Third Whistle

It's ten past seven in the evening,

Her weary sandals take a hesitant 

Refuge besides the stingy shoes.

The saree retires to the wardrobe,

And the withered jasmines,

Part ways from her braids.

Her body is transferred to

Another uniform- a gown.

Then the vegetables are cut,

Rotis are prepared and only when 

The third whistle of the cooker 

Screams to the appeals of

The hungry stomachs..

For a brief while, everyone feels,

Her presence.

Why shouldn't it Rain?

She dances in the crowd holding
Her skirt and I feel teased.
She's like hope of rain in my desert
Of solitude and for the fleeting desires
In my heart, why shouldn't it rain?

For the last leaf that flirts with
Unfinished hopes, and the overbearing
Clouds that want to pour down.
For the earth that needs to be ploughed
And the hunger that needs to be fed.

For a longing unquenched and
Songs unsung. For the wayfarer
That hasn't reached and the night
Un-spent waiting. For the unfulfilled
Waves of the sea and premature
Death of some beliefs.

Why shouldn't it rain to reassure
The worthiness of the wait and
Sweetness of the quench when
The water has been scarce.

Man-childs

It all starts with some hopeless
Idealism when you're a teen.
Then you together read
'Motorcycle Diaries' and dream big.

But life isn't a movie like ZNMD,
Not sure who was gonna be Kabir
But you eventually turn out to be Irfan
With damnation of poetry.

The two of you lose that third-wheel
And get condemned to be just two.
The dream of forming a band is
Still incomplete, a business at least
In the near future, seems just an
Utopian wish.

But the supposed low-key Arjun
Buys a bike and you get to travel
Across Himalayas. Only that
Happens to have some meaning
In your half-baked life.

You go on a drinking frenzy one night
With this more than a friend
And less than wife nigga, thinking
That's how you end it like you're
In a Tarantino tragedy.

But your goodbyes are somehow
Saved like renewed man-child characters
In another Imtiaz Ali movie.

Necrosis

Yes, we lack purpose, hate loving.
Despise living and love the dark,
Against all social norms.
But don't call us dead yet.

The heart might not be beating in
Lieu with your scales.
Breath might not be in and out
In accordance with your cues,
As we're not slaves.

The wings flutter erratically
The thoughts derange and paths
Often change. But we're trying..

Lips are a few inches wider,
If that's what you call a smiling.
There's a small bulb light always
These days as you're afraid of me
In the dark.

I'm trying to die a little less these days.
The mutilated nose is growing back,
And the twisted feet are turning around.
Necrosis is failing and my friends in
Hell smell the stink of betrayal.

Goodbye Chester, Goodbye Willis,

Goodbye you son of a gun, Hemingway.

 
The golden drop of life still seems
To be waiting for me she says.
So I refuse to die this evening per se.

Self-

The self wanders, takes a walk,
Goes on hikes and on rainy days
Hops on untrodden paths to
Get lost for good.

Gets twisted, and stabbed in all gore.
Obliterated to dust and ash.
And each night after work,
You gotta pray, conjure and
Force it down in the confines of
Yourself to love, hate and abuse
It to keep it around.

It needs coaxing, cajoling and
Appeasing and lots of pampering.
Self is a cougar who thinks she's
In a teenage body. A gigolo who
Assumes he's a warrior's daddy.

It fleets without fidelity and
Decays fast to the cues of inevitability.
The self can become a drunken sailor
Who gambles his fate for a
Cheap bottle of rum to sink the ship
Where there's no water..

So you need to be at the helm

As a captain always, like Jack Sparrow.

Though drunk and losing control but

Playfully enough to keep the heart intact 

Even when you're lost.

Living at an Edge

We scrape our dirt, store it
In a jar and wait for it, hoping
It doesn't rot.
Poems are pickles, a decay
Used to our advantage.
A breath of life added to
Something that's dying or dead.

Incense sticks in a dirty
Dark rooms that haven't felt
Touch of a broom.
Broken chairs before anyone
Could reach to the noose.

Empty roads engaging in a
Small talks instead of losing
Track of their path and
Suicide notes deciding to
Forget it all by becoming
Paper crafts.

The drowned, saved by a
Lady's mouth to mouth.
And the ants dancing in blood
To leave a script that occupies
Your boggled head.

Looking back at the abyss
When it stares at you,
Bouncing back from the pushed
Borderlines is what gives you wings.
A breath of life to what's
Dying or dead, art comes to you
Only if you live off an edge.

First Mango of the Season

When the mango trees flower
By the start of April.
The taste buds on the tongue start
A revolt to have a taste of
The first ripened mango of
The season and they don't
Let you wait.

