If I had my will
I would’ve clocked back thirty years
With her on the Ferris wheel!

Go girl red ribbon on the merry-go-round
Go back on the rocking boat
Thirty years whizzed past us
That time looks dreamily remote!

My belle gaily girl of yore
Go ride once more on the wheel
I would clock back thirty years
I would hold time still!

Still lurking there in your eyes’ gleam
Still stirring there a dream
That goes back those thirty years
For popcorn and licking ice-cream!

Girl, go, run once more
Thirty years is never too far
It’s still there with open door
The time it can’t forget her!

On one of city’s endless wires
Above spits venom guttural swears
When the sun tinges an orange red
The lone bird cries a dirge for dead!

The dead footsteps that left the shore
Walked million miles could walk no more
Their joys and pains on earth foothold
Silenced now deep buried in cold!

The bird it knows the stories untold
Hurtful sighs of hearts of gold
Silent fall of molten pain
Left for good here won’t be again!

The lone bird knows how hard it hits
The ones still here forlorn heartbeats
When death maims bonds breaks love’s pairs
Moonless eyes wake through nightmares!

Seeing the man for nearly twenty years
In his eternal Spring of joblessness*

Man, wife, a son
A one storied house
Market and home
The only places I have seen him tread
And on the roof
Any time of day
He’s there
Staring around
Sky gazing

I envy him
His length and space
Stealing my Saturday dusk
Sunday dawn
Weekday moon

I envy him
For so much time
If I had
Would have spun endless rhyme

But then ceasing remorse
That like him
Much time isn’t mine

I think

Stuffed with so much seen
Heard
Observed
The bard in me
In free time’s delirious wine
Wouldn’t have budged a line!

A cashew-nut
she pressed between my lips

slumberous awestruck
I chewed it

groping for her hands in the dark
if she really was there
or I was dream living

why should a woman
in the middle of night
press a cashew-nut
moist and warm
between my lips

was she hungry herself
hypoglycemic
picking them in despair
popping one betwixt my lips

or is it the one
I popped through hers
last evening
misdirected
without my knowing it
found the vertical lip
betwixt her swells
till she felt the *****
when loosened her robes
and it stirred in her
a long forgotten spark
so she came back
in the middle of night
for me to chew
the re-popped cashew-nut

slumberous awestruck!

A few dried leaves
He makes a fire.

The fire in him
All his dreams
Cinders now!

Twigs of wood
A small spark
Is all he need.

For breathes the belly
He must feed!

The past is dim
Nay the past is blank
All left is now.

When the fire burns out
Ashes will fly!

He makes daily
A meal measly
With deadwood.

When is next
He doesn’t brood!

A roadside meek
Lives on pick
Yet don’t die.

When the fire burns out
Ashes will fly!

None bothers his fate
High up they wait
For him to die.

*When his fire burns out
Vultures will fly!

Man oh man be kind, don’t be so mean
Leave for me a scrap, don’t lick it clean
Men of toiled hands, creasy worry face
My home is not forest, but this urban space
I love yer food so tasty, spicy, fried in oil
Peck at everything, even your bowel’s spoil

Man oh man be kind, don’t be so harsh
Leave a little space, my space is sparse
Men of busy walks, bushy knitted brow
My home is not forest, here only I grow
I love yer food so tasty, but it ain’t a shame
Pick up everything, even your spit and phlegm

Man oh man be kind, kindly look at me
Leave a little love, I love your company
Men fair and dark, having or lacking grace
My home is not forest, I live at your address
I love yer food so tasty, crunchy salty sweet
Pounce at everything, your waste becomes my treat

Man oh man be kind, I ensure your place don’t rot
Pay me your sight a little, spare me a kind thought
Men of all shades, all religion cast and creed
My home is not forest, your space is what I need
I love yer food so tasty, the smell when you unwrap
I’ll gleefully pick up, my friend’s throwaway scrap

Man oh man be kind, don’t feign you don’t care
I’m your all season mate, comrade of all weather
Men of generous souls, broad and golden heart
My home is not forest, I love to be your part
I love yer food so tasty, baked or fried in oil
Throw for me a crumb, a scrap for all my toil

I’m happy to have lived here in this my abode
Without bothering to think if it was made by god
Nor needed to know why here only the bell rang
For the earth to take birth from one great big bang.

