I trudge through the sands,
the sun beating down mercilessly
on my head as if in punishment.
I wipe the sweat from my brow
and shade my eyes as I look ahead.
An ocean of golden sand
with unrelenting dune waves
stretches to the sweltering horizon.
A palm tree stands still and tall
far off to my left.
I turn towards this promise :
of a shade, of a succour, of an oasis.
Hope spurs me on,
dredges up the vestiges of strength
and makes my feet move.
The heat rises up from the earth,
burning my feet through the shoes.
The wind teases and torments me,
playing dead and then awakening again,
blistering my face and broken lips.
I hold on to my sanity
and stare at the scene ahead.
Through the haze, there appears
behind the palm tree far away -
A palace of splendour and majesty.
I tremble and cry dry tears,
too tired for this land's tricks.
Tired of body and tired in spirit,
I hold my head and scream.
I open my eyes and the mirage vanishes.
An eternity passes, or a moment,
and I find myself at the tree.
I dig with feverish need,
and through the wet sand
bubbles up a trickle of water.
I scoop it up and take a drink.
There is not enough to slake my thirst,
Not enough to quench my pain,
Not enough to douse my madness,
but enough to preserve my tether to life.
Leaning against the tree, I fall asleep
and dream of friends, guides and birds
under the watch of that cruel flame.
Not caring when or if I will wake,
I sleep and dream in a dream.
I wake up shivering in the night,
the wind caressing me in apology.
It kisses me tenderly on my parched lips,
and brings a sweet scent with it,
as if to reconcile me to itself.
The sun has broken into a billion pieces
and is strewn across the sky.
His fury has dimmed now.
And as I lift my fevered gaze at him,
he winks at me like a rogue.
But they are mischievous cronies,
the sun and the wind; and
winking and caressing, they mock me,
and conjure up a new magic
on that moonless, desolate night.
The wind dances and the stars glimmer,
and across the sere wasteland,
rise up phantoms made of sand;
spawned by the barren desert bed,
given form by the dexterous wind.
People, beasts and monsters emerge
and populate the arid land.
Each sand creature moves about,
either alone or in pairs or droves,
and lives its life in full.
And as I watch these creatures
being born, living and dying,
I notice that not one of them,
in their life of a few galloping minutes,
seems to be touched by sadness.
I sit there under the palm tree,
wrapped in my cloak of misery,
envying the magical gamboling forms.
My exhausted eyelids begin to droop,
and healing sleep takes me once more.
Feb 4
Feb 4, 2026 at 2:19 AM UTC
With each step of mine,
the sand rolls down the dune
like a cascade of gold.
In the twilight before dawn,
I walk on gilded paths.
There are tornadoes up ahead -
Pillars of swift swirling sand
rising impossibly high.
I walk towards the marvels,
ever drawn to the impossible.
I see people milling about,
waiting under the scorching sun.
Their feet betray their impatience,
their eager eyes watch the pillars -
the Impatient waiting for the Impossible.
A woman walks out of a pillar.
She walks to the waiting crowd,
her blue robe fluttering in the wind.
The crowd is silent and still now,
like a held breath near a flickering flame.
She moves to an old woman
and takes her hands in her own.
They converse for a while
and she steps back a few paces
still talking; her voice clear and calm.
She lifts up her hands,
one higher than the other,
her flowing sleeves hanging.
Head uplifted, she starts to spin
like a graceful dancing wave.
Faster and faster she turns
and the sand moves with her.
It swirls around the two women
and rises slowly up to the sky,
a spiralling column of yellow.
Just as they are hidden from view,
the woman steps out again,
the sand parting to let her through.
She strides towards a man,
piercing through the sea of people.
A touch of hands, a shuffle,
a dance and the sand moves again.
Another column, another bated breath.
I draw closer just as the woman emerges,
the crowd suffocating with hope.
She catches sight of me and turns.
I stand transfixed by her gaze.
A cocoon of stillness forms about us
as she approaches me with a smile
and envelopes me in calm and understanding.
She takes my hands in hers -
hands small and cold and strong.
She peers into my tired soul
and instils courage and cheer.
My soul responds as she speaks.
She lets go and steps back
and I say my prayers out loud.
Not to her but at her.
She lifts her arms and spins,
her eyes closed, her mouth moving.
The sand dances with her and rises
and my prayers float up inside the column -
a channel between heaven and earth.
Prayers, groans, hopes and answers flow
through this conduit created by the woman.
