Un-Limiting the Sky

The sky opens up to us, by and by

Even with someone or the other

Staring at it at some point of the day,

(It’ll get to know light years later, it’s alright!)

Some squinting for inspiration, some with disappointment,

Some with hope, some at child-like wonder.

The sky is a shy, breathing being, you know.

Who knows what secrets it keeps on the other sides?

Do you think it is two dimensional?

It never perceived itself that way, you know?

The changing colours are only a peek into her person’s aspects, you know.

It’s constantly unfolding,

Like a neatly-folded piece of origami

Sky’s the limit, you all say?

I wonder whom the sky looks up to

For inspiration.

The Recital Part II

Pondering over 'Prose versus Verse'

As the participants recited AND narrated

Their feelings & experiences,

I started listening to them,

Jolting myself from the lip-synced mute

I'd imposed on their words,

As they'd read out their experiences,

I'd exult with a 'Touche!' & 'Ditto!'

Each time they'd share emotions

That I'd bumped into, rolled over, jostled with

A million times,

But faced, spoken to, never.

Emotions I'd always considered 'trivial',

Too 'trivial' to be written down.

The Recital

(Attended) a poetry session today,

Enacted by a poet through his

Onomatopoeic, gesticulated gestures,

Clenched fist-ed, strained, wide-eyed,

Shifting his weight from one foot to another,

Like dodging his public-speaking fears,

From one leg to the the other,

As he tried to build

A rapport with the audience,

Through his words as they (the words) sifted

Through the folds of the air

To make a silent thud against

An attentive soul's solid, soiled exterior.

While reciting, looking into lit screens,

Scrolling up and down,

And trying to look for that line,

That trail of thought which was (most) perfect

Only in its untimely, chaotic, vague birth in that mind.

As the poet tried to familiarise

Himself with his feelings

Flattened out on fresh paper in

A font different from how

The curves & edges had felt 
In that first gush of thoughts,

When he'd probably first thought of

Penning down his thoughts,

Wise as he was to realise how

Precious they were.

Maybe he wanted to

Articulate his thoughts in written,

But ended up pinning them down.

P.S. Having attended a poetry session today, where the emphasis seemed to be on gestures, sounds, or let's say on the 'enactment' of poetry, I had a question stirring from within. The strain of thoughts, must be penned in words for retrospection and introspection. But once a poet, in all his earnest yearning to convey his/her feelings through his words, to his audience now, and not to himself, takes up the task of 'presenting' his composition in a certain way, does not that precious, original thought, lose its very essence? 

Maybe, poetry isn't about being accurate. Maybe that is why, we converse in the intricacies of language, and not in equations and formulae. :)

Tug of War

While I try to figure

Which is the trigger

And which the consequence,

A battle breaks out

Externalities cave in.

Simultaneity takes on a horrid meaning.

Anticipation becomes the catalyst

Of a demon that I created

But know not how to kill.

I forget where my comfort zone lies

In the sphere of my inability

To face, to do things all these years,

Or the realm I wanted to leap to.

There's no single-leap shortcut though,

I've been crawling all the while

With my head buried in the sand.

P.S. My stubborn mind preferred the stagnant familiarity. I don't. I had to distinguish between the two till I won the war.

If Thoughts Were Audible

If Thoughts Were Audible,

Would you try to catch & make

Every fluttering thought your Bible,

In your craving

To come face to face

With that one thought

Which would have the answer

To what is the question,

That has gnawed at you since birth?

What if you bumped against

Hitherto infrasonic tremors

Of a morbid sigh or curse,

While hoping to tune into

A blessing or yearning?

Would you consider yourself

The sniper of the Panopticon

Or a prisoner of it?

Would the nail-biting curiosity

Of groping the trail

Of fragmented thoughts

From all (how many?) corners

Make you lose your own 'stream of consciousness',

                         as they would call it?

Deaf now to your own mental utterances

Would you (n)ever speak again?

[Since,

Your eavesdropping mind

Would already know

What the other has to say

As would he, about your thoughts

Before either uttered the first syllable.]

Or,

Would you start thinking

About what to think first

And what order to place those thoughts in, next,

So you could fool your mental trespasser,

Sending him off to a parallel trail of thoughts?

But of course he would be able to

Hear through your strategy

As he would also know

Of that moment

When you decided to

Guard your own thoughts.

But the question is,

Do you have any left, now? 

A numb stare is reflected

In your mental neighbour's eyes

As you both confront

The fact that

Deaf people don't have

Songs stuck in their head.

The Night It Rained

The moon lulled itself

Into few second-long naps,

The winds whispered the smell

Of the oncoming rains

As ants did a tight-rope

On the tree's sleeves.

The dog pricked its ears,

Each time the tiny hurricane

Of dried leaves whirled round.

The spider attempted to balance itself

On the maze of its own making,

As the web threads strummed

A happy tune

In response to the wind.

The lull before the storm,

Was becoming too much of a bulk

For the clouds to bear,

Before a slant of water droplets,

(Some drying midway through

The atmosphere's layers,)

Stamped their arrival

On the parched layers

Of land, leaves and minds.

