of

that asshole whom we saw with her. And as the semen came out, my world seemed to throb with

glory hitherto unknown and bugles of a strange victory seemed to roar out of the sky and resonate throughout the world.

It’s not that I hadn’t pleased myself before that and frankly,

I have done it at least a few thousand times since then if not more, but I have never been able to recreate

that particular moment.

It was totally unique.

The next day in class as I recounted

the experience

to him, he told me,

to my sheer astonishment,

that even he got

the very same feelings.

Both of us were, to use a word which was a recent addition to our respective vocabularies then, “mindfucked”.

We had never seen

that girl

since then,

even though on numerous occasions,

we had stopped

right outside the fencing of that house

on some lame pretext or other.

Then, on the last day of our annual exams, we had a huge fight.

I don’t remember how it began.

All I remember is that he called me a “lousy prick” before he gave me my black eye, and I called him a “piece of shit” before I gave him his.

I was in no mood to hear from him during the vacations,

and I am pretty sure that the feelings were mutual.

Then, on the last day

of our vacations,

I was returning from my aunt’s place and the good lady had given me some money.

So I decided to have alcohol for the first time in my life and so

I entered a bar.

I must admit that I was very nervous at first

and I thought I would get nabbed for underage drinking

and would get thrown out,

and that the police and my parents would get to know of this.

But with a few shots of stiff whiskey, I warmed up.

By the time I came out,

it was evening.

After walking for quite some time

I felt like having a cigarette.

I had one on me,

but as I searched my pockets for the matchbox,

I realized that I had left it in the bar.

There were no shops nearby and,

being tipsy, the idea of walking up to the main road again

made me feel like throwing up.

And then I saw him standing before me.

He offered me his lit cigarette to light mine up.

He seemed drunk

as well, though, evidently,

he had had his fill somewhere else.

He gave me two pieces of information, and I still remember those.

The first one was that his father, who, by the way, was also an alcoholic, had lost his job because of drunkenness and hence he will have to drop out of school

And the second one was that his father had taken up a driving job at that girl’s place and he had gone there with his father.

Apparently, the guy who we thought was fucking her was her brother.

We didn’t talk much, and he walked away. I have never seen him again.

As I was walking home, I was still drunk, it began to rain.

I remembered the rainy evening when I got that crazy feeling while thinking of her and masturbating. Even I had a sister.

But I didn’t give a flying fuck.

And the thought that I will have to sit beside a new backbencher from the next class did cross my mind during the walk.

Honestly speaking, I didn’t give much of a flying fuck about that either.

Mokkhirani Pokkhiraaj

2011-11-25T13:48:00.002+05:30

DushkabYo

2011-11-25T13:41:00.002+05:30