In the mango tree
a pair of crows
have made a new home.

While up on the roof
watering the plants
I see the heavenly sight
how they raise their beak
to swallow the trickles
before the heat ***** away
and having this little favor
they're back in usual mood
cawing at their hoarsest
stay away, stay away
come no way near nest
which I do my best to do
stealing a look when they're away
at the three blue nuggets
happy in the thought of
little red hungry mouths

broken
the mangoes would grow
around an empty home.

Why an emptiness within
with the summer wind
blowing away the dust

Why the mute tears
we weren't friends for years
but came together awhile

The earth doesn't pause to grieve
but in the heart of hearts
when a good friend leaves
the void for lifetime hurts.

A dog's life

On the dog the blazing sun pours
but closed are all the doors

hungry and thirsty and mad in heat
the asphalt burns his feet

Isn't there a kind heart
to see and feel his pain

to play God's part
as His will ordained?

Life without a roof

His bed is the pavement
roof the firmament

famished and sick
his pillow is a brick

people pass without a stare
if you're fine all else is fair

their sight is a shame
disreputes the city's fame

Where is God?

Full is His misery's cup
all muddled up
He has no clue

why nothing went fine
with his divine design
what to do!

Is all lost?*

Two gifts you still can feel
in your mind live their trace

to use them if you truly will
love and kindness*.

Words are now
as if
I never wrote

gather as an aching
lump in my throat.

They don't seek paper
only a river
to pour and mingle
in refrains of a dumb sadness
flow away
sunburned and tidewashed
to where the river is widest
deepest with sighs
of life not enough
in once only
and when just begun
ending broken on the shore.

The plump moon lights up my room.

My mind is now a flat graph
no desire no lust no dream

the cold winds from the rumbling sea
make no dent on me
I look at my palms
and see the cracked floor
gnarled roots of mangrove on the wall
blend seamlessly with all I have
like once I had her in this room
love together
taking wingless flight to the moon
but now I more like sitting here
prospecting no words to rhyme
not angered at the blankness
for in this vacuous moonlight
I wait without a hope of gain
without a despair of loss
unconstrained for time
contoured by fireflies
alone
recounting a new beginning
from the end.

He lies flat on the rooftop
looking at the stars.

Useless worlds birthing and dying
he muses
the colossal magnificence of waste

if atrophy is the verdict
why create a complex web of universe
just because someone from an island
would stare at them
in awe of the beauty
seeking a key to the riddle
himself a grain of dust
lost in reading the firmament
and not grasping
of what significance
he is
within his shrinking space and time
in an expanding universe.

On a distant summer
a girl walked four miles
to sell fruits at the haat
and mowed by the May heat
fell asleep on a patch of concrete.

The noon dusts played around her
sleep little girl rest your feet
the winds will play you a song
refresh you with dreams so sweet
the walk back home won't be long.

The sun had slid the shadows grown
when opened her dream dazed eyes
there she was at the haat all alone
her fruits in the basket had dried.

She had dreamed a round dime
clutched in her palm
colored gold with her wish

she had slept thru the time
and when the winds calmed
held nothing to buy home a fish.

Time has flown those dusts far away
years have grown her wise
yet when the winds blow lonely in May
her tears she cannot disguise.

The old man mumbles in a dying voice
had my sons been alive.

A tear wells in the daughter's eyes.

She pours a spoon of water in his mouth
and wipes his lips and her eyes.

Having lit the pyre of his three sons
he was willing to barter his daughter's life
if that made God grant him another son
and here is the daughter by his bedside
feeding, cleaning and even shaving him
her only prayer to God being to save his life
bartering her entire means.

Outside the thunder cracks the sky
and she spreads a tarpaulin over the bed.

my son laments the father.

Inside her is no cover for rain.

I never got to love the girl
she spreads wide her rainbow net
where the sky plunges on crystal river
tides swell to hide her shame
ebb to fill her bag of catch

I never got to love the girl
her hairs in the wind
my dreams spawn
a flower rising from the riverbed
she grants a love in my head
spreads wide her rainbow net
thru the long night of blue moonshine
her frock fills up with sparkling life

I never got to love the girl
could no way be the right match.

Deft hands cut precise whirrs the ceiling fan
closed eyes bar view the scene can't scan
before they reach the ground take windy spin
falling in scattered piles gathered for coffin.

Shreds of gray and black dot the white shroud
little to write about nothing to be proud
don't reduce anymore that's about fine
add not to the growing woes says hairline.

Cool the clime crawls the clock at its own pace
halts the head to think about the changing face
would it look better or yield a worse clown
ridiculed by one and all folks of the town.

