"Seen this, Swaps?"
"What, A?"
"Today's headline is a #haiku.
Huge tariff on jokes.
Register to #canoodle.
Big Brother is Here."
"redruM."
"Don't get the second line."
"Can't find anyone?"
"Where should I register for a can of noodle?"
"We need you in politics."
#vss365
I wish I knew a wise poet
To lay bare love.
She will hear out my tragic case,
Scoff at the acidic guilt burning,
"That alone keeps old love alive."
And, smirk at new love.
"Cream on stale cake to sate #desire.
Who wants to know
What we think
When we say
I love you."
#vss365
"Arjun, why are you standing outside the Principal's office?"
"I erased the Thought for the Day."
"What did it say?"
"God is the tangential point between zero and #infinity."
"Why?"
"Dunno. Got too close to that point."
"I will stand with you."
"Oh."
#vss365
#truestory
how many times have I
stood like a fool
expecting
a bit of love
to leave with
nothing given
something taken
Mother says
it is worse for Her
not even expecting
a bit of decency
from her #guilty kids
to be left used
barren and dead
#vss365
#vss365
On #sempiternal love:
I forgot about you,
And I still
Call you my one love.
Is that the norm or not,
And that's me
Trying to evade.
I could generalize,
Find comfort
In ways to survive.
Let me state the obvious,
If there was
Another to love,
It would be the same tale,
Or will I
Remember you then?
#truestory
I asked a girl I liked
If I had abused her then,
"You were like all then."
We were bad in many ways
But we were good in trusting none,
"Ain't whitewashing what's done."
On a dark stormy night
Thought of the #cerulean sky,
"Dream on! Don't fight, say right's might."
#vss365
March 16, 19--.
A day before her birthday.
We kissed. The first time.
October --, that year.
Said I love you. First and last.
She could not hear me.
Diary stays blank.
Was it an #interregnum
Between empty states?
But, I see beauty.
Like the tree with the lone bird
Reaching for the blue.
Can I hope and dream?
Should fatalism decide?
Should I fall further?
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
"Tell me something that's funny and sad."
"Friends are people one can't love."
"What's sad about that?"
"There's something about them one hates so much."
"And, funny?"
"One rarely realises that."
"Like us."
"Knew you would #chime in with that. We are not pals."
#vss365
The reunion triggered status anxiety (for us nearly 6 feet under).
Bruce Lee Raj used his walking stick as a nunchaku.
After 5 pegs of Old Monk, Wodehouse Cyril recited:
Winter will no more have snow white and #flocculent,
Love has left me a flagellant and flatulent.
#vss365
Am I a dirty old man
If you and gods enter
My life only after dusk,
Can I defeat insomnia
Without that deceitful faith
In a togetherness,
Till then,
Lemme fit a #Pomeranian in a pome (Aargh!!!),
Lose battles before first cut,
Bluff with rhetorical queries,
Am I a dirty old man
If I feel you when gods smirk
At daydreams that were real.
#vss365
"You are a coward, #incognito and all that."
"Not that. Just a nonentity."
"Bah!"
"After you left me, I became that. Not just invisible, so easily forgettable. That's for killing you."
"Bah!"
#vss365
My first love was my own creation and she remained in the umbra.
The true one managed to put my consciousness in the #penumbra, enough light to love, dark enough to lust, b4 death.
Then came the love in the antumbra, never sure of the cause for the eclipse of the mind.
#vss365
99. When a man loves a woman a lot but knows too little, it is advisable for him to be a man of few words.
100. A man should keep his better half away from his worst half unless… (show more)
from ‘100 points in the #Countours of a Lovesick Old Man’s Life’ 5th ed.
#vss365
"Arjun, amuse me."
"Swapna, did you know that Man created Work to be away from Love?"
"Jobless you implies no love?"
"I'm between projects. In the #interim, working on pareidolia."
"What?"
"I see you everywhere. This morn, on a boiled potato."