You pluck those tiny-bud-like
Mangoes in pursuit of your
Craving and you keep doing that
Compulsively till you find that
Final emancipating taste.

You go climbing trees and
Hitting private farms in summer
Holidays with all your harmless
Childish face but the owner
Chases you away.

You collect unripe mangoes from
The roadside to keep them for
Fruition in the paddy husk and
You don't have the patience to leave
Them to the forces of nature.

So you press them a couple of
Times a day to see if they're
Magically ripe and sometimes
The squishy pulp of the unripe ones
Makes you believe that it's ready,
Before it explodes its foul taste
In your mouth as a cold revenge.

But that's the grind right?
You chase around restlessly,
For that one over-aged ovary.
And when you find one, you peel
The skin and lick it well first.
Feed on the pulp and suck on
The stone till it's core is visible
And then play all day with the fibers
That get stuck in your teeth.

The Widow Maker

She breaks the bangles of women
Who's husbands die.
She rubs their vermillion-laden
Maang and wraps around them
A white saree like it's a shroud
To condemn them for life.

She herself is a widow,
She can't look someone in the eye.
Her shadow is forbidden on the kids
And they don't let her walk around
When the newlywed couples arrive.

In the seventh house on the fourth
Street of the village, she too
Has a humble life.
The smell of her sambar makes it
The streets daily twice,
There's hope in the bright eyes of
Her only child.

But more often than not, everyone
Tries to remind her of the closed
Paths to her maiden home and the
Jasmines in the backyard she can
Never have.

The last soft touch of her deceased
Husband crosses her mind sometimes,
Only to grip her with the cold
Hesitant hands of another woman,
Who wrapped what's left of her life in
A white saree, to make her a mere

Body of the walking dead.

One that's Supposed to come

Where's the one that's supposed
To come before it's late?
Where's the one 'I would know'
Upon her arrival and by now,
It seems it's too late.

Wide awake, I wait, for this wayfarer,
Sometimes questioning the sanctity
Of my eyes, and sometimes
The intentions of the paths that
Lead up to my house.

Sometimes stability of the lamp
That keeps flickering to the deceptions
Of the winds, and sometimes 

The sanity of clouds that keep 

Masking the polestar.

I re-oil the lamp, pray for kinder
Paths and prostrate before the
Winds invoking ancient chants.
But there haven't been any signs..

The Lotus I brought droops and
Retires to forests and the songs of
The Sparrows dissolve in the air
For it didn't find a beholder.

Seasons are tired, decades have
Passed. Lamps have made way to
The LED lights and the warfarers now
Are vloggers with Google Maps.

Yet, there haven't been any omens
But the wait hasn't stopped.

The heart seems condemned to be
Unfulfilled, like an unplayed guitar.
But the urge to compose songs renews
Each day like periwinkles in an old
Cement wall.

We're are all Bukowski's Poems

We're all Bukowski's poems,
Stolen from the rawness of stingy
Beer bottles and crotches of whores
Bedding his sadness.

The illegible bloodshed on tissue,
Left unread beneath a park bench and
The one lost to chance while he typed
On inkless ribbons.

We're all Bukowski's poems escaped
For good when he poured rum on his
Bluebird to keep it hidden in his ribs
And goodbye to his broken car,
Sent prematurely to salvage.

Fifty miles from nowhere at Twelve past
Twelve and coffee mixed taste of a cigar.
A twenty-year-old with a 9 mm waiting
To reconsider his options for one last time.

Sleep wanting a cigarette break-
Life coming alive in the dead of the night.
Swollen fingers compulsively pressing
The keys of the typewriter in an
Attempt to erase his suicide letters.

We're all Bukowski's poems, blamed
For crudity and lack of aesthetics-
'Burning in water and drowning in flame.'
Trying to stay relevant in specific niches,
Like 'Love being a Dog from hell.'

Urge

I wish I could walk past that
Dungeon but this urge to jump
Because she's beautiful..
The mole on her right cheek
And the blush that goes with
The shine of her eyes.

I'm already a slave of the swish
Of wind that's blowing past.
There's a winter crawling under
My skin and a cherry blossom in
The aridity of my heart.

I know in my head that this is
Just a hormonal act but there's
This desire to get myself stabbed..
Smash open my smothering walls
And take a plunge to give away
Everything to chance..

I bet many chose better wars.
Wet paint, guns, and fast cars.
And there are other ways to die
But this urge to drown in her eyes..🤌

Discerniblity of Time

Time passes, grain by grain like
Cooked rice in a baby's mouth.
Then it turns discernible tick of a clock
In night to hail upon sleepy senses.