Know this much I’m bound in circle of cause and effect
With god playing a truant he himself isn’t perfect
Often when and where needed he keeps a distance
Not just feeds the good the evil too he gives a chance.

I’m happy to be here the abode of god or not
What’s his designs and purpose I spare not a thought
Happy to be here till I drop down like a leaf
That lived without a question a faith or belief.

Have you minded the water?
Not the one for drinking
But in the eyes
Your words do bring!

Where they go and hit
You never paused to see
Never thought a bit
How painful they could be!

Once said they do hurt
Do bring pained surprise
Words you thought smart
Brought tears in the eyes!

But you had things to tell
Mouthful words to blurt
What if they crafted hell
Left a bruised heart!

In ten times if at least once
Had seen the shadowed face
You would’ve ached for penance
Searched ways for redress!

Check faucets and pipes for leaks
Don’t leave them leaking for weeks.

If you smoke to evade constipation-al day
Don’t flush cig-**** and use toilet as an ashtray.

Ditch the habit of taking long showers
To remain clean is not to bathe for hours.

Don’t let running water flow in gush
While you’re busy with the toothbrush.

Your mouth though you must cleanse
Keep a glassful of water for the rinse.

When you clean vegetable or dish
Don’t let the faucet run as you please.

Be not under the slightest doubt
If you waste water it will run out.

The way we waste water future isn’t bright
For supply of water is only too finite.

Conserving water it makes a prudent sense
For on it depend we our earthly existence.

3 mice on the tin roof
though their minds were on food
an impulsive id drove them
they swung to different mood!

I warned myself here no poetry
no story to make out of it
let them have in privacy
a good time bitterly sweet!

3 mice on the tin roof
swayed by their id
I should have stayed aloof
and not watched them in greed!

I told me there’s no poem
in the 3 mice and their id
leave them alone with their game
but my greed paid no heed!

It’s not civil not nice
to act a peeping Tom
see furtively the 3 mice
breaching all courteous norms!

3 mice on the tin roof
to me I had this to say
go your way stay aloof
and not venture on their way!

My house seemed unusually quiet
As I rang the hoarse calling bell
Quickly it passed my thought
Did I come to the wrong address?

The bell’s hoarseness shattered the peace
Something my house never did grace
The trademark noise one can never miss
So had I come at the wrong address?

She slowly came and opened the gate
The house was dark but for one room
I wondered if she slept till late
So there still hung a pall of gloom.

I sniffed the air to find what was amiss
Shook my head a little to shrug off the fears
Reigned everywhere a distraught-ing peace
In the house I’ve been returning for years.

I tiptoed on the floor lest it broke the silence
The hush appeared so incredible and fragile
The thought that peace even could make one tense
I couldn’t repress the inward flowing smile.

‘Why the house is so quiet dear what’s the mystery?’
I saw a flirting smile prancing on her face
‘For a change I have switched off the TV

*So you think you’ve come to the wrong address'!

Every year I make a resolution
To observe mom’s birthday
Offer her a garland,

But here I stand
This year too,
The day passed, mom,
I didn’t remember you!

It would not have been so
Had I been gone even this long
For you mom
I would never have been out of sight
But on this day
With tears and one candle light
You would have remembered
Her son long gone
Offering him with your trembling hand

Your love’s garland!

Every evening I find him at the bus stop
Under the semi-dark shed
In posture meditative
As if he isn’t waiting for bus
But something more serious
Like god’s second coming!

When I greet him
He bows in ponderous nod
But not a word passes between us
Breaking his impenetrable aloofness!

I find his serenity alike the evening
Softly descending to lull the day’s noise
That he in perfect meditative poise
Let envelope his whole being
And it looks he isn’t waiting for bus

But god’s second coming!

Every night on the divan divine
Beside her when I recline
In the comfort of that precious chance
My mind in the sit finds a hidden romance!

It may seem her eyes are glued to TV
But I know they aren’t but riveted on me
In her sensuous silence I don’t fail to notice
The charm of her cheek how they still entice!

I utter not a word love those times’ silence
Like an old lover never out of patience
Stealing from air her old wine fragrance
Just happy to be there clutching the romance!

