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Dharmakarna

Fire God hath no fury Namo Namah Her surma-laden tributaries. The pious pundit rants Successive, dangerous chants She throws her head backwards In hysteria Matam ki khushi, matam ka sama. A thousand bowed heads A thousand devoted faces The blood-curdling jarring Of maha-ghantis Holy intoxication of the havan-kund But Dharma resides in only one. No, Dharma sees no one. Yagya karo, yagya karo Karna- the greatest danveer Comes down from the heavens today, they said He will prowl the streets in disguise He will have gold coins in his pockets. Heaven-manufactured, heaven-sealed! Who’s the holiest of them all? Bound to get lucky, that bugger! And then the men combated For the best spot by the fire And the women wore bandhinis and laheriyas The children cried. Dharma peeped from the window Karna tousled her hair. “Women have dressed for you.” He smiled.

Marsala

Whiskey runs through your haggard veins  Your ashen face, still picturesque  Framed by gallant waves  Storm is raging, hush!  Hold on to your glass But you let it fall down your window pane.  Why do you pull that dress down your thighs, after all this time  Why do you grab a shawl to cover your breasts  The night that fell upon your sensual face  You kissed it fully, without another sigh Let me remind you  Of the palms that knew  Your blissful cries & kindled hues As the forget-me-nots woke with the drizzling drops I was Rain, trying to open you. Your eyes are worn out now Your heart has sunk The Marsala linen graces the floor My greedy eyes linger, behind the door All that is around us, is petrichor. My needs are no different from the wrath of the storm  Unfinished, Unfulfilled, Uncoloured  But your darkest eyes seek something else  And so I wrap myself up in our line...

Lily of the Nile

While you were tying blue flowers to the clot of my hair  I moved about impatiently  As if it didn't matter  Meandering like a little girl  I swiveled through the gazing trees  Oblivious to the thread that knotted up our dreams  It was a dark night when the oceans called I was cradled in a bubble you had just breathed with life  Floating across our jittering timeline  It landed half shot into a mountain peak  What a pity, what a pity.  The bubble that carried purity was rendered bleak.  So when I fell, it took less than a moment You lit a fire to cook your meat I fired my parachute to pull me away But the voracious flames charred my feet What was meat, was I meat  You often whispered, you liked me raw.  You emerged like the mellow shades of morning  Resting on a street bench Hands stretched on your sides  Glancing, smiling  And I swam in like a sea of autu...

Anamorphosis

They say perspectives can be many  What if the world is a playground  For Anamorphosis in another Where it all makes sense  What if our bodies  Are waves  And  Waves are  Only a fragment  Of a universe set straight  Which doesn't appear as universe Cosmos uncomplicated  Abruptly, kindly  What if you were to see The shapes that scattered stars  Slaved to arrange in constellations  In a simple upturn of earth  Postcards, trinkets and french plats Worn gallantly  By a mad man?  You would perhaps  Finally see your journeys converge Concisely, wholly  On a paradigm free of material  Meaningless, until placed against  The world  Won't you come  Set things a little awry  To set the reflection pondering About a fickle one's ambitions? Oh won't you come  Crawling  So the feet in your image wonder About a da...

Purple

Once upon a time When you sat muddled, with stationery strewn all around you On a windy afternoon, the ferocious curtains behind you willing to sweep all of you away You had asked me what you must paint. And I had entered the room troubled, with my memory impinging on me I hadn’t a clue what you meant. One of your old records was ablaze in the living room Jarring the dinner table, the wall frames and the window panes Only faint sensations jolted us where we were One to the mercy of music, one to the mercy of wind. Something about your house was soul-stirring Maybe it was just you. Broken tributary amidst the rustle of purple papers Flying all around you, and you around them What must you paint. The body, used to cajoling and embrases Had grown weary of all the love. Yet the excrescent veins on the back of your hands Filled me to the brim with delirium You were the subject of my concupiscent dreams Wavering and disappearing like a nymph Leaving me hankering for...

Upon a flower

Oh, Velvet Your contradictions changed cyan to crimson And your root given threads embellished your petals  What makes you imbue this devastating hue In all that is ephemerally mine? 

Statement of Purpose

I have heard too much, my love.  I have listened to verses plucked  shamelessly on strings which were once mine.  The beginnings of melody were given to me, all that was unsung lusted my voice, chaos found culture in my mind.  I imagined a Coruscating Cosmos.  Every vision had a wing, each thought had a tune. When the wind blew and the chimes jingled, a new book opened to give the lovelorn what he needed  Promises, Hopes and Dreams.  And he came to me, he came to me every starstruck night  With questions on his pensive face  like carvings in stone, craving decipherment.  I countered each promise, each hope, each dream with the songs hidden in keys and strings Until I became them. I could believe now, that my words were reminiscences of your endearment  My cosmos was resting on your body.  Together, we tried to create melody.  I had scars on my fingers from forcing it to take birth, I h...