Pi and Richard Parker

When you grow too curious and 

hold your ear against the fabric of 

reality in search of a higher purpose, 

you're thrown into a desperate ocean. 

You and me ended up in these

existential waters, like that.

Helpless, drifting and hallucinating,

while trying make meaning out 

of this salinity.

But the waves here aren't made 

of water. They reek of confession, 

compulsive guilt and self-humiliation 

that comes after forced sarcasm. 

You made gods out of language, 

fed meaning to every passing cloud, 

Tried to tame the wild thing in me 

with tenderness. and without noticing 

Didn't you become 'Pi' like that? 

And I, Richard Parker. Not fierce,

just an animal, too wounded to admit 

I have grown used to your companionship. 

And this raft between us-

these exchanged poems, 

these metaphors stitched together as 

survival manuals. 

We fed on verses like it's a wisdom 

that guide us out of the abyss.

and somewhere between casual words 

and crafted poems, our instincts 

disappeared and we became witness 

to each other's drowning. 

You fed me your attention, and I circled 

your loneliness, like I would worship it forever. 

And, to be frank, I survived the ocean 

because of you.

But somewhere I know why 

a beast should never forget his teeth 

out of gratitude.

That’s why I keep warning you.

That, one day, land will arrive-

Reality will return like a coastline

neither of us asked for.

And when it does, I'm afraid my 

old instincts will crawl back into me.

The instinct to vanish, to ghost.

To walk into the jungle without turning back.

Not because you meant nothing.

But because creatures like me only know 

how to survive through departure.

Richard Parker

You called me your fierce 

companion, but I was only

a hungry animal dragged 

unwillingly into the brawl 

of the ocean.

You looked at me through 

your dread and 

I looked at you through 

the lens of starvation.

But both of us had to

act beyond our insticts-

So the raft became the 

ground for a negotiation

between us.

The distance we maintained 

as a measure of survival,

turned into mutual respect 

and somewhere between 

salt and hunger, we stopped 

being boy and beast.

And through blind storms

and mad sun,

You fed me with your 

trembling hands and I tried

offer you purpose by simply 

being there.

I've heard your sobbing

beneath the waves,

the way you whispered

to gods like a child writing 

letters to an empty sky.

I never tried to respond.

not because I don't have a

heart. Because Tigers don't 

know how to console. 

But when the land arrived,

and the jungle called me in 

the oldest language I knew,

My predatory insticts were back.

So tell me Pi, whether 

saying you goodbye was

important or grabbing your 

neck against my will?

And because somewhere

inside my animal heart,

I could not bear to make 

a meal of the only witness

to my survival, I walked away.

Not out of indifference,

But because instinct is older 

than gratitude.

Ila

They ask me her name, and 

an imaginary mirror appears 

in front of me again.

My grey hair gleams in it. 

The wrinkles on my face 

suddenly grow honest, 

and the shame in my eyes 

settles heavily upon my 

shoulders. 

They ask me her name, and 

my tongue fidgets restlessly 

inside my mouth. 

The throat thickens, blood rushes 

up, but before even her 

image fully forms in my head, 

her name collapses into an 

awkward smile.

They ask me her name, and 

my barren lands enter the fray. 

My untouched soul protests 

against the ebb she creates. 

The solitude I have grown 

used to goes into defence.

Even the ghost of my dead wife, 

whose face I no longer

remember-

indulgences itself and asks me

the definition of love- 

The bravery in my veins 

quivers down again.

But why won’t this wretched 

world let my brooding rest? 

Again and again they ask, 

" What’s her name?" 

I try to swallow it back, but they 

do not know how desperately 

I want to scream it away. 

The letters she sent in the

'The Lunchbox' push it 

against my restraint, and 

her name returns tasting 

Like all curries, I relished.

Ohh! They ask her name again 

and again. But I have to 

smile first, to hide the blush. 

The world could end in the 

next instant if I say it but 

to hell with it this time. 

I say "Ila" and the world 

is still stands unbothered.

But all the weight is off my 

shoulders and I'm in the air.

River

There is a river in me, and 

I let you flow through it.

The fragrance of your hair

dissolves into its currents,

the tones of your anklets

ripple across the water.

and the caress of your feet

colors its otherwise 

restless depths.