The beggar quenches his thirst
The clerk fill his bottle must
From its spout pouring water’s gush

Don’t ask one belongs to which class!

In the conglomerate of disparity
It stands a symbol of equity
At everyone’s beck and call

Flowing for one and all!

It’s like for all one stop
Pause here a thief and a cop
Throats parched in summer heat

Get cooled in its reviving treat!

An oasis on any sun-burnt day
Its sparkling drops seem to jovially say
Come friend get cooled in my gush

*I’ll never ask you your class!

Mew mew
Pussycat cries at night
Closed doors
There isn’t warmth at sight

Mew mew
Is there any kind soul
Crackling fire burning coal?

Mew mew
Under open sky
Like pussycat many more lie
For them is spread no bed
On pavement dream tomorrow’s bread

Mew mew
Cold night’s curse
Doors shut no kind soul
Far up blinking stars
Glow like burning coal

Noses in blissful snore
Won’t ever get to feel
The misery preying outdoor
The knifing ruthless chill

Mew mew
Not awake one kind soul
Doors are all shut tight
Crackles no fire in burning coal
Pussycat cries for end of night

Times frail bonds are strong
A ritual going for long
Low earn prices steep
Still whispers her lip.

She marks on his forehead a paste
Of sandalwood to wish him the best
Come bad time rough weather
Must sail through his dear brother.

The sight seems in heaven made
When she touches her brother’s forehead
Radiant in her finger’s bless
In happiness beams his face.

Hard times prices are steep
Pours good wishes from her lip
A woman she’s a loving sister
Wishes the best for brother.

Missed the ‘l’ typed the ‘r’
Clime became crime
Don’t think I strayed too far
It was in tune with the time

For man sees no harm
In Globe’s getting hot
If oceans rise changes the clime
Earth becomes a melting ***

More of rain more of drought
Heat and cold in excess
Earth’s heating up is not in doubt
It’s happening without redress

The rich they don’t feel the heat
Glowing too hot in wealth
It’s the poor who’ll take the hit
Scarce food will mean ill health

You may ask where’s the link
Between crime and climate
The answer is there within a wink
Scarcity drives up crime rate

Crops will fail when the globe gets warm
For we couldn’t forsake a motor ride
Didn’t foresee belching smoke’s harm
Cared not to take earth on our side

With little food to feed hungry stomachs
Not enough to sate belly’s growls
Folks will forage like the wolves’ packs
Will take to crime the innocent souls

As for me the seller of rhymes
Though they aren’t worth a dime
When hot climate breed lot more crimes
Surely will arrive my time

*The impoverished poet with his wand of poetry
Will roam the burning roads of asphalt
Singing his rhymes in tears of misery
Selling his balm amid tumult

He had to get it anyhow
But the sleepy Sunday afternoon
Found all the shutters down

He had to get it anyhow
But a sad figure on the empty street
His sighs in himself drowned

He needed to get it anyhow
But it seemed fortune didn’t care
It couldn’t be ever found

He needed to get it anyhow
But his tries ended in despair
A life could bow out

If only he could get it anyhow
That small thing now priceless
He would forever treasure

If only he could get it anyhow
It would prolong a heartbeat
Reviving drops he could measure

On the sleepy Sunday afternoon
In search of a one penny dropper
A man a poet a philosopher
Was thwarted came a cropper!

Why does it come to your head
To make your bed
One night alone

Upstairs!

Once behind the closed door
You aren’t with anyone anymore
Your fears mount
Till they surmount
All your courage
And in awakened daze
You only regret
That at the outset
Knowing the night is theirs
Shouldn’t have come

Upstairs!

To lie alone
But not be left alone
By the ones not your own
Faceless men women
Frighteningly alien
That at your intrusion rage
Mock your courage
And you find it too late
Beyond repair regret
That showing your fears no cares
You dared to come

*Upstairs!

See what’s not seen
Hear what’s not heard
Find precious gem
From the seeming muck
Lift one soul
Bring one smile
Stop one while
To look away from you
Love one way
As if hearts live
To only receive
What you must give!

Then ask yourself
Judge yourself
In all the years done
You a poet a man
In what gain
Have dragged your pen!

You stop there
Afraid you know the answer

*I’m vain

As a poet as a man

The unseen not in my sight
The unheard not in my word

I’m vain
Echoes your sightless sight

I’m vain
Returns the depth of night!

