He was a young boy then. A respectable-looking middle-aged man was peeing behind a tree.
Was it that tree, like that man’s hand reaching for him? Or that, with shadow spreading, dragging him into those depths away from innocence, the #thunderous pounding dying within?
#vss365
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2011/04/story-tellers-sabbatical.html
She's everywhere. Her eyes follow me, with love that #eclipse accusation, why. She sings a song. I don't remember the words. It's not exactly this, it's better...
If we had...
one more day,
If we had...
oh god what,
Would we have
Remained
Together
Forever...?
#vss365
I #pray well now, when I try to create,
‘Can I use you?’ supplicate at love’s grave,
‘In a dubbed flick of old couples, Him and us -
Face turned away, blank smiles, lying, near?
Let me empty albums full of yellowed past,
Fake diaries too. I hear well now, your silence.’
#vss365
Trees have stories. Long ago, two lovers dreamt of making love beneath this tree. The clouds and the heavens beneath them. Lies from lips that kissed deeply. Their love was in such #cypher. With the little time they had, they could not have done a better job with truth.
#vss365
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2011/04/story-tellers-sabbatical.html
Alex left no suicide note, just a novella for me. It has no plot, only the minutiae of moments with a love 'Deeps'.
With Veena, I reproduced whole scenes from it. The perfect #undercover lover I was.
When I married Divya, I avoided the book. Her nickname is 'Deeps'.
#vss365
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2017/12/she-went.html
When I could not handle the Kafkaesque,
I engaged in Mittyesque daydreams.
That is in the past,
In deep-#freeze.
No more of the Mittyesque!
Till life grinds to a halt,
Today, tomorrow, who-cares-when,
Without a hope of a hope.
Don't tell me that that is Kafkaesque.
#vss365
"Did you know #Utopia is different for poets and storytellers? You poets need a few flowers, lover D-or-A, the mood to brood. Don't scowl. We need more, especially a lover alive to kill. Flower for me? Lovely! Is that a lemon-squeezer in your hand? No, not my ba...owww!"
#vss365
I wish I was young again, to be
A hypocrite with great one-liners.
I still try that stunt, and collapse like #dominoes
When they retort, "Is that how you lived?"
I won't tell you the good I thought or did,
I will have to tell you how really stupid I lived.
#vss365
from
https://newnonentities.blogspot.com/2021/06/is-that-how-you-lived.html
By my grave they stood,
How they did brood;
She who I loved yet declared not,
A tear! I know not her thought;
Lads! How well you look,
Do you count the time I took;
#Move on, wash not the broken clay,
You who stood by my grave. Or did they?
#vss365
from
https://discardedthoughts-swapna.blogspot.com/2010/01/his-epitaph-1992.html
'Ennu njan naaley nee' (Today me tomorrow you).
That heavy duty sign at the gate welcomed all within.
I was not in the best state:
strapped to a stretcher,
covered like a mummy,
stinking of incense and flowers,
waiting for my turn
at the gas crematorium.
Forgotten.
Already.
(They might remember
to place me in the oven.)
I spotted a pretty lady.
I winked. Auld lang syne.
She gave me a cold stare.
(Cast away wokeish propriety and protests,
Send me away with the right spirit, will you?)
I remember our honeymoon.
A strange incident happened.
We were making love.
"Look at the mirror on the ceiling," she said.
It took a while to figure out the reflection.
#Maniac, it said.
That's when we knew we were made for each other.
#vss365
My love was brain dead. I was in the ICU to say ‘Bye’. And ‘I love you’.
A lady stood at the next bed. Her love was paralyzed, except for his eyes. They made love with their eyes.
I met her later in the hospital prayer hall.
Two #maniacs praying for the afterlife.
#vss365
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2015/06/fading.html
"Is a nightmare in which you have a nightmare a dream?"
"Huh?"
"A girl with my dream girl's name called and said I love you."
"Is that a nightmare?"
"A dream girl should remain a dream."
"Bah!"
"When I called back, a kid picked up. The kid called me Papa."
"Be #brave..."
#vss365
It was my childhood dream
To shift from the concrete jungle
To my lovely #country manor.
Life is lovey here.
Half are crazy,
The rest kill.
When my kid took me
To the river to bid adieu,
Statistics survived.
#vss365
1.
I felt like an old poacher,
without a gun, on unfamiliar territory.
It used to be a hunting ground,
when it was a hideaway,
before it became a copycat coffee-shop,
before there were too many friends,
virtual and real,
when communication needed thought.
Casual encounters must have been rare even then.
At best, a look or two, a rare smile.
Now, that is not even a dream,
the weight of experience
is a drag on such quick wit.
2.
I saw a best friend of old;
she looked through me;
that was not unexpected.
Most people there seem busy,
that’s not new;
it’s always been a crime,
a shame, to have time.
If we had talked,
we would have promised to meet again,
not really a false promise,
with too little hope.
If we met again,
we would have wondered
when we became strangers.
Or not wondered at all.
3.
I smiled, inwardly, at two couples.
There was always a Che Guevara and a Joan Baez,
in t-shirts and old jeans, with wild hair and borrowed air.
In a few years, they would become the other,
dressed in formals, talking softly
between clicks on their laptop or smartphone.
Some will be sad, disillusioned and lost by then;
most will have dreams, opportunities,
expensive lingerie
and a vacation at the Majora in the Maldives.
The bakery always had a privileged touch,
even when the puffs were five rupees
and two could share
couple of parotta and beef curry for twenty.
There is too much body-spray now,
yet the body stinks,
too little cigarette smoke,
not enough soda.
How do they rebel now–
by going organic,
by exchanging a few characters as protest,
wanting to be a billionaire by twenty five?
Don’t get me wrong.
I would not have noted all this
if I had not met her.