Streaks of lightning

Conducted a survey

On the distribution of downpour

Clicking vintage tinted photographs.

The rains slowed down to a drizzle,

The insects buzzed through a banter,

The moon tried to

Sneak through the clouds,

Surprised at its reflection

In a puddle on the street.

The morning wakes up 

Smelling a misty presence 

Of the (previous) night it rained.

A Dewdrop's Tale

A drop of dew
Pristine and brand new
Landed atop a blade of grass.
Though tempted by the wind's song,
Balanced itself on the blade's tip,
Strove to not trickle down
Lest the grass strand would lose its crown.
Birds stretched and perched
To take the morning's first flight
While the sunlight wrapped its
Arms around the earth & sky,
And the coy dewdrop glistened anew
In the multitude of a million hues.
Reluctantly, it began to bid
The grass fraternity adieu
Evanescing into vapour,
To accompany the wind
In the search of another grassy patch

The Echo

Before you set off on a song

Strumming tunes

Of a hunky dory future that calls,

That frenzied adrenaline rush,

Bring it to a halt.

(These dreams my dear,

Should be taken with a pinch of salt.)

If you're chasing a wish,

Because the inaudible frequencies

At the back of your mind

Clash rather than merge 

With your future song's rhyme,

Then you've clipped its' wings already

For your creations,

Fantastical as they may be,

Stem from a mental hypochondriac

Stamp of injustice.

Epilogue:

‘Do you often catch the chime of reality,

Singing to you a morbid lullaby

Have you lately been crawling

To unbeknownst corners and turns (in your mind)

Only to slide down back into the pit of

Questions, angst, fears?’

Problems are meant to motivate,

Turning our thoughts to action,

Not so we become complacent 

In our mind's utopia

While reality becomes

Only a reminder of 

The mental hypochondria 

We subconsciously keep 

Seeking a right to.

There are Times

There are Times

When I am

Groping at the vapours                         

Of nothingness 

Hoping to churn out

Life and hope from it,

(With a desperation 

That makes me feel

As though I were 

strangling emptiness itself.)

There are Times

When I wish with all my might

(Believing for just that dead moment 

that my thoughts are powerful indeed.)

That the concrete reality 

Would crumble and melt

into nothingness.

There are Times

When I remember 

That it's darkness

Staring at me in the eyes

[Threatening me or encouraging me, 

                                          I know not.]

And I shut my eyes

To crawl within 

The cold comfort of familiarity

That I first meant to escape.

There are Times

When I seek to

Merge into a shadow

As the gust of Light, 

Having shot out 

From unseen corners and walls of impasse 

Now straining its eyes at me

Sears and sieves through

The dust of opaque fear

Settled since long before I was born.

There are Times

When I realise, a truth

Shall not be uttered by me

Not the right time,

How do you set a time for truth?

There are Times

When I must not let

The truth run amok

Lest it wreaks havoc.

P.S. / Epilogue 

Don't tell me that you

Have already forgotten

That there were times, 

You did not know 

Or even want to know

What you wanted to do, or 

What you ought to have done.

 There are times when we seek hope, in the form of an opportunity, a person who could guide us, without realising that the only person at that juncture to help us, would be our own self. But there's a constant wait for (Godot?) something to change things, as if trying to make the universe say that we were in an unfair place that could not be helped, and only a definite pattern or turn of situations would give meaning to one's life. The manifestation cannot be, prior to the determination. 

There are times when the opportunity doesn't merely knock at your door but stays put like a silent comrade waiting for you to pack your bags, so it can bring you to a new dimension of you yourself. Many a time, our fear stifles us, overriding the striving that seemed hope enough till now, only to bring things back to status quo.

There are times when one feels that one needs to take a stand, make his/her voice heard, to try and bring a halt to something that shouldn't happen, and is happening, yet. But circumstances spell out a different path altogether, and then we are faced with situations where we'd rather not let something be known to everyone, because it would do more harm than good. What is the truth, then? 

Life as I See It: Busting Myths

Illusory as this corporeal existence 
        may be termed,

I am too glad sifting through

[This imagined existence of]

The interspaces of Time and Space.
Don’t need to be interceded for

To a space-less place-

The echoes of infinity
Tingle me, weaving infrasonic waves

Of life around me.

I can catch up with salvation
Some other day;
I'm here. Soaking in 
The sun's tickle tingling me awake
The wind's whistle cooing on a dull day, 
The patter of rains as it sings 
A new rhythm into play.
A dog's wagging tail at my caress,
Smiles from faces familiar-unfamiliar,
Or a dance move I'd been tugging at to perfect.
Lapping up a home-cooked meal
After a long day, curling up in my bed.
Celebrating joys with an exultant jump
A high-five or a fist-pump,

Celebrating life more
Than fearing death.

On Procrastination

I have procrastinated for months

To eventually write this poem today

Ironically, this time

The poem to be penned

Was meant to bring to an end

To my pet peeve of procrastination.

I thought my writing of it

Would be bring me face to face

[Oh, no. I am behind time and Procrastination is ahead of me.]