If you were a bird
with a poetic brain
could draw your thoughts
needed no key or pen
poetry you could pour out
perched atop the tree
float them in the wind
on sky ink artistry!

none would know the bard
masked in bird’s face
dipping hand in rainbow
scribbling on cosmic space
but they would read your poems
on the blue canvas
hear your mind’s nuggets
in the wind’s rush!

if you could spread your wings
a bird a hidden bard
in each flap a magic rhyme
each flutter a glorious word
they wouldn’t know the poet at work
but once a while would stop
to marvel at the night’s mist
early morn’s dewdrop!

Gyrating in its own web
Spinning up and down
It hangs perilously
Like a circus clown!

Its swim delicate in the air
In silent graceful motion
Striving to have its way
In a rigid instinctive notion!

The slightest stir by chance
It freezes in its dance
Swoops on the prey

*Lives another day!

I forget you
Forgot you
In the din

Years roll
Taking their toll
You sleep within!

You slip within
In the din
I forgot you

Never gave
Will never give
What’s your due!

My wearied soul
As years roll
Reach December

It’s then you come
Your song I hum
I remember!

I remember
The face of her
But not her mind

Deep I brood
What’s lost for good
Alas no rewind!

In the din
She sleeps within
A little scar

I remember
The face of her
In December!

Her dark silhouette moved beyond the grilled window
Was she a living woman, an apparition, or a shadow?

In the evening sitting there her head bowed low
I loved to think of her a ghost on the window.

That house from ours was within a stone’s throw
At that time looked remote now only I know.

Her hands they always moved what she was up to
Was she knitting corpses’ shroud I had little clue.

Don’t look at her, mom would say, stay away from her
Her words ran me down the window didn’t seem far.

Quickly I shut my eyes there was no way I could dare
To ignore mom’s caution and had her in my stare.

I went back to my homework not that I much willed
But lessons had to be learnt pages had to be filled.

I heard ghosts could pass through wall anyplace they could be
What if she had stopped her work and come looking for me?

I sat frozen in benumbed fear my courage they all fled
For courage would be of no use when dealing with the dead.

I wasn’t safe alone cried out 'mom' to find her I frightfully ran
*Passed by the house the grilled window but there wasn’t a woman.

As the bus turned at the bend
he saw the lane diverging from the road,
empty, silent, inviting.

He felt a pang
for at the end of that long winding path
was a house
in it a woman
waiting her fate
of the day’s loneliness
in simmering dream
of the night’s union!

He sighed at the fleeting thought

went his way

*of enduring another day!

The soldier was receiving the gallantry award.

In his mind was not

How many enemies he had killed
How bravely he had fought the war
How greatly he defended his country
The heaping praises
The glittering medal

But…

The reassuring happiness
Of having come out of it

**Alive!

Two innocent eyes look up at me
Blue pleading watery eyes
I catch that moment on my cellphone
Before long they would be gone!

Come back cute fluff
I croon in each dark corner
Come back milk bright fur
Come back silk smooth caress
You can’t have gone too far!

Crescent moon hides you in shadow
Covers you the pale ashen star
Come back not wrench my heart
You can’t have gone too far!

Why the ones I love don’t stay long
Like you I carry on my cellphone
A few tunes and part composed song
Hushed into dusty yellow tone!

Why I can’t hold them back
The ones I love disappear at dawn
Go hide in the moon’s shadow
Leaving me bruised forlorn!

In his heart brimming river’s flow
When he sees it passing below
He on the bridge cries ‘train, train’
Goes back to be a child again!

A child that’s what he loves to stay
Refuses to go the grownups’ way
Being a kid is pleasure immense
Smallest things tickle the sense!

He shuns adults their company
Their faces somber as somber could be
Their lack of laugh frowned eyebrows
Creased countenance stern morose!

He nicely fits in his childlike poise
Claps when glad dances in rejoice
Catches a grasshopper in palm holds rain
Lovingly goes back to be a child again!

I don’t need your bare skin
The deep alleys lying within
When I sink my nose in your hair
All day you linger there.

I can do without your kiss
Warm crevices I don’t miss
When graze my lips on your ear
All day you linger there.

