I should stop
The #blatant infidelity
When I look for her in you.
If you have been
To the island of no return,
You will understand.
There the sun hangs
In limbo, there's neither
Sunset nor sunrise,
One prays to nothing,
The god of the lost,
A scary demon for most.
#vss365
"Swaps, I've committed seppuku on social media."
"How?"
"Admitted I hate cats and dogs."
"Lemme be the kaishakunin."
"How?"
"Will say #beastly you hate kids too."
"Ironic."
"How?"
"They hate the kid in me."
"Hate's creator thou art, to hate's victim turnest."
#vss365
For once, I could be faithful.
Not that you have complained.
I didn’t carry the past and
I didn’t pack for the future.
We laughed at our fantasies and
We promised not to write a poem.
For a little while, I was not #beastly.
Not that I heard your complaint.
#vss365
According to the stars,
I'm the #mountainous sort,
But you knew what I am,
#Enchanted by the beckoning sea.
Did I know what you were,
When we shared that dream
Of spending a night high above
The clouds hiding the azure?
You stayed back
And I delay the last swim.
#vss365
"Swaps, firstly, it's lovely to be one of your 4 this #ValentinesDay."
"Secondly?"
"We 4 are not sure of our role."
"Ah!"
"Platonic overcelebration? Situationship à la mode with no #kiss rule?"
"Lady with 4 lovers. 1 guy dies. She can't be the killer, no?"
"Oh!"
#vss365
Where are the lovers?
In cynicism's blind spot?
Erased by #dark mood?
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
On a Friday in early spring, I held Swapna’s hand for the first time.
We were on the S-Bahn from Potsdam to Berlin. I spotted a vacant seat. I took her hand. I did not let go even after we were seated.
That first #touch took six months.
#vss365
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2013/12/touch.html
We don't leave footprints, do we, my love?
I try to lose mine in the deep.
But, you know there's not a decent #bone in me.
I pray for another chance.
Not with you. Even when I hold you.
But, they laugh at our clown act.
They should throw coins where we try to meet.
#vss365
My village is a tourist hotspot.
Rajendran's Puttu Kada now serves: 'steamed rice and coconut sandwich cake, oeuf dur avec sel et poivre'.
The temple pond is a hotel's swimming pool called 'Happy Hour 24x7'. Nice ones come out #pale around the gills, the others vanish.
#vss365
I know that I should think
Of the #blood spilled
Of the #wounds inflicted
Of the pain and the agony
But I have got to stay sane
To ignore all that
And remember love
And feel you with me
And share the beautiful
Before I think of all that I do not wish to know.
#vss365
Why did I leave her?
Cold black instead of #lambent,
Her eyes said get lost.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
The dead don't disturb
Unlike the creepy greedy
#Ghosts of the living.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
"Why are you wearing a black ribbon, Arjun?"
"My pet cockroach was murdered."
"Pet what?"
"Ma'am, after reading 'Metamorphoses', I had a dream in which Swapna turned into that."
"Swapna, are you wearing one to share his #pain?"
"No, Ma'am. I killed the wrong one."
#vss365
I was sixteen when it was discovered.
It seems we have been born straight from some historical age into the current times.
That life of some yesterday, after death, decided to park its #soul or DNA or whatever, here, in us.
#vss365
from my old note:
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2014/01/afterlife.html
Thoughts merely placed-
in parenthesis-
which is within or without
which is in light or in #shadow
which is to barricade or to escape-
is a matter of mirth.
Waking to the alarum of resolution-
a clarion call or a swan song-
love or skeptic, live or die?
#vss365
from
https://discardedthoughts-swapna.blogspot.com/2009/05/in-flight-1993.html
Scream, shall I? Mourn, maybe.
O poets, I can love. And, fight wars.
Brood about a world going waste.
But, they will say it’s an old story.
Tough they are with no hope.
With wise words to #soothe or sting.
Then, is there reason to write?
I am tired. Tired being tired.
#vss365
from
https://discardedthoughts-swapna.blogspot.com/2009/10/tired.html
"What do you do, my love?"
"I'm a taxidermist."
"Really? I thought interest in that was on the #wane."
"It's for myself."
"Ah! Any particular animal?"
"Human beings. After a date. Like this. They look rather good on bed, you know."
"Oh!"
#vss365
I looked at the Indian flag
As I would at any deity,
And there was the usual prayer,
"Take care of ALL of us."
Celebrated this Republic Day with one hope:
"I hope every Indian can afford at least one balanced meal every day."
(Balanced not only in terms of nutrition but in terms of participation too.)
