Sensibility

Quietude is broken by
The whir of the note counting machine.
In the dim, a deep measured voice
Slowly recites Frost in my ears.
And yet, I do not turn.

I am not reminded of the boisterous
Kolkata streets with the humid weather
The big mosquitoes, and the little alleyways
That only the cartman could navigate.
I am not reminded of the mighty Victorian skyline,
or the tiny drops that look as wonderful on your skin
As absent from your eyes, and as present on
The little blades of grass all around.

All I'm left with is an insipid nostalgia
Of times better spent, imagining your hands
Trace a yellowed paper and bring it to light.

For now though
I don't like your poetry.

The Church of Tomorrow

Meet me someday
In the Church- of Tomorrow
I'll be sitting in the front row
Holding flowers, in a three-piece
With a bow tie you like so much.

And we shall that day
Swat Death as his impending hum
Echoes around the large dome
While you will point to your watch
And tell me that you are busy.

And I will, even that day
Look into your eyes and remember
The charcoal sketch I drew
With you in my mind, never having
For even one second to erase
Or re-draw the contours.

But I will cough, and you
In your pant-suit will motion to me
That your Limo is waiting and
That paupers can never turn kings.
And I will slowly rub the sweat off
My palms, on my corduroys.

And I'll slowly look down
To my bow-tie, when a gruff voice
Would announce your name
And you'd run into his arms, leave me
Staring into the nothingness.
And Jesus- with his pain-stricken face
Will look down, as I would be
He without a bow-tie.
Me with one.

Tempest

The rain falls in unforgiving sheets
And the wind in its drunken stupor
Stumbles onto my window pane,
Takes a step back, only to fall again.
And I sit, wonder to myself

In the relentless darkness
That when I traced circles with
My fingers on your smooth forehead
Did that start the sandy storm
That rages in your mind.

Ritter, Tod und Teufel

He glimpsed at the clock from his newspaper,
As she walked in with a smile splashed across her face.
He went to the balcony, lit up a cigarette and,
Looked far into the lights, until she meekly called,
"Dinner is ready", she whispered, with a soft touch
Sending fire inside him, the tip of his fourth glowed
In the darkness of the night, he replied hoarsely
"I'll be right there."

In the night, when she had curled into a ball,
He slowly dragged his unkempt frame to the mirror,
Stealing glances through sips of Jack Daniel,
Sometimes touching the bags under his eyes,
The stray hair on the face and chest, and his little potluck
Hard-earned through life, as the dent on his chair testified.
A little voice, groggy with sleep called out, he flinched,
And in the darkness of the night, he replied hoarsely,
"I'll be right there."

He slowly shaved and showered, the next morning,
He slowly dragged his clothes and placed them on his frame,
He took a few swigs of his coffee, and then drained the rest,
He heated some of the food from dinner, packed his own lunch,
Left the stove on, turned the lock slowly, and said hello to Rita
The motor roared, and he slowly disappeared, a black spot
In the distant horizon of whiteness.

He came back that night to see his abode on hell like flames,
The police found a scorched body in the bedroom, Rita tells her,
He cries, testifies to the police and slowly drives away into the night.
In the darkness of the night, he replies hoarsely,
"I'll be right there."

Darkness and Blackness

Lately the fine red branches have
Slowly crept up, little by little
Reaching for the dark brown orb
Arm raised, hoping for better springs
Of mellow fruition when it would not
Rain so much, and nor would the twigs
Choke in the artificial grey smoke.
But the clinic heart is not breaking
So healing stays long aloof.

And her eyes sink beneath clouds
Of blackness, thinking of days
When the sky would rumble with noise
And her world would fill with darkness again.
Drifting away she'd find a friend, to reaffirm
Darkness and blackness are not the same.
Darkness is the absence of light
Blackness when light ceases to survive.

The Best Juice Wallah in Town

He rose, filled with juice,

As the first rays of sun threw needles

Into his eyes through the holey tarpaulin.

He took a bath while the

Other men squabbled with their wives.

He loaded his cart with the

Oranges and Yellows and Greens

And his beloved Usha,

While other loaded up their carts with

Lakshmis, Radhas and Poojas to sell.

He half ran, half glided across the road

To his spot of twenty years, outside the hospital

And waited, sign ready and in place

Bombay Juice Wallah:
The Best Juice Wallah in Town.

He put in the globs

of mellowed sunlight

And thrust with all his might

One hand moving the wheel, 

Grinding, extracting juice out.

He'd pull out the ugly carcass

Fibrous, tired juiceless mass

Devoid of any use

Falling wrinkled onto the

Flat plastic underneath.

He'd serve the juice with 

Right spices in the right amounts

He'd take his time, let the spice mix

Before he'd serve it with 

His own zest and fervour.

Evenings, he'd stumble back

Into the tarpaulin, having had

A juice quite unlike the one he served

Listen to his daughter sleep beside

Her ragged doll and her little two times table book.

He would kick his wife awake

And smell the municipal water on her breath.

He'd make juice like in the day

And roll back to sleep

Leaving her to cry in silence

For the tarpaulin was thin and

People would talk and in the moonlight

And the eerie shadows of the tarpaulin

She'd see he wasn't a good man. 

The day when "Call Me Maybe", "Raining Men" and "Irreplaceable" become acceptable songs, we know Indian society has definitely come a far way.