"Work isn't working."
#vss365
Why can't I write a love poem?
Don't I miss the playful #petulance,
the lingering troubles?
Can I deal with trust without hope,
with desire without tomorrow?
Can I crush her against me,
wonder if I'm good enough?
Minus skill amnesiac with words
I should write about that.
#vss365
#Reservoir of love?
Life is not for tomorrow.
Give-n-take, that's best.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
All that remained of the hill was the portion in the middle. Right over us. Like a multi-headed serpent, guarding or waiting to strike.
When the floods are over, if it is still standing, they will bring it down. No serpent, no god can survive the #onslaught of man.
#vss365
from my short story 'The Third Night':
https://gatheredthoughts-swapna.blogspot.com/2019/04/the-third-night.html
It moved lightly on her shoulder, to her neck. It skirted past the thin strap of her nightdress.
Was it his fingers?
Or the spider? What if she turned and found it on his face? How will she #displace the arachnid?
She reached down and picked up her bedroom slipper.
#vss365
from an old short story of mine 'Stories of the First Night':
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2015/04/stories-of-first-night.html
Love in lust's #slipstream,
Or vice versa. Right eM-Oh
For good crime fiction.
from 'Wisdom of Mata Hari & Casanova'
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
"Arjun, I am so bored. Confess."
"I was very young when I read my first adult book. Sidney Sheldon's '#Bloodline'. That accelerated the onset of puberty. Your turn, Swaps."
"Biggest
Lie
Of
One's
Disillusioned
Life (:)
Insufferable
Notions (about)
Extraction."
#vss365
#acronym
For some reason, not known to me, I used to post stories on #ValentinesDay. Otherwise, it was just another day. Kept that 'tradition' for a decade or so.
Not too sure why I stopped writing.
https://newnonentities.blogspot.com/2020/02/valentines-day-stories.html
From ‘The Thirteenth Book of Meaningful Life’, volume 13, chapter 13, page 13:
“One’s life is meaningless if one does not #chase the following*:
Food
Health
Knowledge
Wealth
Lust
Love
Kids
Ghosts
Friends
*If one does not chase in that order, one is doomed.”
#vss365
"#Liberation? Bah! The old ways were better. I went to her house. She was walking in the courtyard. With a few cousins. I didn't know which one she was. She thought my uncle looked good. Didn't notice me."
"How is that liberating?"
"When you are free of all illusions."
#vss365
My land is big enough to keep my neighbours distant. That advantage also brought troubles. They took it for granted their cattle and goats could graze on my land. Even cleared a #thoroughfare across my land to get to the market.
I had to guard my boundary. At any cost!
#vss365
This is from an old short story of mine about 'outsiders' and what creeps (aka 'bumiputra' or 'son-of-the-soil') do to them:
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2016/03/my-land.html
"Class, tell me about the #oak tree. Arjun?"
"When I croak..."
"Don't you dare!"
"But, ma'am, I have never seen an oak tree."
"Ok. Swapna?"
"Beneath the fine oak
Lies buried my weak darling.
Afterlife? Ha ha."
"Et tu."
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
"Filling your pocket is no rocket science."
"I have no time for your #rockets pockets."
"Bro, what's the leading cause of deaths among the elderly? Parricide. Who checks all those peaceful deaths at home? Everything will come to you, no?"
"Two goats and the old car."
#vss365
"What is your research topic?"
"Natural redistribution of wealth. It's about how the blue-collar workers stand to gain when the white-collar lot loses faith in matrimony and procreation."
"And the black-collar?"
"They will accelerate the process. Without gain, sadly."
#vss365
I saw 'Eye of the Needle' (1981) at that tender age when the past becomes irrelevant, and the future and the present are coyly entangled in deep uncertainty.
I knew then my love (in the future) would not let me live. That too, without me using the #needle on her hubby.
#vss365
I like to see her
Without the #flush, morn or night.
