I am stuck in the trappings of poetry.
I have an exam to answer at 8 am.
I read and rejoice.
But I am sure
that I'll be overwhelmed
by regret in the morning.

I will mourn the people I lost
and the opportunities I took.
I will suffer when the sun is out.
I will stay in bed tonight.

I will not go out
when I am supposed to.
I will think when I reportedly don’t.
I will stay in bed tonight.

I will admire the people I cheated.
I will congratulate the ones
who aided my fall.
I will stay in bed tonight.

I will not drink as required.
I will not be antagonising
another man in the dark.
I will stay in bed tonight.

I will not steal an idea.
I will display my work
and be laughed at.
I will stay in bed tonight.

I will stay in bed tonight
and wake as a failed being
that almost resembles a human.
Oh wait- a failed being is human.

A perplexed hand reaches out
and a trembling fingertip reaches the ****.
It circles the burgundy, round grip
with faltering determination
to push the hazel door forward.

All things work together for good,
I’m told.
Even if that work together is
silver or gold.

People tell me that I’m going crazy.
They’re just lazy,
To figure out the real issue that lies underneath.
Underneath all the perfect gloss and shining sheath.

Maybe I am going crazy- on second thought,
Even then,
It’s working together for good, I guess.
Or are my brain and heart just playing plain ol’ chess.

This is all.
I rest my case.
Cause I don’t even know what’s my home base.
Anymore.

The great green expanses of land which I saw
Were scratched by Human's deadly claw.
The mountains so tall & great
made to serve as global warming's bait.

The canopies of trees both scanty and tall
Were cut down despite nature's call.
All varieties of wastes are running a race
of who gets to deteriorate Earth's base.

All the lives of animals came to a halt,
When the cranes gave the forest a jolt.
Pollution is intensifying each second.
We won't destroy the environment.

I root for a day in the future
when there's harmony amongst all creatures.
I long that amazing day,
When there's a ray of hope and the skies aren't the polluted grey.

He sighed a sigh of relief.
He had wailed on his death.
His own death.
A death of a misanthrope.
He was born once more.
Like a phoenix, he rose
from his own tears,
And turned into an
angel.

For we have suffered ample
We aren't naive nor imbeciles.
We’ve had enough and refuse to *******.
Ultimately standing up to the oppressive regime of lawbreakers.
We do have rights, some dignity to uphold.
In these dystopian times,
Some ancient manuscript of our rights is in decay after years of mimes.
But is the mere way of upholding our laws.
The committee with Ambedkar maketh the constitution prolix yet perfect.
Let the criminals be punished,
Let the victims be given justice and
Let equity prevail.
Torture me, wound me but awareness about our rights is not going to halt.
Unfortunate are going to be those who assault,
For the victims are not the ones at fault.
Articles 14-31 testify our rights,
Taming the animal in us to stop the bleeding fights.
Simply blaming others won't do,
But it is up to us to respect each other’s dignity too.
The finest from the finest set of rules is imbibed in it.
Our godforsaken spirits rooting for justice and equality are lit.
Lit with flames of years of turmoil,
while the dominant ignored the state of our own soil.
Of what worth is an old, old paper?
Justice to the mistreated, power to powerless, equality to the oppressed and sentence to the hater.

The clock strikes twelve.
The day is about to die.
This date would never come again.
Another day, lost.
Martyred itself to the power of time.
Another day, wasted and dumped.
No purpose in the dark solitude.
The sun did not shine today.
The moon hid.
Darkness remained the dictator.
It did strike twelve.
But, just to reset itself to zero.
It will strike twelve once and forevermore.
Just to be lost in charcoal, forevermore.
“Pointless”, I said.
“Open your eyes”, he said.
And I woke up for another day in the point-fullness.

It hurts when the darkness takes over.
After that, it hurts no more.
Dead before the storm is felt then on.
It continues on and on.

The storm is supposed to arrive but
prolonged silence is “not” heard.
It fears something inevitable.
What’s nagging is the unknown.

When the storm does not arrive at all,
the dead before it persists.
It stays there, asking about the storm.
I sigh- “It did not arrive at all.”

Her hardened feet and cracked heel
brush against the muddy ground.
She travels on foot to fetch water
as she withers away into the befouled.

I breathe out all my insecurities.
I am alive, and content.
Calm and tranquil thoughts
Overcome my body and mind.

My problems seem far away.
They are floating away on a ship.
I am waving goodbye at them
At dusk, when the sky’s orange.