Nothing can be done enough damage is done
fiercely to blow the heat waits fiery sun
over sir says barber open my eyes
the one in the mirror doesn't look any wise.

Leaves' dancing shadows on the piece of sun
missing the keen eyes
rebound on the vacant space.

The man played with shadows
weaving them into whimsy shapes
before most of them were pulps of paper
gone into the bin of night.

If not for light
would be no shadows
he was always churning in his mind
probing dark holes of moon
going into shady nooks
seeking playfully alive shadows.

The dead casts no shadows
he brooded
on the space he would leave

but he wished
they had
when he wasn't around.

When the moon hovers hallucinated
on the post canal
breaking in bubbles of fish breath
the white widow of the night
revives her long dead tongue
to lick the scales of your skin
pulling you into her bed of nails
making love with you the whole night
leaving you bruised and insatiate
when they find your shadow
scouring the edge of the canal
with her name on its lip.

In the narrowest of lanes
I found the sweet shop.

Behind dusty crumbling glasses
dozed the old keeper
smelling of sugar, milk and sweat
over fossils of Paleolithic sweets
on a time machine from the century
he never was
to a millennium he doesn't bother about
clinging onto clay by pottery
not succumbing to synthetic
counting not on android
but accounting on parchment
with the art of finger's arithmetic
most intricately scribbled with pencil
announcing progress is a trouble
not designed for the simple
and contentment has no more nitty-gritty
than price and quantity.

Over his head
spiders worked and reworked
from the ceiling to the glass
as have been doing
since Carboniferous.

The man at the studio doesn't like us

we aren't pretty as the teens
not dazzling like the newly weds
our faces are pretty grim
smiles are once a river
foreheads dry riverbeds
eyes hold no commotion
but he does it for money
and winds up quick.

We walk to the river
where under the grey February sky
she plays with our reflections
babbling and breaking us
into unreadable pieces.

the boat pierced the grey mist
and her eyes were misty

it has taken us twenty years
to be on that green island
to dig up the time
she glowed like a butterfly
and I shivered from her touch

her hand is ripened now
but that time
still hanging in the air
unleashed a wildness
froth from which
spilled into two children
chasing butterflies.

Set your aim well
narrow your eyes to see
where hatreds dwell.

It's everywhere in the land
with guns in our hand
we are fighting a war
brother against brother
a battle without cessation
nation against nation
settle with the bullet
more right is which faith
decide with gunfire
which race is placed higher
for centuries the same story
battles make bulk history.

Races raged cities burned
but we never learn
to build one world city
one humanity
only aim further well
narrow our eyes to see
where differences dwell.

Around me is dying another day
silently falling in surge of emotion
in the mournful dirge of the dusk
dropping on the black drongo
flying home in dream of dawn
beneath the first star of twilight
blushing in the kiss of sky
heralding another earth evening
celebrating death in the dire need of
resuscitating life.

In the market I'm a popular man.

So very nice they say
he doesn't even ask the price.

I'm the sellers' good mate
they decide the weight
or rather the mass,

So very kind they say
he's the buyer top class.

I'm the sellers' idol
the quote they call
I pay

So very good they say
he's our man every day.

They decide the rate
decide the weight
even the item

while my mind thinks of a poem.

I held his hand firmly on the fairground.

There were ferris wheel and rocking boat
even a flying saucer
of rides worth a few pennies

but the boy embracing that unlucky age
had his eyes stuck on the shining silver blue
beaming behind the sparking glass
full with rotor blades ready to take off
dreaming a ride to the sky
past the high tent of the circus
over the tallest coconut tree
into the haze of stars
where to only lonely pilots could fly
for being loved and understood
and not questioned for the cracked voice
for the thin hairlines on upper lip
for glancing at the girls
but inducted into the team of thirteen
for perpetually traversing between stars
on free rides into freedom
worth a lifetime.

I used to eye her more than books.

She had good looks
and for me
in the library
she killed the dullness of patience
the stifled air of silence
with her lips' hidden smile
that was quite a diversion
from pouring over yellowed pages
all the while.

In the garden I sought my chance
but she resisted any advance
telling me it's not her
I needed to be in my mind
but a job I must find
for couldn't be raised a family
merely loving in the library.

I think she gave me love
when I needed a job
but by the time I earned the bread
she was already married.

Once I thought of her as Miss Giving
but now as I look back
I have serious misgiving.

I was honing my voice
he was building his muscles
to impress our common interest.

Whenever she was at the roof
he was seen doing squats and push-ups
I was heard singing love songs
taking the notes to that high scale
where my voice invariably cracked
and his bones creaked with exercises.

The three roofs became one battlefield
where two warriors would rather die fighting
than give up the princess to the other.