When others don't look.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
I was a Poet Laureate
Till I used
décolletage (for decalage)
&
amanuensis (for anamnesis),
They still remember
Me the gladiator,
"My name is Gluteus Maximus Coitus Interruptus,
Loyal servant to my love..."
She interrupted,
"Don't #fawn
&
Stick to 4-letter-words."
#vss365
Pausing the flight
To escape the blues,
There's hyped solitude
#Laced with grey uncertainty
And memories a mirage
Of mere nothingness,
Such thoughts trouble
Before scavenging,
Or call it hunt
In the epitaph.
#vss365
Why do I feel your touch?
They say the amputated is like that.
I could lose money
Or write about crime,
Why can't a condemned #fool
Change for the better?
In between the ebb and flow of moods,
Life lingers in a smile at the sublime.
#vss365
Whispered I love you.
Then, #silence before the kill.
Brain dead. Pull the plug.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
When I had most of my life,
I lost nearly all of it.
Nearly all, I did not lose
The memory of a love too brief.
That killed me, leaving
Nothing but the rest of my life.
Why did I put all on #ice?
It's too late now. To answer.
#vss365
I go round
the temple pond
to keep count
there's
the sublime
and
minors destroyed
innocent dead
a world drowning
or on fire
I am a serpent
coiling
before
swallowing
its tail
on which
a serene god
rests
waiting for me
to #quit
the quitting game
to accept
the end
#vss365
tgif
i don't have to lie or love
for 48 hrs
not that you noticed
not the #esoteric crap
not the needy cry
i can lock myself
in a cage too small but right
for a fantasy
in which i wake up
after an or-gy with ah
i can't tell you that
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
"So, that's how I finished off hubby 4."
"This is not a normal first night chit chat."
"I didn't chit chat with the others. Don't worry. I won't kill you."
"Did you say that to the others?"
"Take a #guess. Why do spouses always think their case will end differently?"
#vss365
"The follies of youth
or adult stupidity-
which should I #measure?"
"Try to blame it on
the system, company or
Peter Pan syndrome."
"Be serious, Swapna.
How many loves did I miss
With word or act wrong?"
"Do you want the truth?
Even if you had done it right,
You would still be you."
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
Do you know why I loved her
I wanted all to understand
With her
Realized it didn't matter
A #question would be enough
Do you know why I loved her
She told me about all her lovers
Me too
Knew it didn't matter
My loves were imaginary
Do you also love for wrong reasons
#vss365
I love people who:
believe in an ideology;
vote for a single party;
think there's only one love;
read-write feel-good crap;
hate unpleasant truths;
smile for a time-filler;
etc. etc. etc.
They say
I'm too old to love.
Ha am I #turning into
an idiotic teenage rebel?
#vss365
Declared war to lose.
My New Year #resolution.
Enough of BS.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
#EndCasteDiscrimination
#Vanchiyoor #Trivandrum
#NoWater
#HappyNewYear
I said Hi to 2025
After #AmarSinghChamkila on Netflix
Did I forget 2024
And all the abuse I took
Am I going to take
More of that from them
Am I going to beg
When the m*F* won't give even water
I will be ready without a #prompt
Let me be honest about the real creep me
#vss365
Around 18:30, I received my wife's call. She talked about her trip. Then,
"How was your day?" she asked.
"I took leave," I said.
"What did you do?"
"I went to Seetha's house for lunch."
#Solitude shifted from my right to the left and whispered, "Call me Loneliness."
#vss365
from
https://newnonentities.blogspot.com/2010/09/24-hours-in-urban-reality-show.html
Every Dec. 29, I think about my past 'sins'.
1. Showing the middle finger in every photo.
2. After the hostel warden's lecture on #decorum, playing Zappa's 'Wet T-Shirt Nite' on my boombox.
3. Forgetting wedding anniversary.
...
Moral: Have new sins for new year.