You don't realize how you grew tall
And wrinkles on Grandpa's face
Progressively increased. Then,
Grandma dies leaving a void in
The family of seven.

Father's command over his gait
Changes, mother's saree starts to
Shed bright colors. Your brother's
Pants passed over to you fall short
And you grow a bit of hair on
The face and a lot, elsewhere.

Time then starts leaving marks,
And scars, claiming a couple of
Friends- one to marriage, one to
Unbearable debts and another to
A highway on a rainy day.

What once hailed upon you
At night, eventually gets to you
In the morning as you sit alone
Staring at the empty cups.
The ticks turn into threads of
Loneliness strewn across your
Coffin-like walls.

You count them initially but now
It doesn't really matter.

Smile

His face on the other side 

Of the foggy window,

Making faces, trying to make

You laugh.

You're not sure, whether

To laugh at him or this

Questionable reality.

But you know, people

Managed to have time for

Dinner in a war?

Some even managed to

Write songs about the snow

And how it covers the dead.

It's funny how a man laboring

In a wheat mill can take his

Happy siesta on sacs of grain

And go without any food 

On the plate by night.

People laugh clenching the weight 

Of hunger in their stomach.

Children build castles with

Empty bombshells and 

Thank God for the makeshift roof

He has provided.

Sometimes it's necessary to

Carve your lips wide with even a 

Blunt knife to force-feed smile 

To the gloom-ridden teeth.

The touch of all emotions is

A basic human need.

And especially when there's

Someone outside the window to

Witness your smile, bless 

The poor lad.

Passing Precedents

They break and bend the joints.

Bathe the body and tie the neck

Against the wall to make it sit

On a wooden cot.

Women cry their hearts out.

They have to.

Men can't, they've to pretend

To attend to other chores.

Some gather bamboo to make

'Sidagi', some warm their drums

For a loud announcement.

Some wait for the alcohol.

Kids from the sidelines wonder 

About everyone's mixed behavior.

They're hungry but gotta tolerate it.

By this late in the noon, they too-

Understand that food can't be

Cooked in their house of the dead.

Sidagi- a carrier for dead body till the graveyard

Harbinger

The first time you learn to make

A kite and fly it. You get wings.

You're a low-key unlicensed pilot.

The first time you feel that air in

Your ears when recklessly peddle-

A heavy dirt track rider.

You fall in love and trace a line of 

Romance on the desk. The touch

Of love and stuff, you're the poet 

Plato once talked about.

And you almost found gravity 

After you see that jackfruit fall,

So to hell with Newton and his laws.

You somehow fixed the radio,

Carried a rice bag beyond your

Body weight ratio. You skipped school, 

Went around the village, climbed trees 

To steal mangoes. You explored.

You the sailor, voyager, the risk taker,

You freaking Ferdinand Megalan.

And the Spiderman for saving

The falling pickle jar.

Who ever lights the lamp the dark

Is an inventor of fire.

You once lit up a hut in the farm,

You're harbinger of this civilization.

Barefoot

To all those roads I walked 

Barefoot, when any sort of a
Footwear was a sign of luxury.

The shrubs we invaded and
The trees we climbed to eat fruits.
The thorns that we stepped
Over that got till the bones.

And all those bored grannies,
In the noon, sorting groundnuts,
Keen on digging into your foot to
Liberate you from the nosy guest
With their safety pins.

The cashews you collected that
Summer, you sold for sixty per kg,
To buy yourself a pair of Paragon
Slippers. It's a long way you've
Come from there.

But even then, when the 8 am
Bus from native leaves to your
Mom's village-
The hot soil and unintended
Sharp black stones on
The unmetalled roads call you.

And you feel a brief shudder in
Feet and the soles of the footwear
You now wear shy away a little.

Lists

I gotta get my hair cut, gotta stop
Biting my nails. Sometimes hopes
Pumped up, I put up in my list that I
Should get a passport and a nice car
To travel across the mountains and the world.

Then there are days I've to deliberately
Remind myself to take a bath, shed the sugar
And take long noon naps as nights are
Already fucked. That's cold steel of
Self-actualization after looking at my wallet.

Sometimes there's a to-do list to wake up,
Sleep, read and write. And other things
That I think matter, to impact what course
Of Geographical timeline, I don't know.

But many times my lazy streaks run wild.
Nothing happens on those. No lists,
No goals. Only some hazy reminders
To not kill myself and jerk off less.

The insurance, taxes, room rent and
The unwashed clothes on empty chairs.
The trekking trails that mock my tiring legs
And the other stuff in a book with the bucket list
That I haven't Ticked off in five years-
It's exhausting.

