Friday 25 December 2009

Moonpath

In your laugh, I find

A child afraid of growing old

And in your eyes, I see

A woman watching time.

My purple shaded canvas,

Your skin has lines of a sharp star

Your heart, mellow clay

And on your lips, a gentle curse

For the spell I broke.

Lie next to me, and

I'll be silent.

Watch the light come and leave

Buried in white sand

We will feel the waves

With the sound of grass in the wind,

I'll breathe you slow.

My wandering cloud

Where will you go?

When the sun melts

Where the eye cannot see.

Let your words be whispers

To my patient ear.

And vacant, I

Go through the needle's eye

Run my fingers down your spine

Tell you before the day arrives

On your back,

Is a road to the moon.

Thursday 17 December 2009

Upon Looking Back On All Things Past


Speak of the days that went by
Or the beauty which gives you wings
The ocean i find in your sad eyes
A heart that wants to sing.

I've always known that sadness
that beckons closer for it calls
The melancholic song of the night
Is the most beautiful of all.

More beautiful than whispers
More sublime than the rain
In her arms i find no sleep
And i find no pain.

In that cold, dark night i have tried
to shape many a different thing
To find stars fallen from the sky
And the joy it would bring.

But stars are mere pieces
they lie broken in our hands
Like the heart of a woman
Like the soul of a man.

So i return to you with sadness
that has made my mind its home
And with it i've waded through darkness
Silent, empty and alone.

Let's travel to a world pure and blue
like the one in your song
Lets start spinning and never stop
Before the season is gone.

Dream with open eyes
Chase me with your smile

And the light will cause every eye to ache
At the coming of the dawn.
*photograph by Suzanne*

Friday 27 November 2009

A Photograph We Didn’t Take


I recall
Winters that passed
Like a blade of grass
Flowing with the autumn wind.

The smile on my face
Your hair in the wind
Out of place
The patience of elders wearing thin.

All my names
And all her letters
People with umbrellas
Can't embrace the weather

But poets always make mistakes
and muses never hesitate
We crawl back in
Run for shelter.

And in our eyes
The faces we meet
Down the street
Names they will never know.

No one will see
the ground beneath our feet
Places where we used to go.

Monday 2 November 2009

On The Run


(Verse 1)
Come, lets burn this house down
It speaks to me no more
Let's travel to a different place
We haven't been before
(Pre-chorus)
And we could change our names
We could look the same
And we can eat all day
On the trees where we'd lay

(Chorus)
But time, time...will you let me be?
Time, time...can I please be free?

(Verse 2)
You hide from the sun
When the day has just begun
And when the sun goes down
You're nowhere to be found

(Pre-chorus)
And we could change our names
We could look the same
And we can eat all day
On the tree where we'd lay

(Chorus)
But time, time...will you let me be?
Time, time...can I please be free?

(Verse 3)
Yes we are on the run
To call a place our own
And when we're almost done
We won't be alone.

(Repeat pre-chorus and chorus)

(End)

Saturday 31 October 2009

questions


'Whats with you and cracks'? She said.

'Time and again I find myself in one', is what I didn't.

Cracks


There is a void.
A gaping hole.
A chasm full of echoes.
A mirror cracked.
That's me in between.

Thursday 29 October 2009

trees


when they cut the trees down
there were green bruises on the ground.

Where I Stand


I live at the edge of my city
A spot of fading green in the corner
A world within a world, and getting smaller
Of blue swords dividing the land
And people in the cracks
A stranger to paradise
Stranger than paradise.

Everyday the mirror of the sun
Is who we are
We, who used to ache with silence,
Now speak with the same.
Our conversations with voices across the river
Our love
Just a passing of the seasons.

Here I fought a blue beast
That brought me the gift of fear.
Here I lived a yellow night
That left you in my veins.

Again I break from my shell
As clouds break over the dawn
And I rise
And I wait
For the music to come.

Thursday 24 September 2009

After the Rain

After the rain
Everything is silent
When the world sleeps
In its own wound.
And I wait for you
To raid my mind
While the circle breaks
Around the moon.