Her work done, she turns to leave.
And I...I shift my gaze from the sky,
from the promises and the answers.
To look at this woman garbed in grace
In a moment of foolish yearning, I turn from heaven.
As the pillar collapses, the woman turns
and we look at each other -
I, with shame, and she, with pity.
She walks to the next person.
And I walk away, my head bowed.
I sit nearby and look on.
The ritual carries on into the night.
She looks at me from time to time,
kindness and empathy in her gaze.
And though near, we are an infinity apart.
Nov 28, 2025
Nov 28, 2025 at 2:30 AM UTC
Slipping from a dream into a dream
and waking up to a dream,
The painter and I shrugged off
our blanket of cherry blossoms.
The tree was asleep; its song sung
The sun peered from among the clouds
careful not to disturb that pink slumber.
And we walked down the hill.
We ambled sans destination or purpose
going where whim or wonder steered our feet
We ate in the shade of broken monoliths
and rested in the halls of ruined castles
Fellow travellers we met a few
each walking in their own reverie.
Some shared a song, some bread
some offered their soul, some a bed
We came in time to the edge of the plain;
Below us was a wide valley
A road ran along its centre
stretching from one end to the other
And though we saw people
on the plain and in the valley,
not a soul ventured onto the road,
walking instead on the bare earth
"The Road of fates," said the painter,
"A road for the impatient..or the despondent."
We sat at the edge and watched;
We were not the only ones.
Presently, there came along a man
holding a pen and a book.
With an agonised look in his eyes
he stood in the valley, pondering.
With a sigh he stepped onto the road.
He started writing in his book,
his hand flitted from page to page.
Feverishly he wrote as he walked
A slab of the road came loose
and landed on the man's back
weighing him down like an ideal.
And the man walked bowed
Dogs came running up the road
and without knowing how
we knew what they were,
what they embodied.
As Responsibility clung to a calf,
Loneliness and Sickness took turns
and bit and clawed the man's legs
causing him to stumble and weep
He picked up a stick of Faith
and tried to fend off the dogs,
but soon the stick was lost
and the man started running
The dogs chased and harried
and took away chunks from the man.
Not scraps of the flesh,
but pieces of his soul.
Still the man wrote in his book;
bowed and in pain,
losing strength and vigor,
still he wrote.
Rain started to fall on the road
and the dogs scampered away.
The man sighed and sat down
and started writing again.
The clouds poured out their balm
and his pains melted away.
The man started walking again.
But it was a short respite.
A scream filled the valley
and we stopped our ears.
But the man fell down
as Loss struck his heart.
The sound of barking far away
as the dogs gathered again.
The man sat up and wept
and picked up his pen and book
Buffeted by the echoes of loss,
dreading the jaws of woe,
weighed down by his ideals,
the writer sat and wrote
The mongrels came into sight.
The man started walking again.
A snake slithered between his feet
and sank its fangs into his being
The man stumbled, stopped
and writhed as in torment
as if the poison of Regret
burned his life blood
Onto the road he fell once more,
his pen flying away from his hand.
The dogs kept drawing near.
Giving in to despair, the man cried
He lifted up his head and yelled.
And brought his face down hard.
He kept smashing his head
until he rended it open
And as his blood flowed across,
the book was soaked red.
Silver figures rose from the red -
the man's fictions, his dreams.
All along the stream of blood
stories from his travails came to life;
And looking at his creations
the writer smiled and died.
The carcass would be dragged away
The blood would be washed away
But the shimmering silver stories
Would remain floating on the Road.
Sep 25, 2025
Sep 25, 2025 at 7:43 AM UTC
We were walking, the painter and I,
Across the plain and towards the hill.
The moon had waxed into her glory
Causing the zephyrs to sigh.
We rested awhile at the foot of the rise
Nestled in a comfortable silence.
The night moved on languid feet
Passion hidden under a serene guise.
We took the path on the dark leeward
My golden quill our only light.
The painter promised a spectacle
And anticipation fueled my climb
Cherry Blossoms swirled in the wind,
As we stood on silver bathed ground.
A man stood at the edge of the hill,
His hands on the railing, waiting.
Under the tree he stood.
The flowers hiding the wrinkles
Of his suit and his skin.
His gaze fixed upon the moon.
My friend and I sat against a boulder
And waited with him.
The wind whispered with the flowers
And the Sakura tree sang to the night.
The song was impossible,
Yet hear it we did.
Violins and keys, flutes and harps -
A haunting tune of longing.