With procrastination.

The Dance of Shadows Part II

Stuck in the rut of 

The (so called) dye-mentioned reality,

You walk past your oft-mentioned

Thoughts, fears, cravings, yearnings, 

Learnings, ramblings and musings 

Squeezing them into 

[You say they were two-dimension-ed?]

Shadows that remain there,

Brain-dead, 

They play havoc now

As their amoebic infinity

Spreads like an endemic,

Ending your sanity, morality, duality.

They were meant to save you either ways.

Don't you complain them thoughts of sadism yet!

The Dance of Shadows

There are days
When I walk out of the studio,
Disappointed with my performance,
Because today fear, not dance,
Made me finish the steps on time.
I can't mug up steps at the flick of a finger, you see.
I admit I have been lazy about self-practice.
I bet no one dances as beautifully
As I do in my visualizations
And some days I do amaze myself
As I perform the routine.
But when fear cripples me,
Paralyses my arms and limbs,
I wince at the instructor's polite rebuke
I knew it was coming.

The song is replayed,
Batchmates cheer
I wake up
My passion frees me
As I leap into the routine with a
5! 6!, and 5, 6, 7 AND. . . !!



P.S  And you thought your fears don't fear you?

Years and Months

            My very existence, my thoughts had become dusty with neglect induced by self-consciousness, note the irony, will you! Questions interspersed with chortles of laughter about my hobbies would send me into a mental asphyxiation lasting till I stammered and gave into the nausea churned out of the apparent emptiness tugging at me. That's a few years back.

                          Always singing songs on ultrasonics and infrasonics in my mind, or a song that would have me tapping my feet with fervour as I visualized moves and steps that would amaze  me, only to freeze at the thought of performing it even in front of myself. This was till a few years back.

                           I seemed to think I didn’t know what poetry was till I recently glanced with calm acceptance followed by appreciation of my scribblings, without wincing for once, (and always henceforth) at what I thought was meant to be dumped eventually, if I happened to have as much as one retrospective glance at resonances of my assertive existence in words willing to sacrifice themselves for want of better words, or definitions to my life. This is the last few months, this is now.

                            That inaudible hum has now bloomed into heartfelt, happy singing to songs as I walk on and across streets, into my office or anywhere. Never knew any of this would be possible one day. And yet, each day, nay, each second unfurls as more beautiful than the other.

                             This one’s funny, in retrospection at least. Having waded through umpteen rejections at ‘selections’ for dance performances and competitions in school, to discovering the rhythm of my own two left now set right via all that life has taught me in the past one year, probably the most profound of learning experiences in my life till now. From graciously accepting compliments with belief at my dancing skills in college, I further sauntered into dance classes nine months back, and when someone at the studio tells you, that you’ve grown a lot from where you started wrt dance, it’s like quenching my thirst for perfection only for that one instant, that eventually spurs me on to discover perfection in a wholly different posture and garb, with time.

I never knew I could be this passionate about something in my life again. I say, all these years have been worth it. Each day, as I try to bring perfection to my steps, or balance myself during the workouts, the rhythm, the infinite song of vitality uncoils from its self-conscious slumber, and stretches its hand out to me, as my dancing partner, showing me the way to the next dance step, and discovering a certain idiosyncrasy of me. And how do I celebrate the discovery of it? By doing a little jig. Never have I admired myself more than I inadvertently do now, when I catch myself staring at my reflection, as I move to the front row, performing the routine with all my life and imagination. 

As Mary Murphy rightly said in a recent episode of So You Think You Can Dance, dancing serves as oxygen to the soul. I hope I can gracefully dance out my gratitude for dance someday. The irony of it!

Infinity

For science and art 

Are but two interpretations

Of the one infinity

Called the Universe.

Of Memories.

I - Choose to forget,
Choose to remember
Things from my life's history 
So as to think "That's [my] Life.", someday.
And what If, Life chose to forget me one day?

The Best Time to Write a Poem

When should I write?

When boredom gets sculpted into motivation?

When a distracting thought 

Bothers me long enough

To make me turn to it instead, 

With ardent concentration -

Thereby perhaps making it

The topic of my next composition?

Should I risk completing that sad poem

I’d been working on for a month now,

When I’m in the best of spirits, today?

Should I try and imagine

What being happy sounds like,

In an unfamiliar milieu of words

For the sake of completing my poem,

Hoping it’ll lift my mood too?

Should I scribble away

The cold downpour of tears with

The harmless, vicarious vengeance of my pen,

The one thing I half-guiltily hold dear

When my anger endlessly battles with helplessness?

[Or are they not worth being written about,

As many tongues would simultaneously utter?]

Must I write in a state of ecstatic frenzy?

       Or could I have to leave that precious thought 

                                   Annoyed, hanging in mid-air,

                                            When a trifling rush of new thoughts 

                                                  Crashed my way, making me forget, 

                              Why I was holding the pen in my hand, 

                                               after all.

                                                       Epilogue: 

                                               I think I must write now to find out,

                                               Before the ink of my existence dries out.