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. :)

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 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.

Puzzled Enemy

There’s vengeance gnashing its teeth

The anger, blindfolded,  

Flagellates at my insides

Churning out a fresh helping

Of supine decay,

Feeding its crippled existence.

I shrink at the sight

Of fingers pointing at me

To then direct wobbly steps  

Of melting courage

To be able to peer at

The faces behind

The exclamations

Of accusations aimed at me.

Till I bump against a mirror,

That, I had thought to be a window.

My palms scramble for strength

Clamped on to the mirror

As I slip on to the floor

I hope the aches will

Numb me into sleep,

Till I wake up

To fidgeting arms and feet,

As the glass ceiling above shatters

To reveal in mockery

A mirrored ceiling right above,

Which I had thought to be the sky

Before I had entered the room.

 P.S. The mind is its own worst enemy. 

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.