If I ask you to be my navigator,

will you do the honors?

will you place your hands

upon the trembling compass

of my longing and pretend 

you know where this ache 

is headed?

I would obey gladly.

“Aye aye, Captain,” I’d say

like a compliant child who trusts 

the sea only because you're 

beside me.

Let the darkness of night 

be dealt with reading the

stars aloud, let our fancy be

always the constellations 

of the other world.

And when we reach the sea,

don't just stand and watch

me disappear.

step into my depths and

take me to the shores.

If I drift, guide me towards you.

If I drown, lemme be subsumed 

in your reflection.

Atone my storms, 

repair the fear of shipwrecks

in my heart-

For what is a river if not a 

body searching endlessly

for surrender?

Let us find new beaches 

everyday to break as waves.

Let us do it so meticulously 

till they can't say, 

where we began and 

where we ended.

Omnipotent

Whoever bears a surname

as yours, I tend to think they 

might be your distant relative.

Whoever comes from your state,

I quietly assume they must 

know you somehow.

It's as if geography itself is too 

small to not carry traces of you.

Or you're are perpetual enough 

to not be everywhere?

I search for your familiarity

in borrowed accents,

in train station conversations,

in the way certain people

stretch vowels while speaking 

your language.

Sometimes a stranger laughs

in a way that resembles you

for half a second-

and my heart, foolish thing,

stands up to attention.

I know how absurd this is.

You cannot be scattered

across an entire population.

And yet,

my mind keeps rehearsing

your presence

through other people.

I very well know this in my

bones, that this is an illusion 

cast by my fancy.

Yet, I let my longing weaken 

the borders between 

resemblance and memory.

So what if every map

feels mildly inhabited by you.

What if every language in

the world has your hints.

When every crowd seems 

to be capable of returning 

you to me, 

why would I wanna strip 

down my delusion?

When my my devotion 

for you is as real as the day,

Why wouldn't I fancy every 

attribute of God to you?

That way, you're at least 

omnipotent.

Jasmine

Your arrival is announced 

with tones of anklets,

The gleam of your eyes 

reaches me laced with kajal.

The air, swept by the sway 

of your saree,

It reaches me softly and

my reasons fall asleep.

O, the jasmine of my village.

Come to me like a steady summer,

and settle like a season 

in my barren heart.

The restless bee I am

short of purpose, reach me

like fragrance and take me 

away to a certain slumber.

For what good is reality if

it can't be fancied?

and what good are the dreams 

if they can't be lived?

Enchant me into a deep sleep. 

Once I dream you enough, 

Mumbling your name,

I wanna wake up gasping.

Search

They say-

The things you run away 

from, will meet you in 

the middle of the city.

Grief found me on a

rainy day.

Loneliness on a summer 

day.

I tried running away from 

you. Seasons have passed. 

Cities I've crossed-

Where are you?

At the edge of the world 

You meet me, only to say 

I've been searching too-

where were you?

Negotiations to be a fool

On a distant sea shore,

there's a piano and you play it.

I feel the tones here and 

dissolve in a deluge.

The undercurrents have a

thing or two about you to say,

But I out beat them by saying 

many more.

I've done the same in the sky. 

And with gods and devils 

in heaven and hell.

No one can stand me, that's why.

Talk about getting banished 

from everywhere for being 

such a chatterbox-

I'm a stray in no man's land.

And the way I wanna belong 

only to you, own me if you want.

That's why I seek your asylum

with repeated pleas.

This yearning I suffer with.

I've made threads out of it to tone

my longing. Every guitar riff

is tuned to your distant presence. 

My compositions fleet in your 

service, forever in the air-

and if you get a whiff of it.

Embrace it into acceptance.

Do it, so that, 

I could negotiate terms with 

myself, to be a fool I should be, 

again and again.

Hijack

Hijak their tongues.

Hijak their words.

Hijak their silence and

assume it's a 'yes' 

when it's 'not a no.'

Tell them bad air is

all their fault.

Tell them how holy

is water, to hijak

their god.

Tell them nation 

comes first, tell them 

it's for the greater good.

Tell them individuality 

is a sin and sacrifice is

the only way to go.

Punch holes in their

dialects with a

compromised vocabulary,

and rinse their history 

with facts that are 

blasphemous to deny.

Make compliance a

virtue. make questioning 

a sign of betrayal.

Repeat it. Sharpen it.