My one meal today:
Rice
Chicken onion fry
Beetroot thoran
Avial
Theeyal with cashew nuts and a lauki-type vegetable
Aloo jeera Kerala style
(papad, curd, butter milk, pickle too)
I cooked only two of those items (chicken and potato).
Long long ago, at the #cusp of puberty and senility, a reliable oracle informed me that the tenth woman in my life would be THE woman.
#vss365
from an old autobiographical note that could be fiction:
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2011/03/tenth-woman.html
Life of a #vss365 wannabe writer:
08:00-11:00: With mother in a hospital. Ok? Maybe.
12:00-a few minutes back: With repair guy of washing machine. Ok? Maybe.
Now: #haiku or #senryu ? Ok? Never. 🙃🥲
It was #drizzling then.
Our umbrella not unfurled.
Were fingers entwined?
Do I avoid sleep
To escape this #unmoored life?
If I'm well rested
Will I not scream with anger?
Is there a metaphor
To explain this succinctly?
A leaf hiding the sun
To delay the inevitable. Maybe.
#vss365
A mature interacting group behaves like an elastic system. #Bend it a little and it will spring back. #Bend it too vigorously, you will cross a threshold, defects will stream in to stay forever. We are always in that new plastic state with immature inelastic ideas.
#vss365
from my outdated note about this place:
https://newnonentities.blogspot.com/2010/10/itihasa-of-integral-part.html
The day we lost our sense of humour,
Tried to tickle with all that used to keep us doubled over-
Politicians, influencers and followers,
Those who keep gloom and doom #loom over us-
That's a lost cause with the mojo of ghosts
Staring at their worse half 6 feet under.
#vss365
"I had a dream. I was a samurai, merrily beheading and chopping my way to my love. Finally, with her, she serves me tea."
"And, it was laced with cyanide."
"How did you guess?"
"It's you, no?"
"A love in deed, #veer indeed."
"Have your tea."
"You didn't, did you?"
#vss365
The soft #murmur said I love writing,
The shout along said I'm bad at it,
I share that with those called lovers
Not sure what I'm trying there,
Don't think they didn't laugh
Those called lovers can be mean,
Why do I confess all this
Don't think it's to call you lover.
#vss365
Should I be jealous
Of #dappled light they describe?
Without you, who cares.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
The anger, the betrayal, the needless,
The hopelessness #sear the soul,
Go on think I'm being melodramatic
With the outrage, the self-pity,
I'm the murdered one after all
And no one cares who did me in,
But then that could only mean
There's not one who is not guilty.
#vss365
"I signed your name instead of mine,
I wake up holding you even when you're gone,
I can handle any pain with you by me,
I..."
"Whazzat?"
"Love pome, Swaps."
"Ah!"
"Go on."
"One, too many I's."
"Don't get #wonky about it. I'm the one in love."
"That's the problem."
#vss365
Kids aren't what we used to be.
They don't write poetry no more.
We bawled and raged
About love lost.
That took 13 lines of doggerel.
Now, they rage and kill.
We bawled and raged
About a world gone too.
That took 31 #slapdash lines.
They don't waste time on that.
#vss365
The #vss365 serial-killer has struck again.
A #haiku (or #senryu ?) explained the how & the where.
Frozen memory-
Death in Tiger Balm Gardens.
Cooked in boiling oil.
Signed with prompt for the who & the why:
#Kooky artist.
Eschews the same old tropes.
Here to kill a yawn.
Cliff-hangers, twists and
#Unmissable denouement.
Rare in true love/crime.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
#Adorned with nothing
Other than her wit and grace.
He's punch-drunk, knocked out.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
Like the VHS tape in the 'Ring',
It's the #spooky telephone in mine.
On college campus,
Got access to it
In the third year,
Yes, long long ago,
It was the last year of my first love,
Oh no, she's still there
With another,
I was the goner
With calls too dear.
#vss365
1/3
A few years later,
In another Institute,
Still long long ago,
There was a phone
Far from my hostel room,
A girl claiming to be my wife
Called every night,
On that, I got her last call,
Not that wife who #spooked,
My last love, my only love.
#vss365
2/3
It's mobiles now,
I use it only for the macabre,
No, no more love,
That horror genre's not for me,
But the #spook rises
To claim every now and then,
Seasons come and go,
Echoes of the last brief call,
Sweet perennial thorn.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
3/3
“Swaps, I’ve understood all about love & poetry.”
“Pray, don’t tell.”
“What would we do without that? Talk politics, religion, injustice…? Brrr”
“Spook, if I tell you
I love you, will you shut up
And leave me un-#spooked?
“See, you get my point.”