And as the song rose,
A woman stood beside the man;
A bride clad in a moonlight gown,
Her veil of starshine trailing behind.
The man took her hand,
And the woman drew closer.
And groom and bride,
They danced among the flowers.
Wrinkles were smoothened
Trembling hands strengthened
Faltering feet trode sure
And wilting heart bloomed anew.
Happiness perfused the air.
Cruelly brief the phenomenon would be -
So the man knew, and chose to forget.
He held on to the past and danced.
We sat there, intruders and fools,
Too ashamed to look on,
Too enthralled to look away,
Until sleep hid them from our eyes.
The melody rains with the petals,
Tears dance with the smiles.
The waltz of the weary hearts
Lasts as long as the moon.
Jun 17, 2025
Jun 17, 2025 at 8:38 AM UTC
A tapestry of a life lived
Depicting memories and victories;
A tapestry that is gold,
A tapestry that is frayed.
Hangs on the wall this tapestry
And before it sits a Paragon,
Musing, reminiscing and wilting,
Her little world ever shrinking.
Does a Paragon lose her quality
If she can no longer act?
Would her love and patience be forgotten
Or would her past glories suffice?
Illness demands a levy,
Exacts a crushing toll.
Its every touch a withering stroke,
Its very cure leaving another wound.
The curve of a changed smile
Is like a scythe to the heart.
The mutated sound of a voice
Cuts you with its familiarity.
I sit beside the Paragon, unworthy.
Unable to heal, unable to help.
Ill equipped to fulfill her smallest dreams
I sit beside her and weep.
I see now through the veil of the past
Where lives a life I loved.
Over my shoulders I drape a tapestry,
Frayed by the dead hopes of the future.
Mar 6, 2022
Mar 6, 2022 at 12:24 AM UTC
I hear your name in the whispers of the ocean;
The winds from the heavens carry it to me.
I hear it as a lullaby sung by the night,
But I do not understand it.
I smell your perfume in wistful memories.
I imagine the gentleness in your eyes.
I desire the warmth of your naked embrace,
But you are not real...yet.
My aching heart calls out your name.
My lips declare my love for you.
My soul livens up thinking of you,
And I understand without understanding
That though you are not here yet,
Though I cannot hold you close to me,
Though i cannot press my face into your tresses,
You are real to me.
As real as the rainbow is to the parched earth,
As real as heaven is to the broken sinner.
As the embrace is to the lonely heart,
As the hearth to the bedraggled soul.
As the dreams of romance lay dying
Among the embers of my youth,
I grasp at the will-o'-the-wisps in the night
And wait for you.
Will you come to me as I have imagined,
Clad in a beauty glorified by my dreams?
Or will you come as a soft caress,
Unnoticed at first, but lasting till the end?
Forgive me if I remain silent when you stand before me;
For the unspoken words of a lifetime are like an ocean within me,
And looking upon you, they will seep through my eyes
Or evaporate in the furnace of my heart's anguish.
Unitl then, I will keep thinking of you
Clutching close to my breast a pain that feels real.
I whisper with longing, your nameless name
Hoping the winds will carry it back to you.
Feb 26, 2022
Feb 26, 2022 at 2:37 PM UTC
The pregnant clouds rumble overhead,
The atmosphere as heavy as my heart.
The meagre light has long given up.
Bracing against the fierce icy winds,
I walk across the rocky plain.
A moment of stark stillness
As lightning forks across the sky;
And I see the ground gently dipping
Leading to a circular green depression
With black boulders strewn across
As thunder shakes the world
I take shelter under a rocky promontory
Jutting up from an edge of the circle
And wonder at the perfectly round boulders
Hewn by some giant in ages past.
As the dusk deepens,
And the winds die down,
And the world waits with bated breath,
The weariness of my mind takes me
And I slip into a restless sleep.
I wake to the sound of rain and music.
The night is as pitch.
But there is light swirling in the rocks,
Gold, red, blue and green,
Whirling around inside the hard blackness.
And as the colours dance,
I hear the sound of lutes and lyres,
Of harps and flutes and violas,
And of instruments whose beauty
Is not meant for the newer ages.
Thoughts come unbidden into my mind.
The music dredges up forgotten faces.
Lost voices rise up in my memory.
Futures wilt and dead pasts resurface,
And Regrets take root and flourish.
Vanquished by this wicked magic,
I bow my heavy head,
Hide my tears in my drawn up knees,
Hug myself against the onslaught
And drown in the deluge of that cruel symphony.