Sanctify it until 

language forgets 

how to resist.

You're champions of

democracy already,

Yet, you choose to conduct 

elections now and then.

Not for power but

check the grammar 

of your propaganda-

Which is foolproof.

and we, with bit of

rationality left, are fools,

to think, you aren't 

Inevitable.

Opulence

If your income is

below twenty thousand 

per month-

You've a caste, sub-caste.

Kul, Gotr, Nakshatra. 

Rashi, dosh, Mangal, 

Shani and what not.

Upon that, even the 

neighborhood deity, 

who's a boulder,

is angry on you for

missing a upvas.

Maybe, if the income 

doubles, or triples.

Your Kul and Gotr

would be spared.

You can offord to overlook 

the local deity and focus 

on some institutional 

Gods of your town.

If you it notch up a little 

and go over few lakhs

a month kinda bracket.

You can ignore even

mangal and shani.

Can appease a pujari in 

a few temples, he can 

offer special puja at will

whenever you need it.

And if you can go even 

further. Perhaps, if you can

make a few crores a month. 

Maybe you can have a

few temples of your own.

Maybe few gods will 

stop holding you contempt 

altogether.

Few murders, few rapes

can always be kept in

reserve till you piss off

a better lord.

Then, if the money in 

question starts working 

for you and you start 

minting it even when you

don't have to.

You can start a cult to 

enslave a few gods.

Make your own rules to 

keep them in check.

In fact, you can force them 

to interbreed. So that,

you could use their children 

for your pedophilic acts.

Maybe other alpha Gods

will be a little angry but

you can negotiate a

deal to make them part

of your sweet dirty acts.

You don't have to worry

worry about the consequences 

at that level of opulence. 

The onus lies on the almighty.

Or maybe it doesn't.

As they're equally corrupt.

TF

When someone is reduced 

to being a shadow,

No one has to wake you up

to force you into recognition.

That's why you should know,

you're perpetually present.

I know, everytime I mistake

you in a stranger, 

it's definitely not you.

Yet I carry your silence in

each one of them to repaint 

the fading contours of you.

The air doesn't become 

thin for me. It already is.

The flowers needn't bloom.

The bloom is forever and

I taste the fragrance in my 

mouth like I munch on your 

name with each breath.

I've seen fresh horizons.

Experienced new maps

and I've experimented with

new faces to force your

memory into submission.

But the bloody thing sticks.

The fact that you're vital,

constant and Inevitable-

I hate to meet you in 

rooms no one else can find.

I hate your occupancy in

my thoughts and I hate

the fact that I can't get 

you even out of my vacant

gaze when I recollect 

something nice.

That's the problem with 

being reduced to a shadow

you know.

You don't arrive, you persist.

By this time, you're a 

fantasy gone wrong.

A rogue angel back as a 

ghost.

Ohh to breathe around you,

to think despite you,

and to move forward

without ever leaving you 

behind.

Ohh to be aware of this

toxicity and yet be a

hopeless romantic-

You may feel happy about 

the way you linger within me 

but I feel stuck in the 

quicksand of failed 

negotiations with self.

and if it helps,

each time I whisper 

your name before I could 

realize I've spoken,

the only afterthought 

these days is TF.

Contentment

I crave for a freedom 

I don't want when 

I don't know what to do 

with what's already in 

my hand.

This constant urge to 

escape- 

Is the grass really green

on the other side?

I wonder about it with a

cup of coffee in hand.

Where does the peace 

lie though?

Does contentment linger

between the ribs or 

it fleets somewhere far?

When the chair I sit has 

enough to offer,

I don't know what to do 

with these thoughts that 

seek comfort in a

foreign land-

So I take a sip and 

contemplate about how

the mind might sit here

or wander elsewhere.

May sulk in a room or 

bask beneath the shadows 

of pyramids-

The other side maybe 

green or offer, a whole 

spectrum of the rainbow-

and as I take another sip 

of this bitter black liquid,

I hypothesize-

That if you aren't happy 

with a cup of coffee,

You can't really be happy 

with anything else.

Backspace

I type and undo stuff.

seems backspace is my love 

language and I'm becoming 

fluent at it, I know.

I overthink to reject the 

things I feel about you.

sometimes I send,

then delete and deny to

achieve what, I don't know.

I've buried your pics and

pics related to you in a 

vague telegram group.