After the rain
Everything is pure
And untouched,
Like first steps.
Where new colours
Rise and fall
And the world is a canvas
When the sun sets.

After the rain
Everything is hollow
When the sky caves
Into the earth
There are no idols
To be followed
As the statues crumble
And turn to dust.

After the rain
Everything is fallen
Touched by your hands
It is alive
And I, in my dreams
Dream of the moment
When I find all this, and more
In your eyes.

Sunday 16 August 2009

Grain of Sand


On this page
I am
Without strings and words
My tongue racing through
A desert of emptiness
Here there is no wind.

There is no path
Weathered by your feet
Nor a tree
Seasoned by the sun

My friends, there is no time.

It is here I lie
Underneath the stars that burn
And it is here I will be
When my face becomes theirs.

Here they fall
Strangers dressed in silhouettes
This land of mirrors
Without a name.

And it is here that I lie
Like all that I have lost
Consumed.
Unparalleled.

All Her Names


Shall I call you a cloud
That brings the promise of rain?
Or a street that leads me astray?
Shall I name all the seasons
As day turns to night and your face appears
Or should I lose myself in the
Nameless sound when wings are drawn.

Shall I count the number of
Strangers we have met and all your questions?
Or rather, the things we forget and
Never mention.
Confusions, complications
Between detours and destinations
Multiplications and divisions, is
The way we have lived.

Shall I call you a book
Whose pages are yellowed with time?
And each whiff brings to mind
Secrets of yesterday.
Friends and foes that held you close
Made you their own
Within stories where you find yourself.

But no, I shall call you a tree
That is as free
As its roots
Which never pick and choose where
They want to go.
Whose branches are not boundaries
Marked territories
But something that makes it beautiful.
And now naked, as you sway
In the autumn wind
I lie in your shade and wait for spring.

Into The Night


(Verse 1)
Love, it’s been raining lights
All throughout the night
Won’t you hold my hand and fly…away
See, the stars are all aligned
In a purple sky
Won’t you hold my hand and fly…today

Hey don’t give up too fast
‘cuz the only thing that lasts
Are the things you wanna save…yeah
I once fell beneath the cracks
And there’s no turning back
But know it’s never (too) late…yeah

(Chorus)
And I don’t know
What they mean
When they ask me
To believe
There’s no reason
There’s no rhyme
To lose our voice
Into the night

(Verse 2)
And words…they can bring you down
And you smile without a sound
When no one is around…now

And like the human touch
Sometimes words don’t mean too much
And silence too, is a sound…now

(Chorus)
And I don’t know
What they mean
When they want me
To believe
There’s no reason
There’s no rhyme
To lose our voice
Into the night

When The Sun Goes Down

...an incomplete song

Hope lies in uncertain things
No one knows what the future brings
So much horror when there’s no sound
And there is a light when the sun goes down.

So much is gone, we were lead astray
But not al is lost, let’s learn to live.
So much has died, it’s gone away
But not all is lost, we’ll find a way.

Thursday 14 May 2009

The Shape of Colours

Hope lies in uncertain things
The look in your eyes when I depart
The breeze of your skin
That shines as it leaves.
The healing of the sky after the rains have fallen.
There is a light when the sun goes down.

Red, like your skin
When you lay on the grass
Burning naked feet
Diamonds in the sun.

Oh my lady of the water,
Till noon, I’ll trace
The shape your shadows make.
And when darkness arrives, shapeless, we
Become a silhouette.

Truth lies in the silver of the night
In the braches that sway, and
Roots that shiver in the cold
In the whispering wind and roads that
Take you where you want to go.
In secrets that only silence allows us to confess.
In the shining moon that undoes your dress.

Oh my lady of all seasons
You say you will wait for winters
After summer leaves like,
A stranger through your door
And a yellow leaf on the ground
Announces autumn.

Wednesday 22 April 2009

The Beginning


When her hand lay lifeless at the break of dawn
An unironed crease, she
Reminded me of a wave that
Returns to the ocean
Leaving the shore washed, clean and pure.

And as I remembered all the things
I’ve learnt to hold,
Wheels, nameless colours, names, stories and strings
They were your own, as
You are to me.

