THE INDIAN POETS COLLECTIVE

Apr 2014

Nandini

Malhar..

Oh you're beauty a raging flame,
Set ablaze.....
Sets me to sing the Malhar Rag to bring down the rains .

Malhar Rag : Old raga in Indian classical music capable of starting rains.

#haiku #rain #beauty #nano

Apr 2014

K Balachandran

Eternity lights the momentary gleam of your eyes

Every flower in this garden is laden with star dust
if the eyes that see can travel a bit far in time,
each cell,  remember, is a fractal, a microcosm,
death and immortality, in it encapsulated
Shiva's dance of ecstasy seems to bring
disintegration, beginning of a new cycle of creation,
each moment is in a flux, you and me  and all others
are the ingredients of steaming cosmic soup.

You are my impermanence most kindly defined
complement written in the poetic cadence of feminine,
exact to the appropriate meter, rhyming pattern, perfect
dance of alliteration and at times beauty of truculence,
I am a blank verse, keeping infinity contained
in the only way possible, captured in its grand simplicity
pearls of zen gleaming all over, the intuitive sense
of internal rhythm reigns, touching the primordial boom
music to the soul in frequencies higher, unknowable
reverberating through the cosmic star dust refulgence.

#one

Apr 2014

K Balachandran

Life on the move(5 words)

1.A life never tranquil
---------------------------------
On the wave,
catamarans dance.

2.Facets
----------
Beauty is the beast

3.Koan
------
Story ends before the beginning.

Catamaran---sailing raft formed of a number of logs lashed together.
Kon-- a Zen Buddhist conundrum/ a paradox to meditate up on

Apr 2014

Ghazal

Will It?

While he is sort of an
All-black with a dash of fluorescent
Kind of guy
I am more of a
Dazzling fluorescent with a hint of black
Kind of girl
So, what do you think,
Will it work?

Apr 2014

Shay-za-di

Pure moments of happiness

You taught me to love, you taught me to hide,
You taught me to judge, and you taught me to cry.
I have felt joy and have also felt fear,
Tasted the bitterness that is in a tear,
I have risen and I have felt the fall,
In short, with you, I have felt it all.
Yet even in anger, even in pain,
I do not regret and exactly the same, I will do it again.
A lifetime it felt, and a lifetime it was,
Memories undying, it will stay as is, as it always was,
Pure moments of happiness,
Gifts which will always be priceless.

Like you, I too will do it again,
It will break me, I know, all over again.
Who knows, I might act different,
Write a happy end, be indifferent.
#hs

Apr 2014

K Balachandran

The gardener gifted me a rose

The gardener gifted me a rose,
when I was gently passing his way
a bright smile lighted his face
"The best that bloomed
in this garden to day, is yours" were his words.

His sweet manner is a ploy, I presumed,
I plucked one I liked, on the sly,
once I was away from his eyes,
"The best is this, now in my hands,
No way you can deceive me, I've craft"

My love chose the first among the two,
no doubt, that's the best, in her heart she knew,
why did I doubt the gardener in the first place?
not just his eyes, his heart too was perfect.

Apr 2014

Ghazal

***** Lovin'

Hey, I think we should stop right now
Wasting precious hours
Building these sturdy
Pedestals for each other
Let's remain in the dirt instead,
Ankle-deep, slipping, falling,
Giving in to the wind, carelessly
Letting our bodies sway
I have a feeling
Life'll be more fun that way

"But he was the only one who understood me. He didn't put me on some pedestal.
He knew that I didn't want to be adored or coddled..."

- Claire Underwood, House of Cards

Apr 2014

The Flipped Word

I can't write like you

I can't write like you do
I can't really compose
Grace has always eluded me
In movement and in prose

You write of such big things
But they are still all the same
Me? I can't really toy
With ideas so insane

I'm not a professional wordsmith
My art hasn't been trained
When I write, the words flow easy
Unabashed and Untamed

You and your words are sculpted
Precisely, with finesse
But with a subdued gloss and lack luster
So twisted so suppressed

And now I see my dear self
Finally in a clear way
Not in my movements or in the glass
but on my inked page

So if you ask me, dear self
Which cage do I choose?
I'd choose my dented brass one
Instead of your golden noose.

Apr 2014

K Balachandran

Imagine this(10 words)

Sun sets with regret.
Darkness of night
fails to appear.

God play dice, says Stephen Hawking
Nothing is permanent in universe.
Game may change any moment
Imagine what if...
Are we living our life, responsible to cosmos?

#cosmology #gamechanger

Apr 2014

K Balachandran

The two avatars

Her poetry was like a living  organism
that changes form  every minute
by the chemical change it undergoes
within me, the reader's mind,
each avatar did a dance different
so much  the symbols and cryptograms spoke
right from time capsules of subconscious,
I had to choose from this or that.
I looked deep in to her eyes and read silently
words, one feels are severely limited, at times
much goes unexpressed for want of words
"exquisite" in such occasion is an expression
that has lost its sharp edges, due to overuse
so i smiled, I hope  in a way most expressive
of the spirit the poem reflected
but  more was in the poem, I sure felt,
beyond my view, some  hidden pathways exist
my ears craved for hidden voices, and I told her this
evening set the stage for her recitation
we walked the country road and she began
very solemn at first, then the words took
a life of their own and became palpable
I felt I was in presence of an oracle
who receives divine command from universe
a spirit that sprung from subconscious
was heard speaking in her throbbing words
the folk walking the path stood and listened,
the look on those faces were unmistakable
a knowing  beyond the  meaning it was.

Poetry has to be read, but also to be listened to.

Apr 2014

Ghazal

Her Story

In hands hardened with
Hunger, struggle, and poverty
Of all kinds,
She clutched bundles of
Fragrant, delicate roses,
Her beauty hidden behind
A torn dupatta,
The light turned from yellow to red
The other girls by her side rushed
To crowd around cars
While she simply sat unmoving
Face turned away
While I wished I could take a picture,
Because her silent figure needed

Something more than words,
Something deeper, more colorful
Than words
To illustrate her black and white story

Apr 2014

K Balachandran

The brave maiden meets the white tiger (4 & 20)

Across the river in the woods
she met the white tiger;
she wished to surrender
the opposite was his desire.

#union #ultimate #surrender #liberation

Apr 2014

K Balachandran

You are the only remaining fluorescent thought

You are the one and only fluorescent thought,
still alive at the night of my lost soul,
the life giving breath I borrowed through
your mouth, when I chocked and went down,
while swimming in the turbulent rapids of life.

Red glowing ember you are, that warms,
my soul in the winter of  unimaginable freeze
my daily dose of sun's purple beams
at the moments of dawn after a long night,

your moist, warm, soft feminine flesh,
raise and fall in such precision, with every beat,
and when I hold my breath, I hear,
both of our names spoken in the lingo of goose bumps,

You are the joy of discovery after
wandering through an arid desert
an oasis full of, green orchards,
you are the peaches and the apple
I want to steal, just to keep with me,
smelling and petting,
                                    never even would
think of peeling, relishing the taste,
I 'd never ever attempt,
to bite it little by little,  and consuming

#passion #hope #last #cupid