I visit it now and then-

I pretend to hide something 

from myself but can I 

outrun my impulse?

I freaking don't know.

I look in the mirror and stare 

into the abyss of my eyes.

I feel cute and wanna smile.

but I stop before my lips

can give it away.

I know you're the reason 

for this and I don't want

to say it aloud.

Ohh! is this how I look when 

I pretend to be in love?

The gleam in the eyes 

I bury with loud laugh.

words I bite and swallow 

with sarcasm at my hand.

I wonder if I have spilled 

any hints.

But, did anything flutter its 

wings to reach you before 

I could clip those cuties?

I must say, it's difficult to 

kill a beautiful feeling.

But I try.

But no matter how many 

stars I crush and the flowers 

I manage to trample.

the stardust sticks and 

fragrance lingers.

I borrow it all to weave 

it all with my unspoken words.

some of it becomes what 

they call as poetry,

and I humbly slip into the

humble arrogance of 

being a sorted poet.

Messiah Complex

Oh, that fancy for girl 

with terminal illness-

That tumor behind a 

little face.

Hope gleaming loud

in her big eyes, and 

walls ready to crumble 

behind the stony walls. 

Didn't we men create a

romance genre around 

this trope?

Adding fragility over 

fragility over the softness

of her white skin-

Only to bring out an 

inherent duty in ourselves 

to rescue this 

starry-eyed girl. 

Ohh this compulsive 

urge to be a messiah-

A hero complex with

daddy issues that 

leaves a hollowness 

that needs to be filled-

You wait for her demise 

by framing and reframing 

your words for an 

ultimate eulogy-

Isn't such tragedy 

a perfect place to 

rehearse your poetry?

But when she's gone.

when you no longer 

have an audience for 

your pretentious grief,

you're left with a question-

That if you loved her

for what she was or just the 

idea of her, upon which

you could briefly park-

The only purpose you 

were left with.

Make me something you never finish

Oh, to dissolve on your tongue 

like a cherry and taste my name

in your reveries.

To be the hushed tones of 

your whispers and the feeble 

breath of your sigh.

Oh, this yearning to meet you 

and be cradled in your arms.

to hold your hand and 

to lay there off guard.

I wish I could meet you once.

I wish I could walk beside you

basking in your shadow.

I wish the sentences suspended 

in our throats would start a

poetic affair of their own.

And I hope this distance is just 

a comma and our separation is 

a deliberate a plot hole to elevate 

the climax.

And before the ink is dried and

chapters are closed.

memory is thinned and 

oblivion is invoked-

I'll meet you once for sure.

We'll force our hands into 

etching our union onto the 

stony silence of fate.

But the night is longer, and

the wait is forever, my love.

Keep looking for omens till then.

If I swift through your loose hair 

and disappear like a sparrow's chirp.

Preserve me like a fragrance.

Settle me deep in your memory,

like you reminisce your favourite 

Gazhal, Make me something 

you never finish and,

I'll always return.

We'll never meet again

You ask for a meeting

brief as a struck match.

But what if we have already 

burned that fleeting light?

The ancient, unbreakable 

promise you keep talking about.

Haven't we both learned how 

words fail precisely where 

they are most needed?

You philosophize distance 

as a comma. 

I wish I belived the same.

But commas are not always 

merciful.

What if they continue when 

we would rather stop?

You say your heart would find me

in a sea of strangers.

Mine would recognize you too.

But won't we be those 

familiar strangers full of 

contemplation again?

Your fear of solitude in love 

is justified. But again,

ain't love solitary at its core?

Yet there were moments 

when our solitude overlapped.

so precisely that it 

almost felt like belonging.

But if the pages must turn,

and chapters must end and

books should be closed.

Let it be.

Not every story is meant to 

be concluded.

Some are meant to be 

suspended mid-sentence,

mis-plotted and half-baked.

So they can be returned to

without the burden of an ending.

So I will tell you this-

we will not meet again.

not because I doubt it.

But because I refuse to reduce 

us to being subjects of a

bogus promise.

Hence, let the memories die

out of hunger. Ink dry 

after being orphaned.

Deprived of any touch, 

the tenderness of hands must sulk

and heart must ache-

For silence has always been 

the question, let solitude 

be the answer.