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
“Class, has AI produced any lifestyle changes in your life? Arjun?”
“I’ve stopped looking at people. Everyone seems to be AI-generated.”
“Fair enough. Swapna?”
“Ma’am, I’m still waiting for an #oddball AI system.”
“Like me?”
“Yes, Arjun, it can’t match your idiocy.”
#vss365
If I had to explain love to my kid,
Will I talk about the love of my life,
Will I have to explain how it left me dead,
Will I talk about how it might not be love,
Will my #clueless state affect the mother,
If I had to explain all about the other?
#vss365
Don't say, "#Balderdash!"
Ask, "Have you said anything
That's not trivial?"
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ? (Brrr no!)
from
"Questions to ask in Scientific Seminars 😇🙃" (1674) 13th ed., vol. 13, page 13.
I refuse to rename yesterday
To squeal with #delight today
But I can do that to tomorrow
Not to scream with fear the day after.
#vss365
I'm not the setting or rising One,
Not trying to be the loony romantic either,
I'm at the saddle point of Time,
Where the arrow turns hysterically confused,
No #travel, no rest, no circumcatalysts,
I'm free of resolutions and hope, cursèd, in limbo.
#vss365
The gathering was informed that the #sole beneficiary of Mutheychan’s wealth is Revathy.
Someone wailed, "Ayyo, Ammava…what will I do without…?"
Revathy stared at the disappearing back of her husband with cold determined eyes.
#vss365
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2011/08/very-dull-dreary-affairnearly.html
When God read the book,
"Men/women from #Mars/Venus???
Goddamn! Who's from Earth?"
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
#vss365
“You shouldn’t have booed. It’s a seminar.”
“It’s crap.”
“Is that based on your wishful estimate of self-worth?”
“Safe-haven today, sub-prime tomorrow. What a fart of hot #air! That too about gold. Sacrilege!”
“The speaker says the inflated price is because everyone’s buying. What’s the price when big countries sell their reserves? Who will buy? The next big short? Worth a thought, I think.”
#vss365
Every #struggle and every change has its roots in some juvenile but logical thought which gained respectability only much later, sometimes never.
What is the Juvenile Manifesto of the youth of today?
I am too old to be young but I am young enough to be juvenile.
Even if it is a fool who starts a discussion, the discussion need not be foolish. So, let me voice some of my juvenile thoughts while I wait for the young to rise.
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2013/02/the-juvenile-manifesto.html
“I need to ask you something and you have to promise that you will tell me the truth," she said, 30 years back.
“#Shoot.”
“I know what you have been up to.”
“Is that the question?”
“Are you in love with me?” she asked.
“No,” I lied.
Truth is over-rated.
#vss365
from
https://newnonentities.blogspot.com/2020/02/virgin-territory.html
"2 years back, a couple had a problem here."
"What happened?"
"Charged with obscenity in the open."
"Who caught them here?"
"Jealous fools."
"Ah."
"Do you want to get caught, Mrs.?"
"Ready if you are, Mr."
They stripped, #jump-ed in and swam in the cold, clear water.
#vss365
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2012/06/footsteps-in-dark.html
Astrologer says:
"You suffer the rare lifelong Kantaka Shani when #Saturn transits the 4th/7th/10th house from your birth Moon sign."
Translation for layperson:
"All your life, you will be like the one-handed man hanging from a cliff wanting to scratch his balls."
#vss365
(Apologies to my dear #vss365 friends for my absence. If I wait for a sick society to give a regular supply of water, I will never write. I thank you for your support, best wishes and kind words. Truly mean it.)
Fourth day without water supply.
Unable to participate in #vss365 due to the mental and physical turmoil.
Sorry.
1/3
#Kerala might be #GodsOwnCountry.
But, the gods here aren't bothered about #CasteDiscrimination.
The gods here won't give the basic human right- #Water - to all!
2/3
If one doesn't belong to the majority in an area, one ceases to exist.
#Vanchiyoor in #Trivandrum is hell for this backward caste family.
3/3
Dr.: Do you #regret it's over?
Me: Doc, it was over before I married.
Dr.: It's natural for your wife to feel a bit jittery, no?
Me: For her, not even a memory should exist.
Dr.: It won’t hurt anyone, will it...if you erase that part?
Me: You sound like her, doc.
#vss365
from
https://newnonentities.blogspot.com/2010/09/other.html
After 20 years, she got this letter:
"My dear daughter, I have been to a doctor. It seems I am losing my #memory. I would like to meet you. Could you please come to this address? Your loving Appa."
#vss365
from my 2-part short story 'This Year's Trip':
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2018/12/this-years-trip-part-1.html
Tried a #boho life.