I don’t want you pierced and dug
Nor crave you tight in hug
Catching you once in stare
All day you linger there.

I don’t thirst your panting moan
Grab you as if you I own
One touch of your loving care
All day you linger there.

Rows of heads droop in meditation
The journey is slow and arduous
Along same path to same termination
Boring and depressingly monotonous!

An unbroken dullness hangs in the air
Emits a feel the travail is endless
And the heads drooping are in silent prayer
To reach at last their destined address!

For some the travel is not that far
They disembark earlier than many
For the ones left to ride further
Is prolonged the meditative agony!

Little ones we were playmates that leisurely afternoon
The daughter of our poor maid she danced to my tune
Shyly quiet emaciated slim her eyes were bluish deep
One loud word a raised eyebrow was enough to make her weep.

She wouldn’t hum a single tune nor would ever dance
Loved to be there all by herself kept from me a distance
The lonely hour of that afternoon my mum was sound asleep
The girl was there I sniffed my chance for playing on her mischief.

I invited her for a time together to play with me hide and seek
With downed eyes she moved her head her ‘no’ was feebly meek
On that day I had to have my way to play some prank on her
My insistence benumbed her sense courage she failed to muster.

I showed her the room where she would remain till I found a place to hide
Should be there with eyes closed till I cooed my instructions she must abide
The windows of that room I shut them fast so no sound could come out
Explained to her it was to ensure from her place she couldn’t look out.

The poor girl followed what I told her she was a soul sans all wickedness
As she went into the room a cloud’s shadow passed on her innocent face
That afternoon in childish whim what I did I don’t find easy to condone
I played the game mean locked the girl in left her in the dark room alone.

I left her there in her nightmare happy to have caused her the pain
A playful prank a darned mischief in which the child saw a big gain
When they brought her out she was all weeping the captivity was hard
Time and again they questioned her but couldn’t get her to speak a word.

From that day I never came her way just caught a few times her eyes
There was in them against me no complaint only a sorrowful surprise
Years have passed that afternoon is still to rust she still knocks on the door
Beckoning me to play the game of hide seek pleading not to lock her anymore.

Declared at last the choice
Disperses the mist
No more blaring noise
Hangs there the list!

Foes made so are made friends
Flow in bursts of congrats
There’s no making amends
It’s either bouquets or brickbats!

The winners they must rejoice
The losers there surely is none
If something went wrong with the choice
Take it as life’s another fun!

It’s bidding for vote could be a coin’s toss
To determine who could garner more popularity
Whatever, must not suffer loss,
Poetry, for that would be such pity!

There are some sufferings
When you witness
You feel like laying down your pen
Throw out as garbage all ***** of paper
Where you penned sufferings
That comes nowhere near
What you witness
The real sufferings
When you wish
You had the might
To open the doors
Set free the caged birds
See them soar in the blue
Then come back once
Write your last poem
Saying you achieved it
The incredible feat
Of doing a little something
Tangibly good
And way better
Than what floods your paper
And there wasn’t anything
Greater to get
From poem
From life
Not anything more
For you delivered
The ultimate poetry
When you bought two birds
Caged cramped suffering
Opened the door
See them soar free
Gave this world

**Your finest poetry!

Best poems are lost in the warmth of blanket.

Lured away by sleep
they could be precious keep
if I could hold them through night.

Best poems surrender to warm bed’s comfort.

Lulled into stupor quietly abort
before I could take them on a sleepless ride,
they seek a dark corner find it and hide.

Best poems brew though in the stillness of night.

I cannot birth them show them daylight
but let them die in abject disgrace
on warm bed beneath blanket

sunk without a trace!

Friend I stand on your door with open arms
For the grace of your words they truly charm
I love them your agrees and the little spats
Your flowers in my hand bouquets brickbats!

It’s for you only that I get to see
What I am and what I could be
For that you never mind to part precious time
Gift that to me for my trifling rhyme!

My heart’s reader your words always charm
Your likes light up even the humdrum
It’s in your views that my writes come alive
They make a poet breathe his poems survive!

It then so happens your words become my own
Your seeds of thoughts in me get sown
My dreams meet yours mind touches mind
An awakening blooms in that priceless find!

Just some walls
doors windows
moonless roof

mute aloof!

Close at hand
reach not found
drifting island

melting ground!

