Suburb

At night,

not the hissing of cicadas, No.

The leftover-nature, duly plotted,

hears the screeching of a worn out truck

dumping a load of frigid boulders.

In the morning,

not the gushing of a stream, No.

Trees that remain, wilted and soggy

hear at irregular intervals

loud retching of individuals in haste.

At noon,

not the raw aroma of vegetables. No.

The remnants, stones scattered, 

of an old disintegrated hand-dug well,

smell the stank of a concrete septic tank.

In the evening,

not the melody of birds, No.

The scrubby grass, its forlorn bugs,

gaze at the conceited fluorescent lamps

of a cctv-fixed iron gate.

People, nevertheless, 

seem happy,

which complicates the question further,

Is Earth a suburban hell as well?

Dream

Upon waking in the morning 

I settled in to write down my dream -

If only a fragment of it.

I, however, couldn't recall anything.

Afternoon approached 

but the dreamt didn't,

although the sumptuous lunch 

brought its mood back.

In the evening while reading 

a book, one secondary character 

in it dreamt about 

long lost-friends 

holidaying at the beach.

Mine wasn't about that.

I remember, at least,

what my dream wasn't.

Unhappily,

night arrived and with it came 

the thought of dreaming again.

A portion of the dream flashed 

in front of my eyes:

the part in which I'm 

trying to remember what the

dream was.

Sad, somewhat melancholic,

I stopped thinking about it.

Probably, the dream was a dream

about writing. Writing, anything, at all

and paying the dream forward 

to you.

Act II/Last scene

She assured

she'd love him

till the time 

he's frail and old enough 

not to remember 

simple ordinary words

like towel, toys, potato, poems.

Unusually however,

he retained 

all the mundane things

but somehow forgot the words

promise, vow, pledge.

Parting

A baby-word at most,

nothing else,

with its own set of reduplication,

a blabbering sound,

so that the word hangs 

fittingly on the blades of the tongue,

a repetition that evokes 

half yearly, twice, two parts

as if life provides freedom 

to do the same things again.

Still the word oscillates, we befriend it.

Yet when it is time to utter it,

the word suspends itself,

a baby-word it ceases to be.

The tongue entrusts it to the air

as if, conscious of its weight -

the eyes absorb the heat of the moment.

It overburdens us, not letting us be humans.

Bye-bye mother.

Bye-bye father.

Bye-bye friend.

Bye-bye lover.

Bye-bye brother.

Bye-bye sister.

An inane word for the adult world,

to make us feel nothing has changed,

or even if it has,

it will occur again, twice 

yearly.

Bye-bye year.

The class that isn't...

In life,

sometimes, like a 

bored, worn out student,

you raise your hand 

for attendance purposes only.

Otherwise,

familiar with the fact 

that the school is long over

and done with.

Your wife and children

gaze at you, first in amazement,

then take up their mental registers

and mark you present for the day.

Your wife smiles, the kids giggle.

You play along, take notes

and grin in return while 

tinkering with the broken toy.

The school maybe up,

the class isn't -

It never is.

Living on the edge

A mangy dog,

shivering and frail,

sitting in the pallid rays

of winter sun

is actually all of us -

thinking and wishing,

one home chore, another music track,

shopping, a cricket match,

one more reel, a movie, 

going to the supermarket,

applying nail polish,

buying updated gadgets

can cure us of our diseases:

hopeful the impending spring 

there would remain no wounds to lick.

Untitled

A random pebble 

considers itself 

a bit of every sole,

that grazes or tramples it,

even when the wearer disregards

the shoe to be part of the earth.

Intimacy is convoluted.

Knowledge (for Adam Zagajewski)

The poet writes,

while resting his cheek in his palm:

Knowledge grows slowly like a wisdom tooth.

and I can't help but

smile and smirk,

how slyly and obliquely 

he conceals certain things 

that accompany its nurture.

Knowledge grows slowly,

behind all the spectacle

of the incisors,

in agonizing pain,

like a wisdom tooth.

Steeling

Monsters, when granted voice 

within literature, speak just.

They turn out more humane 

than everyone else.

Monsters, when provided space 

within life, spout venom.

They turn out more spiteful

than already thought.

Herein, therefore, lies the difference.

Books showcase spine 

far stronger than humans,

put together.

Anting (is when birds use ants - by rubbing or allowing them to crawl on their feathers for self-maintenance)

Birds perform anting 

without any shame,

in the open.

In different forms,

the same 

relates to humans.