#vss365
Social media taught:
1^3 + 2^3 + 3^3 + 4^3 + 5^3 + 6^3 + 7^3 + 8^3 + 9^3 = 2025
The moral of the story:
In 2025,
Think out of the cube.
#haiku #senryu #Aarghh 🙃😇😎
Our Mills & Boon Reading Club will not see 2025.
A #schism, an existential crisis, has demolished the barricade against the onslaught of reality, bloodying our pages with crime, gore and platonic friendship. To fantasize or not to, that is not even the question now.
#vss365
You can see me everywhere but you can't,
A #reflection in the subway, another homeless.
We can pretend to care, say the right stuff,
But we can't be true once, to anything.
We can demolish and build, Nature's way,
We can't preserve life and dignity, that's unnatural.
#vss365
from
https://newnonentities.blogspot.com/2022/01/can-cant.html
Dreams that are not nightmares
But leaves that aftertaste,
It's a quiet poltergeist
Waiting for me to sleep,
The last time we made love
With death knock-knock-knocking,
Leaving a lone zombie
Scared and angry with all.
#poem ?
Chicken-n-egg story,
My writing and my love,
A recent niggling doubt
Is behind much heartburn,
If she is in my arms
Trusting me to do right,
Will I pick up my pen
And write about the wrong,
Create a #mnemonic
Perhaps, to remember...her?
#vss365
"Her dark hair straying across that beauteous fair face,
Those tear stained cheeks glisten as moonlit waters...
Heeeheehee"
"Why are you laughing, Swapna?"
"O knight in rusty armour, if there's a cheek that glistens, it will be yours."
"This is fiction. I can dream!"
#vss365
Those two lines are from an old 'pome' of mine:
https://discardedthoughts-swapna.blogspot.com/2009/07/his-story-searching-and-finding-1991.html
I knew love is not for me
When I got the writer's block
With no more bad lines like this
To be labelled #poetry.
I remember those long days
When I could not sleep thinking
Of long stanzas good for her
To scoot without a goodbye.
I miss the godawful notes
When the blank pages stare back,
How I wish I could promise
I won't trouble her like that.
It’s time for the rites of the high seas,
By lots let's decide whom to cease.
You, me, the others? Whose blood will soak?
Whose flesh will fill? Let senses go broke.
If it’s me, feed on me without a qualm,
If it’s you, I'll try to be calm.
Ah! This lunatic #tranquility.
#vss365
There used to be a sailors’ custom when they are stranded on the high seas - of taking lots to decide who to eat.
I remember this 'pome' (written 30 years back) because a friend asked me to write it on her Valentine's Day card to her love. Did it last? The love...🙃
#truestory
from
https://discardedthoughts-swapna.blogspot.com/2009/07/sailors-custom-1993.html
Ain't superstitious
But ever since
The #vss365 prompts
Came out only at 07:00 GMT
I have had
One excuse or another
And each one
Better than the other
Not to write
Ain't complaining
But
It's tough to say
I
Ain't superstitious...
🙃
I'm a liberal guy
But love should be banned.
How can I not compare
Your friendship with that?
She's no more and you're there
But that's not enough.
The grey cells should burn red
And the balls turn blue.
Forgive my crude lingo
But that's the plain truth.
#poem ?
It's that time of the year
To forget all that one should forget,
To stare at the sun (for cheap #drama)
To burn images that hurts,
Is it the black or the white smoke
That remains of the preserved,
Resolutions will not last I know,
I'll reconstruct another set of you.
#vss365
Our relationship reached a low plateau. Is it a saddle-point? Will one wrong step make us #descend to the agreed polite exit? Are there paths to unknown highs from the doldrums?
Seasons change, hair and teeth fall, bones become brittle, eyesight blurs, hearing fades...
#vss365
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2014/05/seconds.html
He opens the door. She enters.
He places her luggage by the wall. Next to a #creeper. Hidden baggage. Hiding arrivals and departures.
Their eyes search each other’s. With tears and smile. He takes her right hand. Kisses it. She tenses. Tries to take her hand away.