Drawn curtain
dark grey shade
hiding pain

of un-warmed bed!

Rich in style
no substance
rings no smile

sings distance!

No goodbyes
no welcome
dim-lit eyes

echo glum!

It’s so easy
to be a family
but they forgot
what a house is not!

On the parched land fall drops of rain
Sky mourns the loss soil drinks the gain
When in soil pores summer fires burn
They live the agony dream rain’s return.

You may wonder why cries the sky
Her rain is needed for soil gone dry
It’s because is nurtured a love in her breast
For the tender drops awhile her guest.

Soil doesn’t mind opens up in smile
In the profound knowledge that it’s a while
Before the fruits are reaped to be left again dry
Till new seeds of hopes come down from sky.

The leaking tap dripped all night
Tip tip tip
Sleep took a flight
Dream couldn’t reap!

First thing next morn
A plumber I must call
How I scorn
The ******* tap its nightlong fall!

Poor tap has a mind of its own
******* at men’s free will
Left in dripping groan
Its pain who can feel!

Yet it doesn’t bend
Will fill the bucket
When the plumber will mend
Valve and socket!

A lifelong pair
till one flies away
and makes another!

When they taught me I hardly paid them a heed
now I know my teachers were benefactors indeed
I regret the curses I held in my mind for them
their punishments were blessings not something to condemn!

Sadly those days they seemed to point their gun
on me for unlearned lessons homework not done
for such small lapses the teachers made a huge fuss
pulled my ears made me stand outside the class!

Some of them more zealous went a little far
caned ******* the back plucked out my hair
it appeared so barbaric at my expense their fun
they only knew it wouldn't harm me in the long run!

Such punishments I did never willingly embrace
ran around the room sending them on a chase
in fueled fury with faces in anger red
often flew their duster toward my head!

In life those torments have borne fruit
the running around standing on one foot
they have made my leg muscles quite strong
helped me hold my balance without support for long!

My ears too have still remained intensely keen
my hairs for my age haven't grown too thin
the pulling and plucking had done me no harm
but made my hair root healthy and firm!

*The teachers for sure were prudent and wise
punishment they meted out was blessing in disguise
so if you ever cursed them make amends and repent
say, thank you dear teachers for all the punishment!

A kid I was when on way to school I caught her pretty face
Fell for her can’t call it love the sweet girl in school dress
She stood on her door a beauty of yore waiting for the bus
My limbs went limp grew butterfly wings she was my childhood crush.

I thought she knew felt it was my due flew me a bewitching smile
Waved her hands and knowing my mind she looked at me awhile
Each day on that way as I passed by her I caught in her eyes a gleam
Read in her waves a bridging of hearts in her smile an unfathomable dream.

No ordinary path it was a dream walk for nothing I could miss out the chance
To have a glimpse of her catch those moments forever get lost in strange romance
The ******* the door she made my spirit soar she was close yet a distant star
Took me on fancy flight her smiles glowing bright the child could never touch her.

I set myself a rule not to take break from school but to pass everyday by her
It’s no wonder some things last forever some memories with time never blur
She my whim’s fair red ribbon in her hair stood there in her white skirt
A petite white dove radiating precious love she enamored the little boy’s heart.

In the lost years’ light burns a patch bright where shines her unearthly face
A girl in her teen not aging always green occupying a permanent space
I don’t have of her anything more to remember what remains is so divine
The girl in her teen could be thirteen or fourteen and I was a boy of nine.

Left there as they were
As orderly he liked them to be
With her heart’s burning fire
She dusts them to keep alive memory.

His shoes make her pine for his feet
She finds him in his hanging shirt
She wouldn’t surrender the years’ treat
Won’t let those times fall apart.

She holds the waves from washing his trail
Does it with a dour commitment
Holding on till she would herself set sail
To be with him in the firmament!

chiseled out of rock
the sculpted woman was an instant hit!

her large unblinking eyes held a mystical hint
her full lips stirred an untrodden passion
her stone-carved ******* were forbiddingly alluring
her smoothened rock skin was strangely inviting!

they gaped awestruck the rocky woman
full blossomed radiant in all her curvature
a beauty divinely distant beyond the periphery of touch!

they fell in love with each part of her

for sometime

and when her wholeness eluded

immersed her!