But tell me, for no one else will
Of a mother’s pain that gives life.
Sing to me the songs of harvest
Of the village you left behind.
Simple secrets, like a bird’s nest
A river
And cracks in our ceiling
Teach me how to speak with silence.

Teach me how to be the rain.

And more, for when the boy in me
Meets the man I will be tomorrow,
I remember

We began as we are,
Strangers to ourselves
Without roots or maps and lines

Scattered footsteps in the sand.

Thursday 9 April 2009

Vidharbha


My mother must die with my own two hands.
Here, we can turn
Death into gold.
But what will I do with this gold?

Shall I melt it and make it rain?
On this parched land of mine
Where every wishing well has dried
And promises are turning into cracks, like
Wrinkles on my forehead.

Should I crush it and plant it in the sand?
Watch it grow day by day
So that it may give me fruits, wood and shade
On this parched land of mine.
Where birds don’t sing in the morning
And at night, I have to
Find reasons to sleep.

Shall I beat it and throw it in a pot?
Cook it for my children
Who should never go hungry.
Who should run and play, for
It is their age.
On this parched land of mine
Where there is nowhere to hide.

Or shall I shape it into a sickle,
That my fathers used to yield?
And slice my own throat
On this parched land of mine
Where I can’t watch my wife
Repay the debt I owe to mother earth
With her own flesh.

Ordinary Day


An ordinary day began
When the sun rose the same.
And I didn’t believe the future
They try to sell me
With news I didn’t buy.

Because things written on paper
Do not last.

Prose

Oh, to write
A rhyme without a rhyme
And call it poetry.

Thursday 26 March 2009

My Lady's Home



In my lady’s home, the curtains dance.
They whisper as they reveal
The sun they hide.
While summer sleeps in
The playground of her youth,
And remembers the lines racing
Through her smile.

She needs no armour for
Battles in her dream.
She needs no shelter for pictures,
Of childhood in the rain.
She never knew any spells for little miracles,
Like toy soldiers and pencils that defy shape.

In my lady’s home, the trees sway
And in the moonlight, she says
They come alive.
While she gazes outside the window
The breeze plays with her dark, dark hair
Her eyes mirror a city
Shining in the night.

She needs no words for the songs she sings.
She needs no reigns
For a heart untamed.
And why pray today
For a better tomorrow?
A silent hymn never broke our chains.

And sometimes in my lady’s home
I hear the sounds of freedom
The breaking of the waves
Rising of the sun.
And I become a slave to all I’ve seen
To the beauty in her eyes
When the day’s begun.

Tuesday 17 March 2009

Morning Lullaby


(Verse 1)
In the morning, when
The sun will rise
Half in my sleep
I’ll kiss your eyes.

And then you’ll ask
Is this the end?
I’ll smile and say,
We’ll meet again…friend.

(Chorus)
And with these words
I’ll take you far.
‘Cuz in, in our dreams
We’re just who we are.

(Verse 2)
Summer’s in her shoes
Lines through her smile
Forget my autumn bruise
Fruits of denial.

(Chorus 2)
Some say, I’ll never learn
Anything, so take me far.
Meet me in our dreams
Where we’re just who we are.

(little guitar thingy)

Now tears are flowing,
Climbing down your smile
Like trains and mirrors,
This will pass you by.

Here Comes the Rain (song)


(Verse 1)
When bodies glide
In a silent room
Strangers wait for the afternoon
I sit alone and sing.

Let’s forget, wrong or right
Who’s the first and who’s the last
There’s always time to think.

(Chorus)
Here comes the rain – 2
Washing down again
Here comes the rain.

(Verse 2)
And when we met
Words were bled
Thoughts meandered in our head
It all just ends too soon.

I remember, everything
Places I’ve been to
Things I’ve seen
I’ll never leave this room.

(Repeat Chorus)

(Bride)
Now I haunt
This empty space
I’m an autumn leaf
Flying in the wind
And all I’ll say is…

(Repeat Chorus)

Untitled and Incomplete (song)

(Verse 1)
Stuck in the attic
You move through letters
You curse all the static
Caught in your head

It seems that you doubt it
The course of the weather
Sometimes it’s good to find
What you’re lookin’ for

(Chorus)
Cuz…don’t we breathe the same, love?
Don’t we need the same…?