4.
She was two years my senior in school.
We acted in a drama once.
She was my mother,
I the black sheep of the family.
She slapped me, hard,
the audience went quiet,
it was that real,
she got the best actor award
and I nearly cried.
Was that before or after
that day I jumped out of a bus,
ran to her and offered
to carry two heavy bags of shopping?
She had let me. That was fine then.
We walked side by side, hardly talked.
I deposited the shopped bags,
she invited me inside,
her parents and sister stood by her.
I said, next time. She said, thank you.
5.
We noticed each other
at the same instant.
She said my name,
without hesitation.
I smiled,
raised my hand to my cheek.
She laughed.
She collected her coffee,
I a chocolate pastry.
I took her to my old spot.
We hardly talked.
She sipped her coffee.
I took a bite of my pastry.
I looked at her.
How did I offer the pastry–
a gesture with my eyes?
Did we think about the baggage we carried,
or about the weight of indiscretion?
Did I make a move to get her another spoon,
or did I not?
She took the plastic spoon from my hand
and had a small portion.
I watched her lips and tongue
take in the rich chocolate,
the spoon in her mouth,
the delicate suck on that.
Back to me,
then to her,
we made the pastry last
a dozen or more small turns.
Someone there must have noted
our few-moments-stand.
They might say we thanked each other at the end.
She did not. I did not. I did.
The message in parenthesis,
the present isn’t bad at all,
or the future,
with hope in such a past.
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2017/06/the-bakery.html
When I see the most beautiful hideouts,
the most romantic places where I could be with you,
high in the mountains with clouds beneath us
or in a cosy cottage in the middle of a lagoon,
I hear the old college-hostel battle-cry,
"Where the fcuk are the bogs?"
As a lover, a partner in strange beds, homes
with half-lies, faked orgasms, true charades,
The barter for old times’ sake, to be safe, #secure, I gave,
they looked at me with pleasure, that as love, I took.
#vss365
from
https://gatheredthoughts-swapna.blogspot.com/2011/02/best-thing.html
"How did your love end, A?"
"Oh, S! It was a tragicomedy of errors."
"With you, the error part is a given. Tell me about the tragicomic part."
"Used hombre instead of #ombré in a message."
"What did you write?"
"Your new hombre style made me realize why I love you."
#vss365
I hate war movies.
We don't shed a #tear
When foot soldiers die like fire-flies.
We don't get irritated
When the officers last till the end
And the political leaders
(Don't die don't die don't die)
Write a memoir about a war
They led from the front.
I hate war movies.
#vss365
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2017/08/war-movies.html
When she removed her mask,
Did she know about the curse?
The old warrior has to #retreat
From the shadows into the darkness.
He smiles wistfully at the old him,
The rebel fighting lost battles.
The curse won't allow that fight,
As he sinks into the amnesiac void.
#vss365
They say my father is an Iban (a #native tribe of Borneo, erstwhile head-hunters). I smell like them, family jokes. Is it the smell of longhouse, cockfights, spilled blood, tuak (rice liquor), the earthy scent of their women? They don't say that when I polish my parang.
#vss365
from
https://justoneavatar.blogspot.com/2015/06/family-joke.html
There should be a #limit
To one's bad luck.
Why am I between
The devil and the deep sea?
Literally,
Figuratively!
In a ménage à trois
with a Martian and a lover;
One knows not how to #invade,
The other knows not why.
Such punishing philosophy
And psychology!
#vss365
The narcissistic Net!
It's the biggest revolution
after the all-purpose nightdress;
cure for mid-life crisis,
release of angst;
to forget snail mail to agony aunts,
to cook up news;
and, of course,
to contact old best-forgotten pals,
compare visiting cards.
#vss365
from
https://discardedthoughts-swapna.blogspot.com/2009/12/fare-thee-well-or-after-reading-larkin.html
On the beach, the day before the rains... --- --- --- 'Monsoon will be here tomorrow,' the Met Dept. said. It's late. Maybe the early May showers left it spent. The schoolkids' new books and shoes should be drying Under the fan on the dining table. Those are still dry.
Strange dark clouds are gathering in the east (why east?), Too weak to be the real mob. Above, a half-moon teased. To the west, bright blue sky and the evening sun beckoned. I knew I had to be on the beach, the day before the rains.
There, I should have prayed to the evening sun. But a lovely young one, A twenty something I should not look at, stood between Sad hopeless me and the sun. I could look at her mother But she looked like me, company fit for the lovely one's father.
Kundra took me everywhere.
We explored the hills, prayed at the crack/abode of the sacred king cobra that leaves a golden #trail.
He took me to the three rivers’ junction. I met her there.
"Are you here alone?" she asked.
"What are you smiling at?" Kundra asked.
#vss365
from
https://newnonentities.blogspot.com/2010/08/stochastic-resonance.html
I chose to dwell on lighter stuff.
To the ones who would die in the days to come
I turned my back to protect my life's love.
His girl was religion and #nation, mine too.
So dangerous it has turned out to be,
With no guts to face our femme fatale.
#vss365
from
Swapna met her love on V-Day at Pappu's on Campus.
Manoj hugged her. Handsome, well-read, passionate.
Raju sat opposite. He shook like a dysfunctional wet grinder when he ate/laughed.
Shekhar leaned against a #pillar. He gave her a bored one-raised-eyebrow look.
Me?
#vss365
from
https://gatheredthoughts-swapna.blogspot.com/2011/02/my-funny-valentine.html
Relocated,
after the second nuke,
to the dark side of the moon,
We still fight:
Those who knew what an #aspen was
Versus teak-lovers,
Every growth mere memory now;
Them who want one suit for all
Versus those in their god's colour
For us the blind to see;
etc. etc.
#vss365
