We covet the nature of things,
Like dreams knocking at reality.
As adults in some offices pause-
To mourn over their own death.
An equanimous person squats,
At the shores of flowing thought-
Seemingly free and perennial,
And asks,
What if rivers are forced to flow-
And the drops that don't comply,
Are imprisoned in ponds by rain?

-Ajey.

For 18 years, I poured my efforts,
Into little shot glasses of failures.
Today, I am a successful alcoholic.

Both can ****
        The only difference is
                      Cigarettes shatter lungs
         She shatters everything

            I remembered the first moment
my lips pressed the filter
     as I lit it up breathed it all
                savored every smoke
       as if we covered up painful lies
        in a container of painkillers

The same way  
we used to pressed our lips
     sparked something between us
           savored every moment we had
    as if our love was a rose
               in a valley of tulips

There is no glory to light
When the oceans gleam,
Yet the waters beguile
Sun-lances by the clouds.

A slave isn't the criminal-
In his master's bidding.

So sunlight is forgiven
When drops are stolen
From veneers of oceans
To mend those clouds!

The only companion of loneliness is silence.
Theirs is an unceremonious marriage like -
Couples in the middle of their middle age,
That mutually run out of things to explore.

One tries to find meaning in keeping a book,
That tells the same story a million times over-
Hoping to find white pages in the yellowed mess.
But that hope too, soon becomes a relic.

But lately I've come to love a poem,
That unites loneliness with silence-
It's the twisted compromise made-
By water when it settles in a container.
It is written on the faces of mothers-
Whose husbands are away at work.

A verse in the wind that all men hear,
To an effect that it stitches broken hearts.
It is a call for worship in an unbuilt temple
And the belief that enshrines love in trust.

'Tis like this-

The pride of men is locked in mirrors.
Laying dormant, bound in fetters.
This prisoner is presented to a fool-
Ever at the end of a fruitful groom.

Ajey Pai K