Home.
Comfort to some
trigger warning to others.
I know you hate my generation
The self labbed
Woke people
Who are drunk on one side of a story.
I am a generation
The one who is totally
Failing at being what
We’re to be.
You take pride in
Densely packed
nervous buildings
glued together with curiosity,
not hope.
And call this a living.
You and I have
different understandings of home.
I have seen too much of waves
to call shore
As my home.
We talk about grass
the way one talks about earth.
You can argue that
it’s the same thing
but honey, it’s not.
Earth is the one who nurtures,
lets the life grow
out of it
and have enough strength
to support life.
Earth is a mother’s womb,
heart of a father,
The eyes of the couple won’t/can’t be convinced.
Grass is life.
It can’t grow on its own,
It can’t see
how green it is
or how beautiful
the world think
a vast, lively field is.
She smelt like the old stories
The Ones my mother sang,
her huge house was a shell
a garden,
lacking only a spring.
She told us tales
of people who left her behind,
I was in awe of all that she had
And what she didn’t.
Her daughter was of my age
A pretty face and fragile hands,
A girl, surrounded by people
A girl, no one could understand.
I fell in love with her boy
The walking beauty
of our gloomy beach,
His heart was a sacred place
a glittering thing, I couldn’t reach.
He’d walk on words
and swim in love
But we failed to keep in touch.
My memory seems forgotten
like the book you don’t miss much.
Weather is dripping
from your tongue.
White of the clouds
is the calm
the calm you carry around,
the calm I lack,
the calm world needs.
Love?
Love is the crimson red;
of all the times
you have died
because of
your complexity,
For never fitting in,
For never being understood,
For never having been loved.
They say war is an opportunity.
Red tears are
a substitute for poppies.
But
how do you know
the colour of tears?
Who claimed it?
Who named it red, anyway?
This is an apology
to all the Colours
to all the shades I wrote about
without knowing
what a colour is.
The way things are,
I’m having hard time being okay with that.
They say- forever never lasts long,
HOW to be okay with that?
I see my friends turning to art,
Reading shit and calling shots.
WHAT is the meaning of art?
WHERE do I shoot my shot?
I’m afraid of asking questions
for all my WHAT go unnoticed.
The cat on my patio is purring unnecessarily
Is she afraid of living, unnoticed?
All the questions are hiding
hiding behind question marks,
Despite the endless possibility of no’s
All of us are looking for more,
Childhood wounds are surely popular
to leave marks.
It hurts to grow old, he said
with a hint of pain in his eyes,
and looked at his trembling hands
maybe was trying to recognise something.
“Movement is tiring” he said
to bake a cake in the eye of the storm,
To see the same souls and faces
in all the people, in all the forms.
I wonder if it gets better
for they say everything does,
People generalise though
And when they do,
do they think of us?
Maybe it’s more about losing
than to fit in,
All the storms took things from us
But I miss the spot
We used to sit in.
You see, we poets are ships
Lost in a sea,
there’s nothing to risk
and nothing to lose.
I could say you’re dying
to write the last poem, before dying
as if, death of poems and poets ever
mattered.
What matter, are the private affairs
printed on the front page of
sensational newspapers,
with uncertainty.
For it’s easy to blame the time.
Time, as always will tell us
who the best story is,
but stories are not easily told.
If you ask me,
I could narrate my story
but it’s not mine to claim.
Claims are to be made
when bets will be made
and you’ll find me there
trying to steal a piece of art,
For art recognises you.
Art will come knocking at your door
On rainy days,
days you absolutely hate,
for you can’t stay inside to write.
Writes will meet you halfway
in busy halls of empty buildings
trying to borrow words from the past,
bargaining with the future,
deciding present.
They’ll look for poets
But
All the poets are lost in a still sea.
I failed to check the alphabets
and ended up writing about love.
Once you asked me
how to write a poem on love
and I’m still searching for words.
I was trying to know love and poetry.
So I held my pen tight
and hoped for you to see the ink flow
through my fingers,
droplets dripping from my nails
to the hem of your shirt,
but you stayed there,
without a word
for none of us was ready to speak.
Well now,
I’m looking at your hands;
painfully beautiful hands.
I’m trying to reach out
and hold you.
Your soft, tender palms
come crashing me down
like the fresh waves at dawn.
I recognise the hands
I never held,
like your fingers were
designed to fit in mine.
But
Neither of us is ready.
Each day feels like a product
product of last words.
Words are crushing.
We’re yet to learn language.
Both of us are
waiting
for the other to speak.
You already know how this works;
I let you hold my hand
when we’re crossing streets,
Neither of us is bad at it.
Neither of us is ready to let go.
Poetry.
Words is general mean so much to me. In one way or another, they keep me sane. Poems helped me in a way I could never express in words (see the irony!)
I read everything I can, it’s the only thing, I think I am good at. Words have always been showing me the immense possibility; for us humans – the possibility of life. I am not a poetry aficionado, to be honest. But what I had read, has moved me to a state of such dilemma, I wanted to turn the world upside down and make it better, for everyone (in my own way).
Poetry made me realise that writing can show me what I wanted out of life. I want many things, but nothing beats poetry. I feel deeply connected to it. The shared appreciation and love for poems have helped me reach where I am right now, meet people, helping me discover communities of like minded people, not just in India but from across the world.
It’s like a bridge.
I’m always thankful to poetry and words.
Kafka said “all the love in the world is useless when there is total lack of understanding”. But, how do you make someone understand love?
Fear is a toothless beast.
I see you move across the house and wait for you to see me.
I have been writing on the shape of your mouth; it’s been days since you held me close.
I wonder what you think of the colour violet, you still love it?
I close my eyes
and you’re still here.
here and there
– everywhere.
Quick sand is diminishing through the hourglass. As if wind is carrying me away from you. In a flash I see you, then you’re gone. I’m taking care of flowers, lilies are blooming. You left me a candle of darkness.
I’m longing to feel your touch, mother.
a.mermaid'spen_ 