A house, a marriage, a big fat salary and
Gifts for themselves, those who expect these
Vanities. Someone said I gotta plan a
Funeral too and design myself a tombstone.

My single room is small enough and heats up
So much in the summer that I've got an

Epitaph written already and I'm in search of
Someone who can write an eulogy.

If you have it in you, come up dear as the final 

Nail in the coffin.

Meeting You Outside Poetry

You would have imagined me through
My poems, like I've after reading yours.
And if you ever meet me outside our poetry-

You'll be surprised to know that I've
A dialect that comes clean as an ooze of
Blood and the clarity of English on paper
Dies in the clutter of my mouth.

The feminism in my lines struggles to
Fit within the edges of soft chauvinism,
The romantic idealism chokes itself when
A beggar asks me for a rupee or two.

The ease of love often meets my
Desperation on my forehead at obtuse 

Angles and my confidence goes to toss
Seeking refuge in imposter syndrome.

I can't take a compliment too you know,
That's when my tattered sarcasm
Come alive and the way I talk about
Other's eyes, I can't make eye contact.

My conversation shall be a skewed 

Brawl between my body and soul,
Words may come out with an awkward growl.
And bisecting the aftermath of this

If you choose to say that you're just
'A poem' extending your hand and I might 

Realize where you come from and I say 

'Me too', shaking your hand.

Forbidden Love

I try to conjure you by
The old tricks of black magic-
Lemons, green chilies,
An inlay of said patterns laid
On the floor with chanted Ash
From the ancient temple of a
Furious goddess.

Vermillion and turmeric in
Excess to throw around when
Confused with the procedure.
Capturing the full moon in
Jinxed water, I invoke your name
In what I think is Sanskrit.

A crow comes flying after
A short while to sit around.
The Tantrik had given a clear
Prophecy that,
The bird would be you.

I build you a nest and buy
You a make-up set.
You leave no attempt to make
Yourself, extra bit of fair.
But they now, say that, how
A white crow is a disgrace.

Many disapprove this mess,
Saying how inter-species marriage
Is such a ninth-degree offense.
But true love is blind you see,
We don't care... to all incoming
Criticism we invoke, the fifth.

You say caw-caw, I say
Love you too.
We talk about having our kids
Or maybe just hatch some
Cuckoo's eggs.

This is a divine-sanctioned
Madness, our love, you say and
The inter-genus Gods witness
The fantasy to shower us with grace.

Longing

Longing is a 2 am song with
Unclear lyrics, hailing like nails
On your skin to stop you from
Having an eyeful of sleep.

Longing is a ship wanting to
Leave the shore but the anchor
Is on an undeclared holiday,
And there's an embargo now.

It's a feather traveling from
The lands far away to rest
On your chest to eat the light
In your room, with its heaviness.

It's a hammer confined within
Cement walls, trying to break out-
The desperation sinking an
Inch deep after each thump.

Longing is a bottle with an
Age-old letter sent to a bird that
Never responds, and on the other
End, another waiting forever-

For the letter that never comes.
The sea-waves try to take it
To the distal ends of the beach
But falls short each time and

Is forced to recede.
This un-fulfillment,
Tears shouting in your eyes,
Making the lashes just moist.

The wail that's supposed to
Come crashing down stays
There like a pretending cat.
Longing is the words that turn

Thick in your throat. The sighs,
Soaked in the dryness of mouth.
The blood that refuses to ooze,
Even when cold edges of

A Swiss knife hail on soft
Contours of your wrists.

Mirror

What if the mirror comes
Alive and you met your
Reflection in real-time.
Would you love him or hate?

The tunnel of vision staring
Down that abyss of yours and
The abyss looking back at you,
To get on your nerves.

The cascade of conflicting
Thoughts battling nastily to
Expose the dirt you're.
Your own self-negation singing
Threat to your questionable
Existence.

The way you're exposed,
Would you kill yourself out of
Shame or you would attack
The other for showing you
The mirror? Or you'd just choose

To gulp your insecurities to
Bear his mocking smile and
Go, hug him to accept it all?
Would you make peace with
This miserable better half to 

Marry him into a compromise?

Are you brave enough to accept 

Yourself to carry on with life?

Love a thing or two

You must love a thing or two,
One over the other, the other
Over another, till the grit of longing,
Bruises the walls of your
Heart and demands for
The pleasure of scratching a
Half healed scar.

Like a flower leaving a fragrance
With a tinge of lavender,
The moon, making you forget
That his beauty is just a reflection.
The rain, compelling the desert
To sprout grass and the inability of
A dreamer to be sane even
For a night.