Bombing A School

From the mouth of a building

that forgot its own shape,

they pull out papers-

creased lungs of color,

breathing ash.

A house drawn in seemingly 

straight lines refuses to 

learn collapse.

A sun- not so round, 

not so certain,

keeps smiling at a sky that 

no longer exists.

Stick figures hold hands

across a page in solidarity 

like there's still a future 

that no blast could edit.

A blue crayon river

still remembers how to flow,

though the street outside

has turned to dust.

Fingerprints of red and yellow-

small, stubborn signatures

outlive the walls that tried to 

keep them safe.

And in one corner, a bird 

mid-flight, wings open-

has nowhere left to arrive.

The resuers stack the 

drawings like evidence against 

the idea of war. Proof that 

color survived impact.

Proof that someone,

before the noise,

before the blast believed in 

windows, in doors, 

and in tomorrows.

Proof that, in the quiet

after sirens-

whatever hope that was left

got laced to crayons and 

took an iroclad refuge 

in papers that no

power could ransack.

Cold Goodbye

Sometimes the kindest 

thing is a cold goodbye.

No trembling voice.

No rehearsed compassion.

Just a clean cut

that doesn’t pretend

to heal.

You leave without 

nostalgia.

You leave without the 

fancy of a 'what if'.

No strings.

No soft corners.

No memories left to

polish later into 

tender reminiscing.

Raw, unflattering wounds.

The bruises that cannot 

be romanticized.

The kind that makes 

you cringe when their 

name surfaces.

A disgust that protects.

An embarrassment 

that pushes you ahead.

A decay that doesn't 

grow back-

A dirty breakup is 

A strange mercy.

Ohh that freedom 

that comes when 

even longing gives up-

Insects gone for good 

from the den of head.

Ohh when the definition 

of empty cages come 

closer to peace,

The feelings you kill

becomes an act of 

self-love.

In seek of validation

What if I call you a 

Goddess and worship? 

Would you consider my 

Devotion? 

Would you shower me 

withblessings if I offer 

you prayers? 

If I adorn you with flowers, 

fruits, and other hefty 

offerings, will I be worthy 

of your affection? 

Tell me the threshold of 

your appeasement 

before I stop sounding 

natural-

and I shall cross 

it by jumping, crawling, 

or in whatever way

you would like it. 

The human sacrifices 

aren't enough clearly, 

so aren't my pedophilic 

tendencies.

I've tried bombs,

missiles and rockets.

Space exploration,

Genocide and whatnot.

Still falling short?

Give me a hint maybe.

A sign?

By this time,

The validation I'm seeking,

seems to exceed 

the magnitude of your 

delayed blessings.

Perhaps I can go on

committing more heinous 

acts, till you one day, you 

prostrate before me

to stop it.

But I won't.

By that time my 

God complex would

make me deaf and

maybe you can act

like you're my bhakt.

Missing Girl

At first, it is small.

Maybe she’s late.

Maybe traffic.

Maybe a friend’s house.

Then the clock

sharpens.

Minutes grow teeth.

She could be lost.

Stuck in school.

Stuck in a bus

that forgot its route.

Or worse-

someone took her.

The mind doesn’t pause.

It doubles down-

Kidnapped. 

Trafficked. Sold.

A room with no windows.

A life rewritten

without consent.

suspicious containers.

dingy brothels.

The headlines you 

scroll past daily

start rehearsing 

inside your skull.

Upon that-

What will people say?

How do you tell relatives?

What answer is safe?

What version of truth

can survive their gaze?

and if she returns-

how do you hold her?

How do you ask

without breaking her again?

How do you protect

her from the house that 

failed her?

And how do you

protect yourself while

the guilt gleams till 

it blinds everyone around?

You wait and wait batling

all thoughts, till

the house becomes

a waiting room

for catastrophe.

Phones repeatedly 

locked and unlocked.

Doors half-open.

Breath uneven-

Every sound

pretends to be her.

Every silence

proves it isn’t.

And then-

the door opens.

She walks in.

Normal. Hungry.

Unaware of the war 

she triggered.

Seven hours collapse

into one breath.

Relief floods loud, 

unceremonious,

almost angry.

All the imagined horrors

fold away.

No one speaks

of what almost happened.

But everyone knows-

how quickly

the world can end

inside a mind,

and how quietly

it resumes

when a child

just walks back in.