Your Things

I think of things
A faltering step on a sheet of ice,
Bending down to pick up a feather
Sunlight on a young boy's hair..

Turning around to see who called your name
Laughing with an old friend, for an old joke,
Bear-hug from a loved one..

A juicy bite of orange-green mango
The music from a little girl's anklet
Whispers with no end..

I think of things..
Create a dough, shape into pages,
Blur the drawings with misty eyes
And dream for your dream to come true..

Frozen Me

I look back and I look ahead.
I will always be where I have been.

The infinitesimal moments
The cheer and the laughter
The rains and walks and holding hands
The You in me and the Me not in you

The dust and the days and the dark
The distance between your city and me
The crowds separating us and joining us
The your heart and your smile

The unsaid words and heard silence
The your joy and your sorrow
The things you do not want to own
The others you have rejected.

I empty my eyes forever
The way you emptied your heart..
I take with me what you do not want
And that is pretty much all of it.

Us

Strawberry Fields Forever

About Me

You use words when I least expect
And then you go on and on about me, I forget.
And the rest of the day or the night, I fret
Trying to remember what you said.

Din

Kahaan hein sooraj ki thapthi dhoop..?
Kahaan parchaayiyon ki thanhaayi...?

Tum nahin tho
Din bhi mere andhere mein hein.
Tum nahin tho.

The Ironies

The Distance Between Us.

Doori

Mujh thak pahunchne ka
Tumhaara safar lambaa hein.

Raah mein bheed hein, shor hein,
Hein tumhe chaahnewaale
Aur tumhe doondnewaale.
Aur haan, tumhe meri thalaash bhi nahi hein.

On Fire

"Sunlight blinds us from darkness"

The Presentation

When you get to the point about bridges,
Is where I would like to get up and leave.
To leave
You, unfinished and incomplete,
Like a canvas of undefined colors
Without their identity, forgotten by the painter.
I have never liked bridges, you know.
More than making me happy
For connecting two views,
They remind me of waters flowing for ages
Underneath them.

Is it this much fun to put a period on
Life and some things like it?

The Scream

It is inside my heart
Like a stinging tear, suspended
Delicate, yet gripping the walls.
Going on and on, in pain,
Rising, stretching, hurting -
The scream

I wonder if you remember
That was not how
I used to call your name.

My Doing.

The alley is damp and dark
My favourite place
Neglected and owned.
Silent like a starless night.

What have I done
To that, which was
Never meant to be taken?

What have I done?

They and me. Connected.

I have seen people pass me by,
Whirlwind in their worlds.
I have seen how they make
How they break
Maybe how they take
This breeze around me.
A coldness is stirred to go on.
A feeling I had never known.
It was in the wind
It is in my ways
Swirling through my nights,
It is in my days.

I wonder if people feel
How it is before it is not.
How the touch and the glimpse
Fell before they were lost.
A rare shade of blue
Lost in another stroke.
With the snowflakes long gone
Oh! How this coldness goes on and on.
It was in the wind
It is in my sighs.
Clinging to the lashes,
Now it is in my eyes.