Joy flows within me with grace
Like that ship floating peacefully.
The lighthouse’s beacon turns on,
Breathing light into me.

The cold breeze ruffles my hair
Like my mother would.
I swim back to sleep,
Back from the water.

Still wet, and cool.
Yet, warm enough to fall asleep.

I feel like a bird in the wide, blue sky.
An eagle soaring in the wind,
a koel singing melody,
a crow tired by insults,
a dancing peacock insecure,
a penguin broke,
a parrot pretending,
a chicken distressed,
a vulture scavenging,
a mynah invading,
an owl leading,
an ostrich jealous
and an airplane disarming.

I could just break down and cry.
But I could also get over it
in the fear of being judged.

People’s feet are hurting,
dresses and shoes are a size smaller than theirs.
They’re taking chances, and going to dances
and the truer selves are calling for help.

They’re dressed in their nicest,
their inner screams are the quietest.
Under the gleaming smiles,
their broken, imperfect selves are quietly calling for help.

The smoothest white marble floor lies,
in the reflection they seem to be perfect
while they’re numb inside.
Living corpses are calling for help.

They’re breathing slowly,
to cope with the swift dancing.
The masses are strategizing and scheming
on how not to call for help.

All is calm and feelings are suppressed.
Suddenly!
Chandeliers are falling,
glass is on the dance floor
and hoofers are calling for help.

Candles blow.
They die out.
The fire does
and consumes the candle with it.
The fire was the highlight.
Now it’s gone-
And the candle
suddenly lost its worth and value.
It now lays grief-stricken
And attached to the floor.
Refusing to let go
of their places in the show.
It let illumination enter our world.
And now it’s dead.
We scrape its place from the floor.
Scraping away at its existence.
For this one now and forevermore.

Deep dark days led me to believe
that I couldn’t speak
but shout and scream.

I floated in a starless sky
with the rejects
but absent was the moon.

I shout and scream in a solar void,
this constellation-
-less grave of mine.

I’m buried with tenebrosity
not in a stellar
tomb but in screams.

The elysian darkness outside is
unparalleled by
the darkness inside.

Hands try to move without no stimuli,
they fall down.

He tries to smile in the worst circumstances,
he is a fool.

They try to euphemize what hurts,
they are scared.

Ones who write exaggerated emotions,
the people who read it feel the exact ones.

Honestly, criminally and brutally,
honesty is torn down.

Mindlessness peacefully takes over,
it is despised after the crowning.

While taking the chances,
I fall to the ground.

The plants grow in the soil,
and return to it somehow.

The world is the truth,
the world is plenty with contradictions.

Is truth now only a contradiction?

Dancing at night in dark blue denims.
You left the taste of lemon
in my mouth when you asked me to drink it.
I smiled out loud when I heard of your visions.

Dancing in the diner parking lot.
The cheap speaker you brought
is still playing our music.
I yelled that we were infinite just like you taught.

Dancing at the railway station by rail cars.
Looking at the stars,
thinking about the ones to which we belong.
I point to a pretty pair and you smiled at the dark.

The river seemed gray, muddy and dull.
The fishes had died, so the fishermen starved.
The hard stone on the riverbank was overcome with algae.
The riverside stood still, ruined with its spirit in grief.

All the fishes’ folk attempted to breathe life into the dead.
All fishermen fought fights amongst themselves.
All efforts failed and the folk sank in the cemented graves.
All the fishes’ graves stood six fishes apart.

Death in the river and at the riverside became customary till none were left.
Death came to the fishes and their folk.
Death was brought to the fishes by the fishermen, they brought
Death onto themselves.

All of my heroes died in vain
for me.
I'm not up to their remarks.
Perhaps that's why we have heroes.
Some believe in gold
and find it deep while they
toil the field.
But for the ones
who don't wish for the gold
or are too devastated
by the devastation
their destiny is to die
in and by devastation.
For the majority of us devastated peasants
in the wide devastated field-
our destiny is to
lookup to our dead heroes and fail.
Miserably and devastatingly.

Wanting to change clothes because the ones I’m in aren’t comfortable.
I understand what you mean when you say I look alright.
Seeing you stare another man because you think my clothes aren’t workable.
I don’t hear any of your ******* because you don’t want a fight.

You chew the meat as if you’re seeing it for the first time.
I almost puke at the sight of your gruesome meal.
You puke after too many vodkas with lime.
I couldn’t even get to touch my meal.