Like sleeplessness perching
You down into the submission
Of vulnerability and kindness
Winning a rigged combat without
The need for bloodshed.
The mountains calling you out
In the wake of a snowfall and
The rain-soaked roads leading
You up to a picturesque waterfall.

You gotta give in, to something
At some point of time.
Sometimes over a sparrow or
A cat. Over your own image
Or that of a lovely dog.

There will not be an obvious choice,
But you must choose a thing or two,
To bruise the walls of your heart,
To have a scratch-able old scar,
To somewhere truly belong.

Not About Dying.

So the nooses fail and the vehicles
Refuse to run over. Veins, coated
With steel, the blood doesn't ooze,
And the brain doesn't explode.

The writer of my fate somehow
Forgets to forge me a tragic end,
His writer's block must be serious,
Maybe I should lend him my technique.

There's so much at stake here,
The share in my ancestral property
My siblings might want,
The insurance companies, wanting

To declare that I'm a fraud.
The Taaviz of a Tantrik going unsold
Because my ghost can't make any
Noise in the night and

My wife, not getting a chance to
Play her ultimate victim card.
More importantly, the crows with
A fetish for funeral-food -

Returning to the virtue of stealing
Rotis from the backyards, after
Being deprived of the delicacies
At the wake of my demise. 

This liveliness keeps punching
Holes in my shroud and I manage to
Keep stitching it back with
Self-deprecating nylon jokes.

And it's bloody adamant, this life,
Infects with reason and a bit of
Purpose and lots of cowardice
To keep my breathing intact.

But living seems to be the biggest
Addiction we suffer as a species it seems.
And you're wrong if you think this
Rant is just about dying.

Meanwhile

Meanwhile, the wind blows,
Leaves fall, Dogs bark and
Their voice is dissolved to 

Nullity in a while, but 

Someone, somewhere will 

Listen to their silence.

It rains elsewhere, a baby
Cries after birth, eggs hatch
And the flowers bloom.
Even in war people prepare
Lunch and hum.
Life goes on.

Someone falls in love,
Someone else falls out.
A stone that moved from here
Creates a hole.
But eventually, it'll be filled
By water, dust, or trash,
Or by a combination of all.
Somehow people make peace
And find their place.

Things take time while they
Wait for stuff to happen to them.
The boredom of beauty,
The rush of chaos or any other
Way, if it could be put in.
Life happens like a Lazy Giant
Taking eons to open his eyes.

In the far reached of the sea,
The spring will hoist its Sail,
To reach that one last leaf
On the withered tree and
The next day you'll be surprised
To see yourself infected
With a fresh bloom before
It's too late.

The Houses we don't leave

The first one I fell for at 

The age of sweet thirteen,

Had short hair, wore her

Skirt below the knee.

The second one after 

Two years, when she looked 

At me thrice and the guys  

Teased me with her name.

The third one at the rush
Of sixteen, when the absolute
Bomb of my class wished me for
The exams with a shake hand.
Then her letters found a way
To my home that summer holiday.
SMS in the first-ever mobile I got.
She changed the school after that
And that's that.

The intense one was after

The school. I fell for my

Best friend. A situation ship,

Friendzone and a long streak

Of emotional fog and my

Break down in Goa before

I moved on.

The best one came after a

Really long gap.

The sweetest ever really.

She was always there.

Called me cute even through

My shabbiness. She tickled my 

Imagination to weave me

Stories of fantasy.

We traveled, hiked and

Saw dreams as meteors showed 

In the Himalayan skies.

But some shooting stars were 

Angry it seems. This time, 

I fucked up and I was back to 

The blankness I deserved.

The one that got to my head

Came briefly after that.

It was brief really, there wasn't

Even a proper story.

We talked in poems and 

Cuss words of fancy and 

She often refused to tell me

About her ailment, yet left

Me enough hints.

She ghosted me after a year 

And before I felt like an ass,

Her sister sent me a text,

Saying, her sister passed away

That morning.

I didn't know what to do,

Except to leave the matter

There and punish myself

With the guilt that followed.

I flutter my wings even today

But always in apprehension

Of the anti-climactic flight

I might make.

So I sit here in my nest, brooding,

Thinking about those houses

That turn into cemeteries

When we don't leave.

Sit Straight Doll

I'll write you a poem doll,

Sit straight.

When I compare your nose

To the beak of a parrot

And those lips to the juicy

Slices of orange, don't laugh.

That's how poems were

Written back then.

I'll compare your neck to

The lake I once visited

In the Himalayas and those 

Slender hands to the soft embrace 

Of clouds that shower grace.

