OF ELIOT AND SCARS

Nobody writes poems with disclaimers
or prose with warnings
just like patriarchy
has led women
to believe
only fair, slim and hairless
is acceptable.

Her smile is so warm
maybe because she has no words
or does she
will the voice machine in her ear
ever understand love

women come and go fretting over
the shape of an eyebrow
No dear Eliot
they no longer
bother about Michelangelo

Go,look for the men who
wrote poetry
about the brow?

the girl with a limp
always smiles

the soft fingers rub
a fruity smell into my skin
and I count the dead cells
of the mind
Is there a wonder scrub that induces
forgetfulness
and erases all lines that time has cast

my palms look like the map
of a hidden treasure
only there are no destinations
just a long endless journey
the nails point at nothing

I am tired to even open my eyes
but the hands have changed
the postures, the stances
have altered
the eyes that once loved
now overlook, why life?

she parts my hair
and I am scared
what if she finds
the window to my mind
what if she knows
all my sinister thoughts

I miss the way my grandmother
rubbed oil into my reluctant skull
snip,snip
memory are you a hairdresser?

I don't remember her face
only a smell
of pickles,medicines
and loss.

I walk and walk
round and round
to nowhere
the maze is
my punishment.

each morning
is every morning
she says I look perfect
I am glad
she hasn't seen the scars.

Always is a myth

remembering and forgetting
that is all there is to it, the key of living of moving on, of letting go.

hoardings crying hoarse selling love, dream homes, ideal schools, dreams.
a hot cup of tea and someone to share it with is all I need then.

the kids do not know the ugly faces of growing up
they only see the glitter and the glamour
the power of shouting a NO emphatically

if every hurtful word killed even a single cell in the brain
half of us would be half dead if not more

blue isn't just a colour
its a mood he said
Is there a colour that is not a mood?
is there a mood that isn't a colour?

the same plots
with the same twists
and yet the characters may die differently

the sane ones are locked up in the asylums
the mad ones preach life lessons
and go back to their wretched loneliness
to invent new curses.

deserts and mountains
the beach with the sand and the water merging
the sea tossing and turning
in a constant wait
to spill over its cyclone sadness

the sun burning
giving the earth light and warmth
the earth has nothing to give back

some relationships
are always unequal, unrequited

the closures that never happen
the gratitude never paid
the forgiveness never sought
wounds of time the only medals

never before, never again
always is a myth.


 

Rendezvous with a Sufi

Hazrat Nizamuddin Dargah, Delhi

through the maze like lanes
going from nowhere to forever
and the meaningless
noises of the world

I arrive at your doorstep
and let my burning soul heal
as my forehead
touches the marbled kindness
spread out as the floor
for the careless world
to tread on

I bend my head
and you whisper
"let your myth unfold"

your unseen warmth
seeps into
my frayed edges
the rendezvous is complete
I am whole again !