Love, needs and desires changed that.
The end: a bozo.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
Today evening, I was with a group of old schoolmates.
Escaped, after 30 minutes, from the #monotonous talk of company that's better off without me.
The silence of loneliness is not better but I am fine with the company of ghosts that say dead-n-dead-n...
#truestory
#vss365
Way back in Jan 2026, we had the #apogee of existential angst of teenagers.
Banned from social media, they roamed like zombies.
That coincided with the start of the In-flu serial killer pandemic.
Someone or something killed influencers. Even those with 100 followers.
#vss365
How many times have I killed myself?
Not to be a memory lost,
Not to have a #successor,
Not to fear loss,
Not to feel love,
Not even a question.
It's lonely in one's grave,
With the company
Of all those me's,
Including the one who knew you
When time meant something.
#vss365
"In my dreams, I see her with me."
"Who?"
"My first love. My only love."
"Weren't you two kids then?"
"So?"
"Do you see her as a kid in your dreams?"
"Of course."
"In your dreams, are you the kid you were or the dirty old man you are?"
"Dreams can't be #illicit."
#vss365
Love letters without that word,
Forbidden affair that was open,
A climax before the play began,
A postprandial fantasy
We thought we would share
With kids and grandkids,
But that was before the whisper
Of tender care became the #augury
Of a night that is endless.
#vss365
You look #chic, she said,
What do you want, chick, I growled.
Her left hook said rest.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu (definitely not!)
At a reunion/On social media.
They are #suave and accomplished.
Status anxiety.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
I do not know what the ending will be. Maybe, she has married once again; maybe, I will propose a long time too late.
It is not the ending that #matters.
I will read this to her.
The #last time I wrote about love, she laughed at me.
#vss365
from my story:
https://newnonentities.blogspot.com/2010/07/last-time-i-wrote-about-love.html
"I would have taken my life then. You saved me. I will never forget what you did."
"You are blowing it out of proportion."
Talk about death or love or other personal #matters bores me.
#vss365
from my story:
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2012/01/tasks-at-end.html
A politically correct creative artist is also known as an untrustworthy nincompoop.
#justsaying
Thought it's an old joke.
Told god our #specific plans.
Laugh-like lightning struck.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
Every day I try to write a love poem,
Not that I know anything about that,
That should be the easiest,
Not that disaster's tougher,
One's my shadow I'm the other's,
Not that it's in my #action list,
One day I'll write about you,
Not that I won't delete before the end.
#vss365
I took her hand. I opened my fingers, giving her the #option to remove her hand but she kept her palm on mine. I closed my fingers. Gently squeezed her hand. There was a pause before she returned the same. I noted the hesitation. We sat, like kids, happy holding hands.
#vss365
from my story:
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2013/12/touch.html
“Romance wouldn’t have touched you with a 20-foot pole!”
“I was that bad, huh?”
“Bad would be an understatement. Only later, much later, did I wonder if that had been your #goal all along.”
“To keep romance away?”
“Yes.”
#vss365
from my story:
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2016/07/the-liars.html
She hates my tales. But,
Has no #issue with the act.
Sweet love makes me write.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
"I need free #transport
From this world to hers," I said.
"Sans soul then?" god said.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
Curse the day I got to know that I am a reborn #myth-ological figure.
The tragedy I can handle. Always have. Even without the comfort of it being an old tale.
It's the censorship that's galling. They want my story to suit their rules.
#vss365
It's the worst season here. The election season.
That's when we realize how pathetic we are.
A true #measure of a democracy is a government of the people, by the people, for the people IF AND ONLY IF we the people make sure the present incumbent will lose.
I used to be proud of my state for sticking to that fundamental principle. No more.
There's another reason to be depressed.
Here, religion and caste still decide the candidates. Left, right or center, that has not changed.
And, as if that's not enough, they have removed my favourite choice in recent times: NOTA (none of the above).
#vss365
My #literature.
"Lovely pulp fiction," she said.
Heartbreak through ego.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
I can forget a #language just as easily as I can pick up one. A part of my brain seems to be reserved for this.
When I realized that, I had to acknowledge the fact that language, and therefore speech, could be irrelevant.
#vss365
from
https://newnonentities.blogspot.com/2010/07/speechless.html
To know the true worth of your writing, have an alt account with no link between the two accounts.
What's in a name? Lots.
Love's naught without #history,
That too, the wrong one.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
I saw my first love. In a dream.
On a street, we said Hi and Bye.
Long letters of the past
Reduced to that not ash.
#Geography of the heart is over.
Next class is about history erased.
#vss365
#Education, that 4-syllable word,
Is it useless?