Dinner date nights
always end in
screaming fights
and broken glass in the bin.

It’s so difficult to make sense of a mind.
If there were lesser people of our own kind,
just 5 humans all-alike.
It would be bad, and no differing psych.

Diversity is messy and large.
That is the way to like it.

I visit the places of doom.
I dig graves for myself,
but there is never enough room.

Peaceful nights
and then morning rains,
living through midday fantasy
with fruits for brunch.

Roaming in kaftans
and then cycling in the fields.
To guffaw at our jokes
and sit under the tree.

We're drinking water,
filled to the brim in the glass
to quench thirst
after our outdoor rendezvous.

Dancing to the sounds
of our breaths
and feet tapping to
the throb of our hearts.

Hold me in a
euphoric embrace
as historical wrongs
are corrected.

We'll sleep peacefully
through the night
and wake up at the crack of dawn
to see each other again
in euphoria.

I look at your fences
and your flimsy nests.
The wind comes in and breaks them.
You rebuild, the bear comes in and breaks them.
Yet you still rebuild.

It slowly walked towards me,
Despite all the heavenly pleas.
And held my hand with its scaly dry hand,
With the scythe in the other,
Guaranteed me eternal scourge.
It came with a hood,
Mask covering the face that no gaze has lived to describe.
Its magnificence of the hood shall drive insane.
It lives beyond the mortal plane.
He took me home along with sorrow as a bribe.
Only some can fool it,
Fewer can forever escape.
It has no structure, no shape;
No one lives to take its hit.
Neither thorough luck, nor prayers will come to play.
For it has the final say.
Rustling through the pages of everyone’s fate,
It’s neither early nor late.
It bears a weary look,
And its coming has everyone shook.
All call it unholy, Beelzebub's messenger & devilish
Yet it never fails to abduct with no last wish.
Most fear it,
Only the most gallant open arms to it.
No one can win any blitz.
I let him take me away,
For it will drop me here again.
After, restoring my sanity again.
For it will drop me here again.

I have been to the mountains where I have cried.
I climb hills not for the vista.
I climb for falling down the rabbit hole.
Then, I plummet down the icy gully.

I have drowned in bathtubs where I have smiled.
I swim in cold bathtubs not due to recklessness.
I swim to delude my presence.
Then, I hitch-hike upto the peak.

I do these things I cannot understand.
Reality slips away,
like fresh snow and water slip from my bare hands.
I climb to the mountain and fall to the bathtub.

"Goodnight, sweet dreams"- I used to say.
Then when I came back home
after staying at grandma's for the holidays with the cousins,
I listed their names as I went to sleep,
good night, sweet dreams accompanied with each.
"Good night-sweet dreams, Nani Ji"
"Good night to everyone whenever your night might come"
"Sweet dreams to everyone whenever your night might come"

We're kids- all of us.
Then,
why do we force each other to grow up?

With velveteen curtains and a table of gold
sat an old hag with stories untold.
Kids scurried along the marble path
as they escaped her ferocious shihtzu dog.
Filthy men passed one-liners
about her polished growl.
She played hoarse music on her platinum harp
and sang along verses of outcasts’ tarp.
She read out loud stories
banned by the elders in the ancient market.
She lured and polluted little children’s minds
with her ideas and little schemes.
Yet the townsfolk let that damsel stay,
for she was an old hag who could do magic.
With their minds did the magic play.
The populace attempted to play with her tragic
mind in the hope that they could do magic too.

Healing is never a singular process.
People are there to help you.
It never follows a singular, linear line.
Your thoughts are all over the place,
not singularly spread out.
So, do what is right for you.
Heal the way using your own route.

My eyes have been searching for a place to call home.
I have been to Rome and have done what the Romans do.
I have failed to win a place amongst the ranks of caesars.
I have felt the harrowing escapism of not being at home.

I sit inside the colosseum and work in the communes.
I look for a place to reside, as I sway through.
I curse and beat myself up for not being homely.
I walk in the darkest alleys calling it my home.

I said bought the elephantine houses.
I said that I played with the kings,
though I only washed their feet.
I did not feel at home.

I search for belonging,
in my own heart.

Let me cry rivers
and not be asked about it.
Let me shut myself in my room
and not have people knocking at my door.
Let me pass uninformed comments
and not be embarrassed by the people that surround me.
Let me be a stranger,
a forgettable face in the masses.
Let me not stand out,
or blend into the ordinary.
I am lonely,
let me be alone.

