Verisimilitude

On days like this, when little sips of unsavory tea
And a few drops of Scotland's best --
Fornicate with Barsan Laagi,
On days when I cannot even make friends with sleep
And like trespassers I let night
Tiptoe through my windows - with her, little fireflies
And forty other trespassers, silent raindrops.
They leave behind the boundaries of vowels and consonants,
and the warmth of verses and metaphors
and poetry.

Light beckons, hark, the unwanted Stranger!
Night runs, its aides asunder, leaving shadows and afterthoughts
And a little glass shoe.

I see myself, dark and fragile
I inhale desires, bright and robust,
I dream of us, looking at the rains, enveloped
In the garb of succinct conversations
And limp biscuits, lost in the depths, devoid of character
Not quite unlike clouds-- that we pledge to watch together,
Not now, darling, someday.

Sometimes, after all is gone
The windows and the nights,
The fireflies and the ragas
What remains is a silent impulse;
Verisimilitude.
To make meaning of empty things and broken words that are
But incomplete for me, without the letters to your name
Such words, like love and peace and home .

So,
Sometimes, I let night walk into my home through windows,
To float around me like a bridge to the country of dreams
While I fold your thoughts and keep them safe,
On your side of the bed,
Where no one sleeps.

Not Green

The tree is dead, today.
Spread across the limitless horizons
With its infinite wisdom, and charred branches
It stands, several ants escape
Their lifeless abode, lest the tempest
Of silent sap and flamboyant pollen -
Blows them away into nothingness.

You were there, the quiet whisperer -
Climbing its stony boughs, sprigs cradling you
You were touched, weren't you?
The fire lit its insides, but left you
With tears ablaze, and a strange leafy musk
That you will reek of, whenever you lie -
Or lie next to me, possibly medicinal smelling.

They will come in hordes and swarms
It will rain a million tears.

I have the axe here, see, saw too -
Dead trees must lay forgotten.
But what do I do with the stump
With roots clawing far beneath, holding on
And here in my clinic heart, the storms
Rage on, creating new dunes of sand.
Yellow and brown, not green.

Alas

It was the picture of a broken bottle -

Jagged, a victim of asinine actions

And acrid smoke, lilting by the dark drapes. 

Or maybe it was you, with napalm poetry

Burning red, green, white; who knows? 

Let's wail tonight. The picture, you, I - 

The darkness of the eyes needs washing.

In yours, under mine, and the picture? 

It is but sanguine, you say. My eyes hurt. 

Let's sleep with each other tonight.

I, you, the picture - no, it must remain away

Fetid little thing, not apposite in our havens, 

Of fragrances and musk, and entangled arms

And Alhaiya Bilaval 

You are gone. Or is it I? Dark grey skies,

You cannot see the moon. It burns red. 

I burn red. 

You burn red. 

The picture burns red.

Alas.