Eyes can't be left out right?

They of course are oceans

As the cliches go. But do I

Wanna drown and die there? 

You decide, if you wanna

Kill me or just intoxicate.

The cheeks are cotton candy,

Feet invoke a fetish that

Gets to my head.

The boobies and butts are

Why I write poems and 

The way you smile when

I say that, let's finish this off 

And have a quick one.

And from your forehead

Our romance starts,

Hiking through the mountains,

And valleys, it's hard labor.

With a sigh of relief at your

Belly button before entering

The cave that's portrayed

In our movies as Snake and 

Eagle.

Ohh, sorry for the digression.

I forgot about the poem.

Sit straight again now, doll.

Should I begin from where 

I left or you want this all over 

Again?

Forty Thousand

At a friend's funeral, when 

Someone said it costs at least

Twenty thousand to say a 

Proper goodbye after death.

The Oldman was worried 

About the onus on his son.

He knew it all these days but

It hadn't hit him yet.

The forty-year daily laborer, 

His son, of whom he's very 

Protective of, he kept coming 

To his mind.

'How can he manage that

Hefty amount in a village?'

It was a rampage in his head

While he walked back from

The graveyard.

He had to take into account

His wife too-- forty thousand now.

He tried to recall, whatever

He had saved, failing to reach 

A definite figure.

The anxiety in head made 

The legs walk fast if not run.

Forgetting to wash his feet before

Entering his home after a burial.

He opened his box that was 

Kept in the dingy corner.

The rustle of notes failed to

Assure him, the amount of his

Estimation. Thirty thousand

More he said to himself and

The photo frame above him, 

Of Lord Kuber, seemed to 

Mock him with a beguiled smile.

Perception of Self

Not love but love like 

Experience. Not you but

Someone like you.

Orange-like juices, mango-like 

Flavors. Not the jasmine but 

Jasmine-like lavendars.

Everything is either a fancy 

Of calculation or at most a 

Guided miscalculation.

Like a theme park offering

Experience of a forest with

Different packages for 

The sea breeze and that of

Mountains.

We don't know what it's like

To be lost these days.

Through the unknown paths,

We don't know what it takes

To figure out our ways.

We don't know what we feel

About ourselves really, as

We've seen innumerable reels.

And we don't know what to

Feel about others as we've

Consumed content on DIY too.

Standing in front of the mirror,

With whispers of people

Who don't really matter.

You look at your reflection in

Contemplation, to assure yourself,

How you don't like the idea

Of you, in pursuit of someone

Like you.

A wife for someone like you,

A house for someone like 

You would have loved.

Before you transition into 

Someone else entirely, 

You still got time to exhume your 

Corpse from beneath these 

Layers of pretense.

Blow him to life, give him

A nice shower and buy a better

Mirror that can give away

A clean, naked image to save 

Yourself from a misdirection.

The Broken Heart

The broken heart is an 

Abandoned nest where 

No bird comes to rest.

The broken heart is a freshly 

Born desert where the greens 

Are scared to sprout.

With no desire to hunt or eat

Or a plan to patiently wait 

Or sleep. The broken heart 

Is a restless beast that's 

Mocked by even the petty prey.

An orphan, a tramp 

A tombstone with no one

Left to write an epitaph.

It's an empty bottle wanting 

To be filled by emptying 

Other bottles.

A conch shell on a secluded 

Beach that tries to amplify the wind 

In search of meaning.

But the music nonetheless,

Is hollow and bland.

A war-torn city in the forties,

Great Depression of the thirties.

A failed bank, even US refuses

To bail out because of the pain 

It carries.

Satan wants to develop

Here his real estate,

But the loneliness of this

Dingy Street, only hopeless

Romantics can tolerate.

So the heartbroken come here

To live rent-free for 

Assisted self-sabotage and 

Aid for sleep-deprived nights.

Cut off from the mainstream,

The broken heart is a 

A self-deprecated ghost town,

Ignored for good,

For the benefit of the people

Who can't handle reality.

Dystopia of a Poetry

A poem is a kid's persistence,

To have an elephant for 

Himself in his favorite bottle.

A poem is a lover's belief that

Even in Satan's heart, he can 

Manage to find her.

A poem is a battle against

The world to prove that unicorns

Are hatched out of eggs.

A poem is a the way midnight

Screams at an empty road

Without making any noise.

Silence of raindrops touching

The last leaf of a dying tree,

Crackle of dew settling on

In the Savannas after it was

Destroyed by the fire.

A poem is Grandmas eating

Chocolates without guilt,

Moms taking dance classes,

While cooking and nieces 

Forcing you to be a customer 

In their imagery restaurant.