Jan 23, 2022
Jan 23, 2022 at 12:56 AM UTC
I wake up in a dream,
Without fear, without doubt.
Without a desire to divine its meaning.
Shedding the stupor of existence,
I wake up in a dream.
~~~~~~~
Gloomy skies and silence
Greet me as I cross the dead fields.
I see a mountain in the distance,
Its peak shrouded in mists.
I walk through a drab world.
As I draw near to the mountain,
I see sparks of colour.
I am drawn to them
Uncaring if they are an illusion -
Like the Lonely towards Love.
I see butterflies flitting to and fro
Between flying petals of every colour.
I see the ground littered with fruits
And blue puddles on the lifeless earth.
I see rodents scurrying into the distance.
I see colours everywhere,
Of every hue and shade.
Here a golden moth,
There a mauve lamp.
Rainbows springing from the ground.
A golden rain falls to my right
As if the sun has melted.
And in that patch of deluge,
I see formless faceless children
Shedding black tears.
I look to my left
And see the air wriggling -
Many moving dots of no colour.
And looking into its expanding mass
I feel as if adrift in a void, weightless.
I force myself to walk forwards.
I see birds of many wings,
And red flowers dripping honey.
All whirling as if caught in a tornado
And at its vortex, a man.
I see him standing infront of a canvas,
Moving his arms and moving around.
He is painting but not only on the canvas.
His brush moves even on thin air,
The paint changing colour as he moves.
He is drawing a multitude,
He is drawing them everywhere,
And he is drawing them into being.
His eyes closed, his head bent,
Bringing his paintings into life.
He stops after a while.
His hands fall to his sides.
All the space around him
Is filled with his living paintings,
And yet there is silence all about.
He notices me and seems puzzled
As if wondering when he has painted me.
He beckons me to come closer
And I go to him without fear.
There is only trust in his eyes.
He tells me that he is a painter.
I look around and nod.
He shows me an inkpot
And tells me that it has magical ink.
I believe him.
He asks me to try painting with the ink.
Anxious about the formless anamolies
That might come out of my artless hands
I politely refuse.
He looks baffled.
He draws a pen in mid air, catches it,
Fills it up with the magic ink
And offers it to me.
'Write, if you can't draw,
Life, one way or the other', he says.
He points to the dead lands all around,
Asks me to help him bring them to life.
Others before me have accepted the Ink.
He tells me he never saw them again.
And yet he trusts another.
Or if I'd rather return to the world I'd come from
He advises to take the pen with me.
I tell him I can't carry anything
From Dreams into my Reality,
Except for things untangible.
I tell him where I come from
Hope is a dangerous currency;
That Rivers of blood would flow
Long after Rivers of Ink dry up
Magic or no.
I tell him where I come from
We don't need a pen
That can bring to life everything it writes.
More a pen that can
Write Life into others.
Feb 25, 2021
Feb 25, 2021 at 2:54 PM UTC
Wonders never happened.
Laughs have diminished.
The sun is still shining,
But night has crept in.
Love has eluded,
Hope for it dwindled.
The arms that were open
Never closed in an embrace.
Faith and I,
Went our separate ways.
The life that was to be -
Have I lost it forever?
In a hurricane of sounds,
Amidst people living and loving,
With broken words in my throat,
All for me is silence.
Sep 3, 2020
Sep 3, 2020 at 1:21 PM UTC
Come soon,
with your smile
prettier than I've imagined
in my musings.
Come soon,
with your voice
more melodious
than the cherubims I may never see.
Come soon,
to take my hand in yours
and pull me
from this quagmire of mine.
Come soon,
to breathe into me
a life I've been too afraid
to hope for.
Beloved Beloved,
born in my dreams,
born of the desperate longing
brought by loneliness.
Come soon -
walk through the veils
of my fantasy into a reality
where I wait for you.
Let me hug you from behind
and weep into your shoulder,
so you may not see
the ugliness of my sorrow.
Let me savour the beauty
of your name on my lips,
as I call out to you;
Your name is a succour, a solace.
Let me kiss you
on your brow,
and tell you wordlessly
how precious you are.
Let me love you
naively, nobly,
forgetting my fears and pains,
forgetting everything.
Let me love you Beloved,
let me become yours,
losing myself in your embrace,
like a tear in an ocean.
Jul 18, 2020
Jul 18, 2020 at 2:48 AM UTC