If I (song)


(Verse 1)
Have you seen my woman?
She was born in the rain
Have you seen that child?
With songs in her head?

Like a picture in a frame
She’s tried to be free
Oh, it’s all the same
Can’t you see?

I’d ask you to stay
Just for a while
If it helps you to stand
If it makes you smile

(Pre chorus)
The time for starters
Has gone out of hand
What doesn’t make you a woman
Will it make you a man?
And rest assured, I’ll do all I can

(Chorus)
If I could, then I would.

(Verse 2)
Did you see my woman
When she danced in the rain?
Did you see her cry?
When her thoughts, they bled

And I promise I won’t take
Most of your time
Unless it helps you to stand
And if it makes you smile.

(Pre chorus 2)
‘Cuz these thoughts in my head
You wouldn’t understand
Does it make you a woman
To not be a man?
And rest assured,
I’ll do all I can

(Chorus)
If I could, then I would.

(End)

Hold On (song)

(Verse 1)
And to those who preach
Could you look around and see
What have you done?

And to those who know
Tell me the truth
Is this what we've become?

And I forgive, I forget
Just an inch
An inch is left
Of this resolve
Don’t let it go.

(Chorus)
When time itself slips away
Could we hold on...?
Could we hold on...?

Innocence is lost today
Could we hold on...?
Yeah, hold on...?

(Verse 2)
Neighbours fighting - left or right
Promised land, take me back
I don’t want nowhere to belong
...to belong

And I forgive, I forget
Just a breath
A breath is left
In this heart
Don’t let it part

(Repeat chorus)

(Bridge)
Why can’t difference ring the same?
Pointed fingers, (with) everyone to blame
Why can’t we stop this war?

(Repeat chorus)

Fingerprints (song)


(Verse 1)
Roads will take you where you wanna go
But who will show you where you wanna be?
If you think you've gotten too far from home
I’ll smile and hush your eyes to sleep

I’m not in this, i listen to you
Never say a word above to me

(Chorus)
cuz I still wait for
And I still wait for...you
And I bleed

(Verse 2)
I sing this one for every broken heart
Don’t know who you were, who you are
She’s not in this, always next to me
Sing and laugh again, set me free.

(Repeat chorus)

(Breakdown...or something like it!!)
Fingerprints are climbing up the wall
We crash and burn (but) we never take the fall
You’re not in this, I speak the truth
The only thing I could not be was you.

(Repeat chorus)

(End)

An Unfinished Song

*something i started two years back but still havent managed to finish*

So sweet when she rolls on the floor,
Heaven in her heart
But in her eyes,
All I see is hell.
There are colours she spoke of today,
But when she dried up and twisted
All that’s left was grey.

Oh she’s walking down the hall
Thinking of her future
Those little eyes of her,
They cannot pretend.
And I’m all out of my excuses,
I’ve fallen hard and dirty
Goodbye woman, this is the end.

Yesterdays

What do you want with yesterdays? She said.

‘To not know what I need to forget’

I replied.

Monday 16 March 2009

Dreaming Backwards


In the blue of the night,
When words rise from the ground
Aching, bending, swaying
Like a woman awakens at dawn.
Like smoke in a chain of rings together.
I will return to the shade of our time
To the unspoken word,
And just a smile
To the rhythm of our steps in the sun
To the shadows in which we fused,
And were lost.

Thursday 26 February 2009

Banjar



There are ghosts in the wind
Above a land left dry.
And behind the veil, a million eyes
Waiting.

The rivers run through history
Now misshapen
Devouring, bellowing
Without lament, like
A beast
Sleeping.

Empty are the houses
With just a stain,
mian ki ma chudaye
And we the people,
Are like forgotten trees
Of our land.
He, who does not bend,
Always cracks.