In college, the country's crème de la crème
Asked me if I belong to the lowest caste.
Lowest of the lowest, I said with pride.
Reservation, they probed. No, top rank, I said.
They had never been to an institution
With my lot, I learned. They will never
Understand how reservation might create
A level-playing field for all. Fair, no?
Sadly, #education isn't enough
To make idiots less idiotic.
#vss365
Around dawn, the doctors met Preethi and Sreekumar again.
"Arjun is conscious. One person can enter ICU. Give him strength before the surgery," they advised.
“Get Devika here,” Preethi said.
“My wife? For what?” Sreekumar said.
“Bells toll on the #domestic front.”
#vss365
from
https://newnonentities.blogspot.com/2020/07/the-rivals.html
He is not a faultless #creature. He is always searching for a nonexistent state of Utopia. He narrates the night’s nightmare hoping its horror would fade away. He is always teaching the little he gets to know and he seems to be preaching!
#vss365
from
https://newnonentities.blogspot.com/2010/06/on-writing.html
A many-splendoured
#Business. That's what love is.
Fiction that's real.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
When time stopped #creeping,
We said bye, stopped ignoring
When we thought we could.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
"Ahoy Archimedes!"
"I didn’t shout Eureka."
"You are outside wet & nude."
"There’s a kitten in my house."
"Aren’t you expecting Whatshername?"
"She brought the kitten."
"Pussy galore."
"#Creep!"
"What caused this zoophobia?"
"Premature unrequited love affairs."
#vss365
Remain we will on slopes fragile, to skid
When rains will bring old plans disposed, #terror,
A day splendid to find a new god dead,
Buried alive in grave unmarked, my kid.
#vss365
from
https://newnonentities.blogspot.com/2021/10/buried-alive.html
We could have loved each other
But there's no point raking up the past
With thoughts of ifs buts and rather than
Sober on a day overcast.
When love and desire play hookey
& there's bitter cold calculation
In Loss 101 for a rookie,
It's cursèd #Martian education.
#vss365
On that day, I stood on this balcony with romantic daydreams of being a hero with the simple dilemma, and #energy, to live or to die for love.
The lady on the balcony next to ours climbed onto the railing and stretched out her right leg.
#vss365
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2012/01/alone-at-meeting-place.html
"I want tea."
"No tea for you."
"Don't be a bore."
"I hate it when you pour tea from the cup onto the #saucer and then slurp it."
"Give it to me in a glass then."
"Sacrilege."
"You won't?"
"No.
"No steak for you."
"Don't be mean."
"And no..."
"Don't you dare."
#vss365
So much to worry about,
Illness, apocalypse, etc.
But,
Today,
#HappyDiwali to all,
I think about that day,
You left,
28 years back,
But,
There's more,
Love, etc.
We didn't have much time,
But,
It lasts,
Forever,
No worry,
Ok, an #atom bomb, maybe,
Can beat that.
#vss365
I avoid the scatological.
From the poop stained great statues
To the filth that’s spread in god’s name.
I avoid love and poetry too.
From the aphrodisiac to the bitter end
From the sublime to the crass.
I avoid you.
From me
To you.
#SundayMusings
#HappyDiwali
At Breakups Anonymous:
"Couldn't write. Thought my stories are about them."
"She thought I was trying to kill her. Wouldn't believe I go for those with no reason to kill."
"An #android needs 1 Exabyte of memory per month @ 1 kg of gold. Should try cheap human beings."
#vss365
"Tell me what comes to mind."
"Ok."
"Love."
"Loss."
"#Arid."
"Loss."
"Money."
"Loss."
"Sex."
"Huh?"
"Friends."
"Duh."
"Religion."
"Loss."
"God."
"Huh?"
"Food."
"Where?"
"Dystopia."
"In-laws."
"Politics."
"Outlaws."
"Poetry."
"Huh?"
"Joke."
"Me."
#vss365
I was 14. Travelling alone to Singapore.
In Madras, went for the 'Poltergeist'.
Guy with 2 dolls sat in front. 3 heads faced me.
"I'm levitating," the lady with bhang thandai said.
"I love you," from the other side. To me. Her bf smiled.
Anything #unearthly? Nah.
#vss365
Autocorrect sucks.
"Need a #deluxe bride?" she asks.
Didn't I type let's ride?
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
I miss good ol' love.
Separate bath-bed-rooms with
Deviant #undertone.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
A weird dream (again).
To prove my love to you (both),
Swim with #piranha.
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
"I'm getting married."
"You can't be a #libertine."
"Time we changed our ways."
#vss365
#haiku #senryu ?