‘See we aren’t leaving anything out,
check once more to be sure’
she said with a nagging doubt,
‘we’re going to come back no more
once behind us we close the door’.

The hassles had made her tense
Moving out was trouble immense
I said to soothe her nerve ‘be assured dear,
We would leave nothing here’.

Still for her peace I went in
To make sure nothing lay within
And what I got was a jolting shock
On the wall still hung our bedroom clock!

She fumed and blurted on my face
‘I always knew you’re too careless,
thank god I goaded you for another look
precious things might be lying in some nook’.

I went in not to seek anymore things
But for the spent moments still fluttering wings
Smell our joys and sorrows hanging in the air
Of the times living as a tenant here!

I tell a lie when I say
Poems in mind always play
Streams on endless output
My mind is never vacantly mute.

To tell you the truth it oft happens
When riding to work on buses or trains
Like a lost river dry up my thoughts
Stubbornly dry much like walnuts.

Funnily it doesn’t for long last
It’s preordained mind mustn’t rust
A fellow traveler brings out an apple
Nibble at it with it grapple.

In boredom my eyes at the scene gape
How the apple gradually changes shape
With each bite a chunk is torn
In each bite a poem is born.

It was bothering him the noise that came at night from outhouse
He didn’t give it much notice in the barn was a lot of mouse
Just wondered why in the day he would hear none of the sound
But it all started with him on the bed and the lunar path westbound.

As the grandfather clock chimed past twelve he kept counting the gong
It was about time to ***** up his ears the music would soon play along
The glass windowpane brought him the sky with stars all over firmament
Shaken out of wits he would tell himself it couldn’t be done by rodent.

Night after night it went on happening he couldn’t wish away with a laugh
It reached him one night to his patience’s end he said enough is enough
With his gun and torch he left the bed the truth for once he must learn
Who played the music regular midnight was somebody there in the barn?

He made his way through the shrub laden path under a half-lit moon
To find what it was that robbed his peace the source of the pestering croon
The outhouse loomed eerily in semidarkness a magic of night’s artistry
The man wondered what was hidden within what piece of baffling mystery.

Just as his shadow fell on the door floating in the crescent moon
The wind hushed off descended a lull stopped abruptly the tune
Nerves frayed in the nightly trudge his brows furrowed in doubt
He shrugged it off unlocked the door the fact must be found out.

A yawning black swallowed him with the smell of years’ dust
It took a while to see past it for his strained eyes to adjust
Then he remembered the torch in his hand his only aid for light
He pressed it on in the beamed circle caught the piano’s sight.

*Lying un-strummed for ages the piano had stood the time’s test
Playing host to its squeaking mates turning itself to their nest
They gaily treaded on the undead keys the notes were sheer fun
Their plot was uncovered on that night without the use of a gun.

Daylong I grind for bread
Seek scope for a piece of loaf
Fill the bowl to feed the bowel
Keep losing the strands of thread
That amid the labor dwell!

Evening I search my coffer
For picked scraps day’s offer
Find little as toil’s return
A few pennies and much heartburn!

Night finds me a coveted treasure
Can’t count them without measure
Were buried in the daylong grind!

Released the threads rule my head
Freed from the clutch of bread

*Bowl and bowel leave my mind!

‘There’s nothing wrong with you’ said the doctor
‘I find you a perfectly healthy guy
But…
One thing I find awkward
A little aberration
In otherwise a normal man
Your way of speech
A little funny
If you pardon me
Irritating too
About which little I can do
Though speaking in rhyme
Is no crime.’

*‘Doc I didn’t mean to offend
Would hence try to mend
And do my bit
To kick this bad habit!’

Rate me vote me on the given link
Beg you please see my hopes don’t sink
I’m word monger poet laureate valiant
Want some fame a few bucks’ aspirant!

Rate me vote me cast me not out
I too will vote for you don’t be in doubt
We traders in dreams are poets every bit
No harm if we compete in the way earn profit!

Rate me vote me let my hopes soar
A little recognition I want nothing more
From the crowd find me hear me holler
Let your clicking vote bring me a dollar!

Rate me vote me I know I may not win
But I’ll fight bravely this war is not mean
If I earn a victory will be a cause to celebrate
The burial of poetry win of voting rate!