Look now, don’t turn away
Delol, Patiya, Gulbarg, Naroda, Vatwa
Sayaspur, Gayatrinagar, Juhapura, Chamanpura,
Asarwa, Behrampura, Sehrkotda, Malpur
Modasa
…are just names?

There are children and their mothers
Coming from the smoke.
And coming from the words
Are men no one knew.
Locked away like official affidavits
In unofficial places
Are secrets that only silence reveals.

And there is a silence in cracking, blackened walls
A silence of blood dried amber.


A silence that echoes a thousand screams.

*for the victims of Gujarat riots of 2002*

Saturday 31 January 2009

Culture?

Today the police ignored calls for help from an old lady whose house got robbed last night and didnt register a case of sexual harassment when a girl wanted to press charges against her live-in partner.

Instead, they went to a park.

And beat up two lovers sitting together.

Friday 30 January 2009

Luxuria


It’s a fever of the veins
The last drop of rain
In this desert of strangers
Who pick and choose
What they can’t alarm or defuse
And pass it off as danger.

Thursday 29 January 2009

I Remember


When talk is easy
Our mouths - a pistola
And separated, we fly with our words
Into the divide
It is times like these, I think of
The road I am walking.
Of the strangers that have passed me by.

And sometimes,
I think of my world
A prism in a bubble,
The colours dissolved.
Faint, as my reflection in your eyes.
A photograph, maybe a decade old
And a shelter from the rain,
Cradled in my arms,
Like a mother to a child.

When the fever of yesterdays subside like,
Moonlight from my door and,
Waves at the shore, we shall
Sing and play games with our masks.
And become two dreams, entwined
To haunt our nights.

In such times, I will remember,
A washed out room
And an evening canvas
Where the yellow sun of my autumn
Sank behind your eyes
When I learnt to speak in tongues
And wishes were let loose upon the wind,
Like clothes hung out to dry.

Friday 23 January 2009

Today



I wrote a song today called Here Comes The Rain after playing constantly for something like two and a half hours.


When i finally stopped, i looked up, the sky looked beautiful.

Wednesday 21 January 2009

No One Knows


Running through ruins, we are
Chasing the sun, almost half now.
Avoiding threats from wanderers with stories
For a price
In similar ways we avoid
Our eyes from straying down a familiar road.

And when everything is devoid of shape,
We are devoured by circles, for,
It is in circles we dance
Before the waves come,
Take us away.

Forever young and foolish
But it’s not enough, and soon,
We must make our way back.
Before the witching hour
Before this secret turns to glass
And breaks.

Through days like these
Or when we meet in our minds and embrace
Forever wary of the eyes upon us
Eyes that know we are not the same
When we walk these streets now.

And as midnight burns to dawn,
We travel
From wind to whispers
From fist to fingers.

Everyone is watching
But no one knows.

Saturday 10 January 2009

the part you avoid.

Ive never been good at talking about things once they are over(...or maybe i am...but only in my head...damn), and maybe it annoys me how good you're at it...yes...YOU. Maybe thats the only thing I am really pissed off about, more than anything. The sad thing is how we get used to...this...to everything, like nothing ever happened...we never bleed, we're not allowed to...we restrict ourselves...to walk by the same road, to smile in the same corners where we huddled in winters and shared secrets, to watch the day turn to black, to wear ourselves out, like sweaters we must pass to our siblings after they stop fitting...sigh, gravity always wins...but I smile now, down is the new up...thank you for everything.

Tuesday 6 January 2009

Polaroid


Through half black slanted eyes moving rapidly,
Gliding from door to door
Watching strangers, foes and friends
Across the room, you know
Sometimes they’re all the same.

And in the same room, we
Watch the day pass in black and white
Devoid of colours, a Polaroid
We become whispers, trapped
Like moths to a flame.
Like a reflection, re-arranged.

Like they keep secrets in China.

At times we talk in pictures.
We take the breeze that flutters prayer flags
And fly away to other lands.
Places where our grandmothers’ stories
Held their sway
To a time when our fathers were lovers
And our mothers didn’t believe
Everything they heard.

And sometimes,
Sometimes we speak in symbols,
In signs we made our own.
But we never say a word.
They will never know
Our language is one.