Unexpected…..
So unexpected was the meeting
It was in the dim candle light
of a city restaurant that I saw her
How time had etched its marks on her
The long dark curly hair
has turned all white
The even set of pearly teeth
now discolored with missing gaps.
A weeping willow with gnarled branches!

Did she recognize me?
Her searching eyes registered
a limp awareness
Soon I saw her cataract eyes shining
in unclouded recognition!

My memory like the arm of a crane
lowered to plough up the hard crust of the past
and rose with heaps of broken rubble
I nosedived into the past
to the little village
where, as children we ran round
the long necked shady trees
until our little heads went dizzy

Stealing behind the tall grass
how I would suddenly yell out;
‘The thief is in hide
Come and track me if you can’
forcing on her an arduous search,
all the while giggling at her vain efforts!

How we ran after the ripe mangoes
that fell in ones and twos
when the winds shook the fruit laden boughs
and how we quarreled over the yellow ones
like mongrels over a piece of bone

I remember once when the drizzle
suddenly strengthened into a heavy down pour
with thunder and lightning accompanying,
how we ran dripping and frightened
seeking shelter in the empty cow shed
at the backyard of a house,
clasping tight to each other!
She was then a little girl
with springing feet and dancing steps
naïve and naughty with all mouth and ears

But as time skipped by
she kept a safe distance
No more I saw the former ebullience in her
In its place, a quiet reserve settled in
The chatterbox no more opened her mouth
To my questions, her answers were mono syllables
My efforts to walk by her side
always ended in futility
either she would quicken her gait
or lag behind at snail’s pace
Seeing me somewhere
she would walk away with eyes down cast
But I always noticed a faint smile
lingering on her curved narrow lips

Around it, I built my dream castle
where she reigned as my dazzling queen!
I am not sure how it was with her
One day even without an abrupt goodbye
I had to leave my hometown to an alien soil.

For long, she came, sailing in my dreams!

After a couple of years when I returned
to the land of my childhood
the mute witness to my unuttered passion
I knew from a close friend
that she was forced into a marriage
much to her consternation!
She is reported to have confided to someone
that she hoped the ‘thief who stole her heart
would one day, come out of hiding’

We met again
We heard each other’s cracked voice
and stood unable to recollect all

Much water had flown down
under the bridge
And we floated in the rush of currents!

When sleep deserted me
I crawled out of my bed unseen
To delve into the crevices of the dark
With the curiosity of an explorer
And the near comatose of a somnambulist
I walked up and down the steep slopes of the night
Like a night watchman
Without a lantern in his hand

When my legs grew weary
I sat on a rock
Covered with moss and lichen
Staring at the dark night sky
With no constellation of fireflies
Flashing their torches anywhere

Sitting there, I listened to the song of night birds,
The rustle of leaves,
The howl of wolves,
And the night wind’s rave

Looking into the dark pockets of the night,
I thought of human mind, a deep gorge
With many an uninhabitable corner
Where serpent desires lie coiled
Scorpions crawl with toxic pincers
Predators roam to prey upon helpless victims

The mystery of the night absorbed me
Her muffled sounds, her dark beauty
Her elusive charm, like thick night fog,
Percolated deep into my consciousness
And I floundered in a fathomless sea,
Swirling in her eddies and currents.
      It whisked me away to lands far…far!
      But on being washed ashore,
      I was in a creative delirium


I am now in No Man’s Land
      Where everything is in a coma of stillness
      Where no light glimmers
No door ajar
And no one in sight!
Here the poet in me breaks open
The somnambulist's comatose
And down way flow my thoughts in indelible ink
Which only I can read

Like a night bird
Roosting among the branches of a tree  
I sing of my heart aches,
Of my yearnings and longings

In the barely audible whispers of the night,
My song reverberates in the eyeless abyss down,
And the dark desolate valleys below

People say, ghosts walk the earth at night.
Oh!  I am not scared!
I am not eager for the dawn to break,
Nor want to put my pen down!

High stakes!
They did naught but
pin me to the sky!
I did more than weather
the storm
I weathered all weather.
She loved me still
with your skin cooked black, she said
she tended to my boils
what a marvel, she said, you're still alive!
my smile bleached white, shone true
all I want... is to be... with you

Lady there's no hell greater than loss
but you've promised me eternity
laud all your passion and virtue
for there is no end to your grace!
You're the marvel, she said, you've been cooked
black
but you still
shine
... inside where emptiness rings I cringe...

Tell me, how white were you
when you
were ****** into the sky
like a kite caught in clouds
tell me! She demands
I smile my sunlit smile
Only the purest color, my dear
the irony of my white lie so clear

She enjoys my moonless tint!
Her tongue swims over my skin
scouting for cacao, or some savor rich
her passion so devouring cools me
for all pain is pleasure
after the fires of perdition
yet, why is there still a nagging
a clawing
a stabbing
a seeping, consuming unease
within my heart?

I must tell her the truth...

My love, she says, how white-
I've been night before there was darkness
I say
I was soot before there was flame
I say
I was the skin of emptiness before you became my soul
woman, I've always been black even before the cooking,
but
my heart is a pool of light, within which
you may bathe...

She stared at me,
finally seeing the filth
her heart knew to deny.
I should have been
a fountain of tears
but the flames of hell have robbed me
of any admission of sorrow.

All I wish in days gone by
is
I wish she had a heart of gold
and
if color be the weight of any being
may sight be struck from purpose!