Teesta Review: A Journal of Poetry, Volume 3, Number 2. November 2020. ISSN: 2581-7094
My Home
The whimsical moon shot past me
like an arrow, in a floral flux
I saw it as a mirror
revealing myself to me.
My home.
I love sitting here
in the windy balcony
and flying in the night sky.
This is my home in Delhi,
Delhi away form Delhi,
my dream home
the home of my long-cherished desires
at the foot of the hillock
flowers all over.
Here I am given more
than I could ask for.
Peacocks dance
to the tune of the wild rain
camels graze,
birds of hue
sing lullabies to my tired soul.
My little son plays around
runs like the wind on the sloppy road,
the country road,
a feast to my eyes;
lying on my bed I watch
him with flower-like kids
flying audible kisses from there
at me
I hum a tune to myself
in my velvety voice
keeping a book close to the chest.
The pretty dappled trouts
with joyful haste
move in the aquarium
like the brook.
This was a present to my son
on his award of a medal –
he wants trouts
for he loves to see them
moving patient,
for not being noisey.
I arrange my home
with a careless care –
nightlong in winter, I hear the silence
silently here. In full moon nights
the nightingales sing frantically
in summer.
The passionate rain
with its vibrations
tinkle my inner self, here.
I discover a newer world
close to nature, close to
a power, unknown, and
rediscover myself.
I
cry no more
my world is wet enough
here my heart is grilled
with green moss
I have transfigured myself,
the base of my harmony
is my loneliness.
I have just started
to count life beneath
my fingertips.
Anniversary
Gathering buds and flowers sometimes
and sometimes mosses
feeling thorns over the foot sometimes
and sometimes roses
growing wings on my arms sometimes
and sometimes chains
tiring of the huelessness of life
sometimes
and sometimes the fragrance
measuring the distance from you to myself
this anniversary
I can guess
the footsteps of the volcanoes
in your and my breasts.
December Again
Month to feel flowery feelings.
I feel otherworldly
as if for ages to come
Twisting libelous thoughts
make me gloomy as belated hours.
I pick stars for me and my love.
Now flowers bloom, the sweet scent
of joy blows in breeze
the rising sun renews the world.
In the long dark nights
the clouds of exhaust vapour
in the eastern region
and my heart’s horizon;
now I become a drooped, withered blossom
of
bygone months.
now I smile and now wail
now I hold you sweet in my arms
and now like a purple haze you disappear!
Now I feel like saying farewell to
all those bitter sweet memories,
write a lyric for you
love
with words carefully chosen
musically harmonious
vowels manipulated in euphony.
Now I beg alms in the door of words
yet now I sing all day long
my grad tribute to love
music resounds with sons of winged
fancies.
December again
Luxurious winter again. I my new heart
beat
I rediscover my love my lord
and springs out a fountain new
in ears.
Away in the grand mirror-palaces of the
Maharani
I roam alone
where past shaped life royal
their attitude forming an edifying quest.
In the mountain tops of Udaipur
mirrors, whirling-dazzling skirts, camels,
grand, decorated elephants
dreamy forts and dancing puppets,
in local trains, hot coffee and the
beggars
nudging at our elbows, and while
watching the never ending yellow mustard
fields
and long deserted deserts of Rajasthan
I find you hazy
watery eyes lost into the horizon
You are an image, the silhouette sharp
I pursue the image bewitched by love’s
myths.
Now you’re near, and in a flux, afar
This December.
Silence of seas broods over.
In December
I become ‘I’
I live my vision of life
I open my eyes in lazy cool mornings
the world exists generating new norms
when you and I work on our computer.
And in afternoons
I regret my gross inability
to assert all worlds –inherent,
dissolution of myself – coherent
and there seems to be a universe
between you and me, but for
my books, my poems, my alphabets,
my blue sky, my life mine.
In evenings I gather up, oh no!
oh no! such restraints never elevate us,
give the whole of me to the whole of you
to the world of oblivion
of all arts, all sciences
in December wintry nights
I feel more netted and slender
wipe off lonely sleepless hours of desire.
December again the month of
Home-coming across half the glove.
Let go let go soft disk memories
of younger sisters growing malarial,
dead young brother,
parents-kith-and-kin half-forgotten
typical new-year wishes from friends
formal
gold medals to feel proud, own people now
foreign, oblivious of the same apartment
neighbor
over-crowded topsy-turvy people around.
this December.
Tears feel no more tears
your face, eclipses every other face
your young smile beams
in the bowers of the heart
now the heart is free of wrong and right.
December is the month of floating images
of events like swinging clocks
when memory rustles down
and spreads its arms to the bottom of
the bone marrow. From heart to soul.
With a life full of Decembers, a time to
feel
flowery feelings.
December again.
The Posters of Spring
The other day when I sat
determined to complete that poster
patched of all colours for my wall
I felt like tearing off the present.
Another poster, enormous, vast, as dear as
the past itself came into my eyes.
And four sisters sticking pictures on a
drawing paper of dreams.
Pictures of all kinds
and all colours-ice creams,
models, guys, girls, fiat cars,
scooters, sun, moon, stars, brooks,
oceans,
kyds, cartoons, jewels, delicacies,
fruits, flowers, flora and fauna, deities,
everything, just everything,
that we could think of.
Guess a thing, and it was there,
exciting, romantic, dazzling, dreamlike
Looks like words, smells like tastes,
colours like views
hold memories, memories of
snacks-n’-tea cold Udayagiri afternoons
and
sisters giggling inside the
mosquito-net sleepless nights
and hot posters that
take a heart away from these weary days
to all those mornings and evenings
where time’s body was composed of
ephemeral dream layers
swaying us into warm winter snow and
into posters of simmering spring-colours.
If Only
If only we were alone
in these exotic spots
walking hand in hand
whispering tinging words
in lazy afternoons
the wind whistling note of a ditty
and the world would be full of
vibrations of solitude.
If the green trees would ask
each other where are we going
horizontally
we’d smile meaningful
and go down into the blossom
of flowers around.
If only we caress the moon
inside our pockets
and the horizon contrasts into a pea
settles in the palm.
If only this life ends
into a never ending journey…
if only these little moments of togetherness
would relieve
the burdens we carry
in hearts for future!
If
only we’d turn into two
closely-embraced sculptures
encompassing till eternity
dumping the world behind
in the garbage bin
where at every footfall there is
death!!
Then we won’t find parting times
more desolate in this dead city
after climbing down step by step
of a relationship
rootless.
The dreams we cherish, wave, nourish
may die
the words we utter,
would of course die.
If only, if only
we were immortal with our
words, kisses, looks,
fragrance, caress, youth…
If only we were knowledge,
here, very much here,
where everything else is
ignorance.
If only we open our eyes wider
fly high like woolgatherers
and not let the sun set!!
If only I were the image of freedom
you , the image of courage
and the world
the image of wish-fulfillment!!