A poem is a belief, a revolt.

A hope, a memory.

It's the sound of pain from

Epiglottis. Whispers of

Cussing in the rosary beads

Used for chanting.

It's anything really.

What you can write and 

What you can't. What you can

See and what you can't.

The long episodes of blankness,

Random streaks of lunacy.

Poems are overwhelmed

Emotions popping out like 

Popcorns. One by one you just 

Put them in your mouth to 

Watch this dystopian movie

Called life.

The Stalker

I listen to you across all
This distance. Sometimes
Pick hazy peeks from
Across the street.

The way you brush,
The way you flush.
The rustle of your hair
While you comb and
The silence of lipstick
On your juicy lips.

You wept yesterday I don't
Know why.
The shame in your eyes
While you stood naked in
Contemplation-
Sometimes I hear your
Silent prayers and I hope
That they're answered.

Also I think you're stuck
In that old playlist.
May I suggest you to listen to
'Billy Joel' now onwards,
But how should I communicate
That you?

You slam your stuff,
Especially your phone when
You're angry.
You've a bad temper you know.
After that an ant stung you
Yesterday, you shut those
Windows pretty hard too.
Don't do that, the curtains
Cuss you for slamming
Them hard.

Also you look frail,
Maybe you should consider
Eating an extra chapati
From now onwards.
Dieting has made you weak,
Your sleep cycle is already
A mess upon that.

I hear your blanket slide up
To your face.
Seems it's past midnight already.
I wish you don't switch off
That bulb in your room,
I'll not be able to see you now
From across the street.

Time to sleep anyway,
I'll have to get some of it.
Also I have to hear your dreams.
So good night 'Little Reindeer.'
Hope, I can assist you,
Through your nightmares
In sleep.

Certified Tragedy.

Wet paint of fresh dreams,
Spilling all over the floor,
And I slip off in the pool
Of colors in the morning.

Ahh! Too much happiness
For a single day.

Staying grounded is
Important today,
Give me a raft made out
Of little misery.

The nightmares are gonna
Hail heavily in the night
On the soft quilts of today
Morning.

I'm afraid of these random
Pleasures thrown at me,
Thinking, must be a coy
Sent to trigger my misery.

So I ignore sunsets and
Full moons and run away
From the flowers that
Are nothing but a boon.

Scared of warm smiles,
Free hugs-- I already expect
Malice in your eyes if you
Compliment me.

I suppose, either I take myself
Too seriously or don't bother
To care at all. I don't know where
The playfulness is gone.

For the overthought consequences
Of common possibilities.
I'm a long-standing deadlock
Between me and myself.

I'm an organically grown,
Certified tragedy.

Buddha in the Metaverse

Buddha in the metaverse is
A gangster from Regina Hills,
Who left his wife to force-feed
Meditation to the masses
Instead of two square meals.

Buddha in the metaverse is
Is a reformer who took Anguli Mal
Under his hood as he needed a
Henchman to build himself
A teflon image.

Fingers needn't be cut now
To threaten people.
Fear is instilled in their head,
To fall in compliance.

The mother who lost her son,
Wasn't sent to fetch mustard
From house with no deaths.
A communal angle was given
To it, to swing votes.

Our Buddha in the metaverse is
No more interested in Prakrit,
He's a steward of that one
Language that doesn't have
Any sanction and if you prefer
Your dialect over it, you're
Anti National.

Stretching the body on
A rock under a Banyan tree-
With man ki baat in Saranath
He exports his enlightened wisdom
To other countries.

He's waiting to declare himself
As another avatar of Vishnu,
But his department of narcissism
Doesn't let him lose or die,
So the incarnation for now is
Stuck in appeasing the camera.

Woman in Love

She'll brush your hair in
Slow motion and caress you
Into submission with her
Unsung lullabies.

She'll cut a pomegranate
On sunny afternoons,
And seed-by-seed feed
You by teasing you first.

She'll wear your formal
Shirt with proper tuck-in
And shoes, make herself
A moustache by pulling front

Her long strands of hair,
And will salute in attention
With a hard thump off
The right leg, to imitate you.

This woman in love, who
Can't write poems but is
Poetic enough-
With her carrot halwa and

Masala dosa, with a mouth
That always blabbers-
This woman in love wants you
To pretend like you're a kid.

But your un-shavable beard
Doesn't let you fiddle with
Your own innocence, and this
Absentee intimacy is

The bone of contention
In the bed.

Her Old Pic

You'll look at it and put it away.
You'll come back to it to
Never to look at it again, but
You gotta put it away.