#vss365
from
https://discardedthoughts-swapna.blogspot.com/2010/01/just-for-weekend-from-scrap-shop-v.html
When Amit wrote his 50th love letter (49 w/o reply), I warned him that such #devotion goes unreciprocated.
Yesterday:
"What do I do? After 49..."
"50."
"50th was to another girl."
"Ah! Have both replied?"
"Ah! Yes."
It's possible only such devotion gets reciprocated.
#vss365
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2013/07/devotion.html
"If there are more than 2 #parameters in a physics theory, one can make an elephant go through a needle hole."
"And, how's that relevant on this date?"
"Love has too many unknowns."
"And, there are no elephants to go through any..."
"Shhh"
"Let's go home."
"Let's."
#vss365
To be a proud #citizen:
1. Get the blessings of a religious leader in the village of one's nomadic ancestors.
2. Take 3 tests there:
a. Roll on hot coal.
b. Lifted to a great height, lowered suddenly and, on each descent, thrashed with metal pipes.
c. Need-to-know.
#vss365
from
https://newnonentities.blogspot.com/2020/01/idea.html
"Is this for your wedding photoshoot?"
"Yupp."
"You dressed up like a #tardigrade, your partner in birthday suit?"
"Yupp."
"Well, you are paying.
Coupling is crazy.
Who knows the right recipe?
Likes or opposites?"
"Plz take the photos."
"Yes, boss."
#vss365
#haiku #senryu
"Can I be your Swapna?"
That made me think.
"Who should be Swapna? Will I feel irritated with the wrong one? Am I desperate?"
I smiled at the young man. He seemed relieved not to get a reply.
"#Yes" would have put an end to all that she is not. And, all that she is.
#vss365
Everyone has their 'How I met your Mom/Pop on a #train or plane' tale.
I don't.
I met her lover.
Jolly guy showed me his lover's chat. Her DP. DMs with "Baby Boo", red hearts et al.
She sends me the same.
I had to kill him.
And her.
It was bloody.
One dead.
Me.
#vss365
I have no questions I need no answers, here.
You cannot accuse, in jail, you can't #complain.
I look through bars for a Muse on visitors’ day,
You or Love, Life or Freedom, Nature or Solitude,
Those fancy names mean little, here.
Memory alone tucks me in with a lullaby.
#vss365
from
https://gatheredthoughts-swapna.blogspot.com/2010/09/only-one-that-remains.html
You are late, I tell him,
But with a sheepish grin,
He holds me, my whim.
There’s no gain
If I #complain,
If all I want is sin...
#vss365
from
https://gatheredthoughts-swapna.blogspot.com/2010/10/gigolo.html
"Are these posters of the murdered or the murderers?"
"Both are the same. Earlier, retaliation used to be quick. Justice can't be #delayed, right? Hack off limbs, burn that too. Then, no use for surgery, right? That's only when one tries to teach a lesson, not to kill."
#vss365
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2012/06/footsteps-in-dark.html
When love died, Heaven
turned out to be the #Skerry
of Dashed Hope. Hell too.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
In the lift, there's a man in tuxedo, gelled hair, gleaming from top to toes. Did he call me a half-naked fakir?
I go to the seaside, to be with people like me, without a tomorrow, glad to have a sunset that won't last, staring at the #horizon, then azure now concrete.
#vss365
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2017/04/incomplete-unedited-notes-colombo.html
"Swapna, there will be five men by you when you deliver your baby."
"..."
"An ex, a non-ex, the father, another and moi."
"Did you #hop on the bandwagon? Got one thing right. No hubby."
"When is the baby due?"
"18 years +- 4."
"That long?"
"We are only 14."
"Ah!"
#vss365
The Librarian remembered that VeeCee sat in a trance gazing at...
The #rain-soaked fertile fields; trees swaying; grey clouds, pregnant; a strange mist settling like a diaphanous veil over the face of those hills.
