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.