A layer upon layer, hidden
Beneath the pile of lost
Emotions that still seem to
Be relevant.

Ready to lose a pound of
Flesh before giving up on
Her decade-old pic with
Your weakened will.

You'll have second thoughts,
And the third and the fourth
And several more before you
Tear it away.

And this girl in your head,
Who's now a full-grown woman,
Still knocks on your door only
To go away again.

Long lost, settled dust,
Demanding another pound
Of flesh before she sinks
Beneath a deeper layer...

Waits there in that tattered
Wallet, till you visit again.

It's Really Hard to Smile

The girl in front of me on the train,

Talks on the phone, looks in her bag,
Pretends to eat sometimes.
She looks away most of the time,
And hesitates to smile.

I try to find excuses to randomly
Meet her eyes but my lips
Evade the humble desire in
My heart, and maybe I look
Creepy without a decent smile.

This happens with all of us boys.
We can laugh our guts out
And talk in roof-shattering tones,
But no one teaches us about the smooth
Transition of emotions like a smile.

The reading between the lines,
And hiding between metaphors.
How it's okay to not have an opinion,
Or mutual insult not the only
Intimate expression-

There's no shine in our eyes,
A chocolate someone offered us
Was decades back and with
Literally, no one to dedicate us
Faintest of poetic lines-

Even from the sidelines, in all
Decency..we too try. But madam,
It's really hard to smile.

Hopeless Romantics

You slide your hair a bit and
The Gulmohars smile.
Your bangles dangle and
Moon decides to steal
Some extra light.

Some immortals are busy
Finding excuses for
Their distractions and
Mere mortals' vulnerabilities
Are justified.

The attempts to tame
The shudder of the evening,
And attempts to captivate
The fragrance of jasmines,
In empty matchboxes.

I've got my lip bitten
By the bees to sing you
Honey-filled lullabies too.
But you can't seem to
Notice any of this do you?

So the Gods have decided
To gather again to declare
"Let there be more light" in unison
For the extra luminescence
You may need to recognize
The hopeless romantics.

The Village I grew Up

The jowar fields and the ragi crop
Have been replaced by the sturdy
Eruption of sugarcane.
The road is all metalled and
The grand old neem tree, cut off.

The old bus stand is in ruins
And the tramp who slept there
Has abandoned his post.
The women don't walk forever
To fetch water and the kids
With no future don't fancy
Flying the kites.

This village I grew up has been
Painted in bright strokes of
Orange and the green now.
And the sparrows have to seek
Permission before they chirp
Or flutter their wings.

There's political correctness
In the bark of the dogs and
The bigots on both sides walk
Safely with stones in their hand.

Thanks to modern medicine,
The elders don't die early now
And in the village I grew up,
New ideas refuse to come out of
The cattle-sheds smothered by
The new stink.

With "The holy and unholy"
Self-contradictions of purification
In "flesh and urine"- my village
Basks in the utopia of an old order.
With a supposed financial growth
As bedrock of its flawed argument.

Lethargy

I often get zoned out into
Long stretches of lethargy.
All goals and ambitions go
Out of the window.

Hobbies and habits trampled
With the chronic urges of
Masturbate-- with the butter of
Procrastination sliding smoothly
On the bread of mindless
Binge-watching mania-

I get caught in a loop of
Guilt-ridden whirlpool that
Sinks deep enough to perch
My charring soul till the bruises
Are visible in my head where
Divergent my ideas brew.

And I try to scream for myself
To save myself from a
Grave that hasn't been dug yet.
But the prayers of an atheist
Are not even answered by
Oneself it seems.

So I'm left here to be smothered
By myself- A master of my own
Destiny preaching slavery-
Left to quench my thirst in the sea
Saying salt water cleanses
The soul that has sinned.

Advice to Younger Self

For some reason, the puberty
Will hit you hard my boy.
An intense sort of rebellion
Will sprout like pubic hair to
Drive you around the edges
Of irrelevant philosophies.

You'll stop believing in God first
And you'll read whatever
Re-enforces your atheism out
Of sheer hate for your father.

And even before college
A sense of existentialism gets
To you and you'll question
The existing systems in place
And the society at large.

And that will trigger your
Innate desire to escape what's
Infront of you-
"This is hard, not meant for me,
I'll wait for the right time."-
Always expecting more from
From life when there's none.

And the decade-long slide of
Hopelessness and regret will
Shine when you look back from
Your thirties, to force you to
Answer the question,

"What advice do you wish to
Give to your younger self?"

After a long pause, you'd wish
To just say "Shave away those
Pubic hair before they sprout".
But you can't, as you may
Wanna be politically correct.

Clutter of Words

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