"Truly sublime," she said. "But then, it got weird."
#vss365
from my short story 'Because of the Rain':
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2012/06/because-of-rain.html
My pal and I were young
And the lady
in the black chiffon saree
saw us
'staring'
(what do you call
the 'stare' you give
a Rodin
or a Caravaggio,
is it #sightseeing?)
And smiled
(god!).
Now, we are old
And we might notice her husband
When we fall in love with her.
#vss365
Matrimonial ad:
'I'm living in a #suitcase.
Like-minded apply.'
Swiped right, with fervour.
'I'm dying in another's.'
Epitaph will say.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
There, in the doc's waiting room,
It's not the #journey that matters,
It's the destination, silly,
Could be the morgue or not,
There, with 36 who have lived,
Sex, job, wealth, family, all ticked,
They must have said ILU,
Whispered, muttered or cursed,
Doesn't matter.
#vss365
what do you symbolize,
my dear #lobster,
is it temptation
or too much luck,
(what's that now luck)
is it undying love
or mating for life
(o don't complain lust or love)
or should I recall
the mess we made at Juhu Mahesh Lunch Home
(I still loved you then you know)
#vss365
"Weather?"
"Humid."
"Food?"
"Burger."
"Love?"
"#Amber."
"Lust?"
"Green."
"Marriage?"
"Red."
"O Spirits!"
"Guru! What lies ahead for me?"
"Next summer,
At a traffic light,
Munching bad food,
Winking at women,
It will hit you."
"Truck?"
"Your wife's fist."
#vss365
"You love me," I said
"That's corny," she said.
"But, that’s what I feel. What’s the point in saying I love you if I don't feel you feel it?"
"Duh!"
"But not a #dud, right?"
She shrugged. Smiled. "You too love me."
"Yikes, that's definitely schmaltzy," I said.
#vss365
(Again! Sorry for using my old stuff for #vss365. Water woes yet again have short-circuited the few grey cells I have.)
From
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2014/05/seconds.html
"Let's go birdwatching," she said the morning after. The cold finger of dread traced a line from the hypothalamus to the gluteus maximus.
I avoid budding ornithologists. Serious when funny and vice versa, they show rigor mortis when the feathered lot shun #peeking toms.
#vss365
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2014/05/seconds.html
His hometown changed. The liberal and the conservatives teamed up. The left became an alternative right. People revived religious beliefs their forefathers had debunked. It was difficult to escape its #pervasive influence. That God got back its voice and ruled the stage.
#vss365
from my short story 'Gutter Talk':
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2013/10/gutter-talk.html
I've never been to a #swamp
Other than the one in my head,
Did nature or nurture cause that
Or is it another daydream,
I can ask the ghosts that rise
But they are not true or helpful,
Did love or failure cause that
Or is it a lush paradise,
To wallow or not to sink?
#vss365
I'm a type of Rip Van Winkle,
Awake but dumb for decades,
Talking to one I cared about,
This time no blunder of past,
No more of my life, or wisdom,
She has no use for such, at all,
I should listen, let her fall, or
Rise, for max #impact, or not,
Awake and not dumb.
#vss365
Weddings here are simple less-than-5-min affairs.
In between the start (couple enters) and the end (junta races to the dining hall), no one hears the priest chant (in the vernacular):
"You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave this curséd #portal."
#vss365
(with all due respect to Eagles and lovers of 'Hotel California')
Yesterday, the police questioned two migrant workers in connection with the Mritya murder case.
Today, the two were found dead in a pond.
According to post-mortem, they drowned in the pond.
Locals say that only the dead can #submerge themselves in the shallow pond.
#vss365
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2014/01/murder-scrapbook.html
According to 'The History of Homo Sapiens', the primal #puzzle is: why did they say 'I love you'?
It's believed a male first tried it to mask a shortcoming, say the quality of meat.
Or, was it a lady fond of cave painting who used it to postpone meals and baser needs?
#vss365