A house is not a home,
your heart is a place where I am
but that's not where I belong.

Shadows are impersonations.
They move around
In the sneakiest of ways.
Lurking and inching and cheating.
Trying to escape the mirror.
The darkness died when the hero won.
It didn’t.
It just followed them, lurking to get back.
The core is darker of the fake.
They’re dark,
because they tell them of the time gone by.
In monochrome,
the color died, it lives in the real world now.
I don’t have a shadow.
I am one.

I have not worshipped them far and wide.
I have not preached what I have learned.
I have not fasted for a thousand nights.
I have not helped more than I have hurt.
I have not done what I should have.
I have not longed for visions.
I have not had revelations.
But
I have met the poor begging for food.
I have witnessed people turn them away.
I have seen people loving so passionately.
I have heard of the dacoits threatening to ****.
I have read the books preached by the leaders.
So I conclude I have met god, whoever that might be.

I don’t know what to do about myself.
It seems like nothing is really working anymore-
How i speak, write and feel- it obviously isn’t working.
How I’m sitting because the mosquitoes are attacking me.
It isn’t working that I’m speaking to nobody.

You know, what is working?
The light is working,
I have enough food in the kitchen.
I have a roof over my head.
I’m wearing clothes that I adore.
I have a lot of books from which I can study.

Things seem to be bad.
But then,
They’re not as bad as they could be.
I’m thankful for that.
I’m really happy for that.

Sometimes, happy isn’t enough.
Sometimes, you gotta be sad- real sad.
Sadness for each person is different.
My sadness is different from a person
Who cannot afford food.

My sadness is that I don’t know who I am anymore,
Who I will be,
who or what I will want.
Basically, I know **** about myself.
That is what my sadness is about.

I write about my emotions.
“Why don’t they work?
Why don’t they work properly?
Why don’t they work like I want them to work
Or sometimes, why do they work too much like I want them to work?“

It is just bad that
My emotions look like that to me.
And yes, I hope that I like “Imagine”
When it comes out on Friday.
I hope that “Imagine” works out for me.

I went to see the winter sky at night.
I was in the hills, and the wind blowed ferociously.
The stars looked so bright, my eyes-
They could almost see myself in that light.

I was so dead when I was in the hills that night,
I couldn’t feel anything except for cold numbness in January.
I slithered out lies
When they asked if I was doing alright.

I felt like a black hole amidst heaven’s bright.
I stood in the balcony to listen to animals, calmly.
But I couldn’t hear them over the sound of my goodbyes.
During those dark and numb winter hours, I lacked sight.

I was dead back then,
I am a little less dead now.
I hope I am alive someday.

The keyboard staring at me-
What’s next to come is
An unnecessary string of
unasked-for apologies.
“I needed to say it.”
turns into
“I was stupid.
Never should have said it.”
I type in
“I’m so sorry.”
I send prayer hand emojis,
and console the loser turned winner.
I say to myself-
“I’m sorry, me.
I couldn’t be mean.”

Abysmal despise curtains your insecurities.

Stealing bits and pieces of information about myself from people I don’t know.

They tell me that I have my grandfather’s eyes or that I behave like my uncle when he was young.

I look for these parts, these broken pieces I lost. I don’t know when I lost them, though.

An aunty I meet will tell me that she heard I was good at geography. I don’t like geography. Or do I?

Don’t blame me for trying to find the shattered pieces of the mirror in which I hope to see my reflection.

But deep down I know even after I find all these shards, I won’t see a reflection of myself.

Because I won’t recognise the glossed over person in mirror.

A chalice filled with the wine of word,
love rotted with time into hurt.
The viscous, darkened liquid
runs in veins instead of blood.
Bubbling liquids spew out
of my decaying mouth.
Bloodshot eyes are searching for
a familiar hand to hold.
Do not ask about the soul,
it's already sold.

I was just a little boy
when I asked why I couldn't run in the traffic;
when I bathed in the inflatable pool and didn't get out;
when I locked my mother in the room;
when I locked my cousin and myself in the room to play with our toys;
when I was puked on by;
when I scraped my bruises in fun;
when I got a fever after I saw that lost kid at the mall;
when I ran in the hallways in races with my friends;
when I told my mother everything;
when I was innocent.

-Can I talk about it?
~Can you?
-I cannot.