A streak of light flashes past the late sky.
It is the distant future.

Or futures, may be?

A knot at the junction of possibilities.
It's a space vessel. Intelligent life whizzing by.

# 1.
Nobody notices the decrepit rock.
Doddering about its axis and orbit by the sun.
Inwardly consumed.
Like Mars.
Long drained dry of all her life.

# 2.
Too hard to resist, the
mysterious peace radiating from the surface -
Contact:
and Earth,
enters the union of worlds.

What road it is that is not to be taken:

for all our righteous protestations
and blaming of the Gods or Daemons,

don't we know the futures unfolding?

# 1. Of long here was once a glorious world.

# 2. Peace in our lands and the universe to explore.

Against the canvas of green
churning out shades of wet brown,
silhouetted
the late crow atop a streak
of another bow of shadows. Canopy blue
islanded in many shades of grey,

ruddy ruddy grey:
crimson light dancing on the darkening tips
of leaves, still wet after the downpour,
fluttering in the slow wind;

Till you disappear from the edge
of my smudged mirror; Turning back
then, I wait on,
and catching a fading glimpse
of you walking away, for moments more.
Life inverted; Fluttering in wind.

Heavenly angels
that descended into the earth with the rain
burst forth now as the copperpods blooming
late now at season's edge

That at last when the night is
falling asleep, and I hear voices
muffled, concealed
in corners, oh my despair
the day breaks in, like a thief ambling
across, it is morning already...

A drum beat. A distance.

Breaking out of her veils,
a tender morning.
Hum of the winds.

Hanging roots of the banyan.
Emerging out of mists.

After many lives perhaps
a meeting.

I closed all doors and windows
and lie listening to the tired fan.

You have found your way in,
smiling in the leaves
past the grill,
shadowed on the ceiling.

Oh this feeling. That can light
two hearts. To know this,
to know this.

The roots are hanging strong.
Upside down.

Tugging at the heart, the
solitary song
of the early koel.

Mists un-heeding,
sometimes succeeding.

I.

I knew she liked me much,
the way she blushed and
went cold, every
morning at my touch;
I love her too, my favourite
cereal bowl: she's
all ceramic, a queen
among bowls. So, I decided
to break ice and ask her,
this morning, when this space
is resonant in unusual
calm amid the buzz
of clumsy bikes, kitchen clanks
and crowbar knocks: tell me,
dear bowl, I say, tell me more
about yourself: I want to
know your story.

II.

She blushed again: really?
Why would you want to know
this my sad story?
Everyone I ever loved,
has been cleaved from me
and here I wait today,
polished and reflecting
the mad whirl of the tireless
fan every sombre morning.
Silence. I gave her a caress:
an empathetic, loving one,
and nudged her on.
She stuttered. I gazed intently
at my interested face
reflected off her beaming eyes.
Well, where shall I begin?

III.

I was the soft clay
lining the shore of this
beautiful lake, in some remote
haven untouched by betrayal:
a far off land, where
people just loved and expected
nothing back.
China? Mongolia?
I was about to ask, excited,
but then kept quiet,
how would a clump of clay
tell one country from another?

IV.

I loved her soft smile
rippling past me every morning
and deep night, and we
loved each other this way
in waves and caresses
for aeons, when one day
this menacing contraption
a monster, cleaved me off
and transported me
to a boiling cauldron. I wept
for pain and roiled on
until hardened and cast
into this shape.

V.

Earlier, my dear bowl,
still earlier I wish to know,
what were you, before
being the sand on the lake?
She got thoughtful for a while.
Well, I was the mountain
that fell in love with the sky.
O, her beauty that
came alive when she wore
a tunic adorned of twinkling
stars and the crescent moon
adorned her forehead; But,
the jealous winds
cleaved me off her: bit by bit
scraping me off they
deposited me by the lake.

VI.

Earlier, dear bowl, what
were you, before being the
mountain that loved the sky?
Now it seemed like I was
in communion with an ancient
deity: a being so vast, that
all existence was in her throb.
Ah, those searing depths
where I flowed simmering
by ragged channels, I was
the pain that the primordial
planet carried in her womb.
Before exploding over the land
and rising to the ashen skies.

VII.

I could not ask her more.
We both were lost in a
trance-like moment. I just
touched her and we felt
every event that pulsed in her.
The giant star that exploded;
Spreading gases and dust
all over vast distances.
Gathering together and
growing all over again, through
and through time, since
numberless cycles of creation.
Stardust. Here in my humble
bowl, is gathered,
the seed of all existence.

There is this bare stalk in my backyard. With upraised branches, all dried,  painted in contrast to the lush greenery all around: sometimes, I feel, like the branches of a swirling bolt fulminating against dark, brooding, boding skies.

I have seen three seasons pass by. This stalk has remained bare. All around, trees have gone from withering to flowering and onward. This one though, stands constantly poignant, almost embodying pathos, endlessly mourning.

Insects - termites? ants? I don't know, but I see they have covered large parts of the stalk. Raised to the skies, like an enigma, a puzzle thrown to the distant stars veiled by the firmament. Yes, I know this slow death that sustains life.

Yes, I can relate to it. It is like this pain that haunts my soul. Like the song of the smudged moon on a misty night, sung to uncaring, asleep worlds. After skies weep out their agony, the music of the last tears dripping off tips of drooping leaves.

In the dreary hour of the just-dawn,
your life painted in grim notes,
you are alone with all your Self;

The trees all asleep in grey tones,
lamps that gave light all night,
become pale packets of wastage;

A gust of wind pours in
carrying the songs of birds
singing to the unveiling skies.

A new morning comes rushing
on the waves of the mellow sea
from worlds beyond the horizon:

A day rises, when you drop all
the burdens you long carried
on your life-weary shoulders.

Dust gathers everywhere.
Only a swab on the windscreen is clear
on my dust-laden car.

Too tight to wear,
the ring
vibrates vigorously on the washing machine.
The cycle is ending. Intensity waxing.

A song of the solitary koel
serenades a reverie.

I open the screen from inside.
You, the windows from the outside.
Glances exchanged from either side.

It is the time of the late flower.
A drop, even a drop of hot water,
the skin craves for a touch.
In partings, a beginning.

In still winds, all the leaves silent.
Peace comes visiting, a migratory bird
and sits sagely by the bare stalks,
in a hurry to reach
far off lands beyond the seas.

You only get a moment: a moment
when the world freezes.