Literature is anting.

Love is anting.

Talking and listening, anting.

Reading, anting.

Like birds,

we wallow in there

to soar high, again.

The thing to remember, however,

is this: every body reeks of ache.

Apor Lal Chowk

A disenchanted Maratab Ali 

mourns lyrically for his beloved.

A teenage conductor swanks

his counterfeit jacket.

His yells pose a competition 

to the singer while 

guiding passengers to the bustling,

nevertheless seatie-khalie bus.

Meanwhile, woustie keeps 

a close eye in the side-mirror

on sadah trunamath inching closer.

The handwritten board at the front 

reeks of human agency.

Random couplets in graceful Urdu

adorn the side panels.

Just below, hastily, is written 

laddias seat with an arrow 

that hints at nowhere in particular.

Woustie's gunj baanie rests in between 

some grease-ridden cloth and castrol bottles.

My dull memory,

of the Tata bus,

of the Mazda bus,

grazes past 

the historicity 

of your Smart Bus.

This World

In a world

where cackling is

nation building,

where progression is 

an unending résumé,

where hollowed out 

mountain is development,

where truth-telling is

unequivocal cheating.

In such a world,

life is a hearse,

stuck in a traffic jam.

Waiting (dedicated to Doctor Uncle)

The earliest and the faintest memory

I have of you, is you listening intently 

and diagnosing your patients

in your meticulously set medicine shop,

while I'm waiting 

on a wooden plank by the counter.

You handed me a mint candy

and promised

that if I wait calmly,

you'd take me to your home, 

to which I smiled like a patient 

relieved from a latest asthma attack.

Decades later,

things have changed drastically.

The shop is no longer there -

neither are you.

However,

I'm still waiting on the wooden plank,

in the middle of what is now a road,

faking to unwrap the candy.

Starvation

The Manna Salwa

that was, yesterday,

drone-delivered 

reeked of mould.

We had to sift 

the breaking news

from the legumes.

On visiting the Leper Colony

In order to reach

that scintillating part

by the lakeside,

one needs to cross the leper colony.

Isn't this what Farrokhzad taught us?

A leper imagines 

God to be a leper as well.

How sublime!

Isn't this what religious scriptures teach us?

On our way a leper

raised his hand.

Was he greeting or 

exhibiting to us his ailment?

We could not make 

any sense of the gesture.

Thereafter,

capturing random photos around,

gossiping and fiddling

with our smartphones,

we left the spot

ready to brave the world once again:

we, the conscience lepers.

Walled Freedom

I would have loved you more

Eclipsed any romance in folklore.

But on a wall is freedom written.

I would have happily grabbed a placard

And swaggered it through a protest hard.

But on a wall is freedom written.

I would have blabbered about progress 

Meticulously drafted a beautiful mess.

But on a wall is freedom written.

I would have advocated a pogrom

While greeting everyone with a Salam.

But on a wall is freedom written.

I would have shed the thorns of hate

Transformed my careless sorry state

But on a wall is freedom written.

I would have surrendered thirst for blood

Yielded the exacting power of thud.

But on a wall is freedom written.

I would have…

Alas! on a wall is freedom written.

Pondicherry Beaches

The ocean waves,

like a skilled fishmonger,

whet the stones feverishly 

boning winds into 

air pockets

for tranquil breathings.

Amidst all this,

a flood of scorched tourists

continue clicking 

the ocean in its workplace.

Bad Weather

At some point,

on a random tuesday 

in the history of climatology, 

we, self-centered ecologies - humans,

termed rain bad weather.

Now and then,

the villian splashes 

our civilized souls.

Things I Iearnt in Vacation

That 10 O'Clock can incontestably 

be rounded off to 10:30.

That conversations feel different 

when not performed in chairs.

That if one looks long enough 

faces do reveal truth and not more faces.

That 11:00 am clocks off 

at home as well, and exquisitely so.

That sharing ideas and thoughts

can be remembered without writing minutes.

That inviting guests doesn't necessarily 

culminate in photo sessions.

That respecting elders feels better

than treating them as seniors.

Principally, however,

I learnt 

that official orders,

and not poems,

usually begin with that.

Wisdom

My barber casually remarks,

"Only that person, for me,

is a customer who 

is sitting in the chair,

the one I'm working on.

Rest of them -

waiting, chatting, smoking,

cannot be called anything.

They can sit or 

may leave any time

depending on their whims."

I lament,

how truthfully,

how closely 

he recognises Life.