ipsyb

[ipsyb]

Timeline (photographs)

Scrolling through timelines 

I realise how we mentally compartmentalize

Events in our head. Look at these pictures… 

That was the last dinner we went for together

Here is the wedding the year after Ma died. 

See those are of the first vacation without her,

This was the last holiday with Baba. It’s funny

How the person in the pictures disappear

Only to reappear in memories

[ipsyb]

Leaving Pune, March 2020. Ater the clouds have been folded and put away, All that remains is the moonlightThose stacks of linen, cool white sheets…

[ipsyb]

Sillage

It feels like there are no stars here, nothing shines

As bright as the tinsel on the tree

A reminder that all that glitter are not stars 

And light reflected upon the glass

Is just that. Light from a man-made tree

In a world contorted by man. 

The night sky lies silent in the haze 

Winter fires draw a blanket 

Over my city. Smoke and fog 

And fog and smoke, when it…

[ipsyb]

Corpses

We are all dying here, some slower than others

The corpses that mattered are calling out to us

That phone you bought will not reach the network

Where the corpses that matter are claiming us.

The man crossing the road out of sight, crosses

Not knowing how far is too far, how far

Till we all return? For the corpses that matter

Are watching, the pomp and splendour that you…

[ipsyb]

Catching the moon...

Catching the moon…

I caught the moon in a mirror

As she skittered across the sky

The road was long and dark

And the forest heaved a sigh.

There were no signboards around

No network to guide us home.

Silence reigned unabated

Save for the repetitive drone

Of my heart, still beating

Inside a human role

Of this life I have borrowed

For this insouciant soul.

  Look away and look again

And I will not be there

Time and…

[ipsyb]

Murari Pukur in the Monsoon

Murari Pukur in the Monsoon

The pond is overflowing, fish leap onto the path

Flopping on the stone steps trying to make their way back

Over the boundary walls that have crumbled in the rain.

Of all the house and garden, only muddy waters remain

As I wade in through the gates, mud squelching between toes

That have seeped in through the skin of my shoes

I stand upon the site of the bones of the old house

Bones that have now…

[ipsyb]

To my girls... (I stop and stare)

To my girls… (I stop and stare)

I stop and stare.

There’s  a thumping in my chest

As you walk away

And I keep moving for if I look back

I will cry.

  I stop and stare.

But it’s not my hands I see

I see you from long ago

Innocent smiles and naughty grins

And I sigh.

  The day is drawing near, the day you dream of, the day you finally spread your wings

and taste the freedom that is yours.

There is so much to say, so much left…

[ipsyb]

The piano (To Enta)

The piano (To Enta)

The tune on that piano carries

Into the night.

I stop Whatever I am doing, soothed

By the sound. Tinkering notes

Calming, clamouring to be heard

Voices from long ago

In this quiet night

When all is still. 

Still, my beating heart, turn down

The thunder. The storms rage on

But we will beat the tempest

We will take the tornado by the horns

And we will beat our drums

Along with that crescendo dawning

On the quiet…

[ipsyb]

To Amisha (someday Rapunzel)

To Amisha (someday Rapunzel) @OfstumblingandMumbling @AmishaBanerjee

Someday Rapunzel will chop off her hair

And leap into the forest, undeterred by thorns

That lay waste the garden outdoors

The garden she never knew up close

The garden just beyond her reach. And 

She will taste the wild berries and learn not to gag

She will explore under shrubs and trees and hide

Among the branches when the prince goes by 

And she will know that all witches 

Are not evil…

[ipsyb]

To Mesho (returning from Kalimati Jn. a.k.a. Tatanagar)

To Mesho (returning from Kalimati Jn. a.k.a. Tatanagar)

I don’t like how you lie there

But your eyes search me out

Looking for a familiar face

Among a sea of servants.

I like the way you talk

Memories from the old earth

Your youth, my father, the stories

That scramble to be heard.

I watch you as you try

To lift those atrophied limbs

Limbs once so adept and strong

That held a perfect swing.

I admire your courage

Your patience in defeat

I doubt I have…

[ipsyb]

Home

The house is in need of paint, father

Plaster peels off the walls

The verandah stares vacant and blank

No life within it’s halls.

It’s just a house I said to myself

As I passed down the road

Just a house abandoned and dark

That once housed our souls.

How can it be ‘just a house’

I thought again as I gazed at it

This is the house where you died

And the home where we lived.

So do not laugh if you…

[ipsyb]

Sunset

Have you ever noticed, how the day folds in on itself?

The trees in the forest are the same and yet look different.

At dawn and at twilight when the light of the setting sun

Misses a glow that shines through when it is rising.

My days are like that now, my life folds upon itself.

The expectations of youth have given way to acceptance

And where I would receive I now wish to give

For it is not my…

[ipsyb]

Y: Yielding #NaPoWriMo

That stone you trip over on your way out

Is just the tip of something buried under

Our marriage eight thousand odd days old.

I know each arc of your words

You know how I bare my soul.

That stone will not be dug in our lifetime

It’s where our eight thousand odd habits lie

That is where our stories will be told.

Of how we yield to each other

Breathing whatever the future holds.

[ipsyb]

X: Xed #NaPoWriMo

  We were star crossed

Marked with an x

Each where we were

Light years apart…

  How I wish I had quashed

The tremor I marked x

That would be that

And I would keep my heart.

[ipsyb]

Nonchalant #NaPoWriMo

I have lain those dogs to rest,

The ones snapping at my heels

Begging me to train them

I have set them free.

I have slain those demons

That were looping into chains

Banished them from my life

Their cries echoing in vain

I ask for no accolades

Those dreams have been interred

No hungers claw at my belly

No masters to be served.

Yet deep in the night comes the moonlight

Whistling through a window…

[ipsyb]

Z: Zephyr #NaPoWriMo

  When I die scatter my ashes

Somewhere like this.

Where the morning creeps in

On the wings of a whistling

Thrush. Where night jars

Ballet with the call of the frog

Where the mist lifts

Long after the day has dawned.

Where blue hills stretch away

Eternally. There let me be

Blown in the wind. And

Should you ever feel the need to visit

Go somewhere with no network.

And call out my name. I won’t be…

[ipsyb]

W: wanting #NaPoWriMo

I want to lie down and catch

drops of snow in my mouth

and not worry about the cold

  I want to lose myself in the branches

Hiding from voices calling me home

and not worry about dinner to be made

  I want to howl back at the moon

and leap at the setting sun

and not worry about the example I am setting

  I want to play hopscotch till the lines blur

ignoring the shouts that call me in

and not…