One day she would smile at me
when I would extend the limit of my voice
the repertory of my vocal talent
but for reasons best known to her
the very next day she would feign
I wasn't existing on the roof
and it was all muscles her eyes got stuck into.

Then she stopped coming to the roof.

The two warriors had only each other as company
the days were never the same
for she was married off to have new interest
and having lost the race for common interest
he started singing mournful songs
and I decided it was time
to give voice to my muscles.

Have you ever counted hour by the seconds
feeling intensely hungry for life?

If for once the sun forgets to rise
this night fails to usher in dawn
what my memories tell me are lies
it's today only I was born.

If this day is filled to the brim
in a blissful child's innocence
yesterday is a bad dream
tomorrow makes no sense.

If only this night is a ceaseless flow
never short of word for a rhyme
on her axis the earth spins slow
and the morn is away longtime.

If only I'm allowed to choose
to relive the life whole night
a fantasy is the hangman's noose
calling me by first light.

Don't let me Lord into the ripe old age
when delirium is the only thing in my head
I don't know when I **** or wet the bed
my mouths can't open a tube in my nose
takes not but teases the end looming close.

Don't let me Lord into the ripe old age
when my legs just wouldn't stand by themselves
can move me nowhere without a hand to help
I don't know when  I would fall on my face
flirts me but fails me that last cold embrace.

Don't let me Lord into the ripe old age
when the marks of time are mind crunching pain
the ones around me don't see a gain
in the struggled breaths that force me to live
defer their tears to mourn and grieve.

Don't let me Lord into the ripe old age
I beg to leave before my mind leaves me
before the loved ones ask wearily
O Lord why not spare us the agony
hasten the end let him die quickly.

The spider was watching Cathy finish her cake.

Thank God, it thought, she hasn't seen me
green me hiding in the green grass, it was grinning.

Why are you so scared of me, Cathy?
do I look ugly, mean, harmful?
once I saw me in a dewdrop
on a blade of grass
the reflection was quite majestic
my eyes were dark as the deep sea
held only peace and no malice.

You too are so cute Cathy
a butterfly in the meadow
on the sky a sparkling rainbow
and how I would have loved
spin my web right there
in the thicket of your hair.

Cathy was singing.

It needed her one glance
to see the spider dance.

To be honest
I don't want to leave
but on my door
the eviction notice
ruins my peace.

You have nothing worthwhile to show
any extension is warranted.

Instead of making good use
you dug up all the excuse
flawlessly lame
in shifting the blame
not giving a penny to the thought
you contributed to the rot
if only by thinking selfishly
the cause was outside you
and the remedy beyond you.

In another two days
I'm shifting to a new home
and you bet
I won't change my trait.

She's a beautiful woman.

When age left her side
she grew a bed of marigold
blooming yellow and red
catching sunshine in winter
and as the years tiptoed to her
a fresh bed of love she made
and lay thereupon newly wed.

The cloth I gave it as cover for chill
is lying still.

Christmas eve was its last night.

Not that I knew
when picked it up
and gave it back
to the cold night.

I'm still holding it
heavy and invisible
on my heart
as my eyes repeat the scene
of crows pecking out its eyes
the head rolling on the earth
eyes closed.

I close my eyes
scared life could be so thin a thread
barely holding
and incredibly uncertain.

There was a handmade cake on my table
and a letter with immature hand:

I start with this
but know that
whenever and wherever I bake a cake
you'll be in my mind.

It tasted not that sweet
I remember
and she was never to make another
in my corners of bitter December.

I have no other Christmas memory.

There couldn't be.

The poet's manuscripts
are preserved for posterity
with odd bits of his personal things
historical than literary
immortalized with passage of time
as his timeless work
perfumed in air conditioned staleness
letters sent and received
the mortal mind sending poems
desiring to be published
and outside on a falling winter day
in a dog's head
the crumbling desire
for a crumb of bread.

Straws and twigs litter the balcony
leaves withered from winter
pigeons have homed here safely
dirtied the place
but I don't mind
not replaced the broken glasses
we can make do with them
our family has grown
somewhere we left the nest
to wither in winter
barely holding together
me and her.

It seems yesterday
she lay four eggs by me
but didn't come to stay
she was soon a memory.

Her plume yellow green
eyes dark as sea
a short time she had been
then gone hastily.

She was not by my side
nor in the nesting ***
my heart was pierced wide
she was all I got.

Seeing me glum and hurt
they brought a bluish plume
I shunned her at the start
my heart was still in gloom.

Before long I fell for her
she preened me soft and sweet
helped me heal the scar
get back lost heartbeat.

Back to happy mood
I worked up one new nest
loved her best I could
putting the past to rest.

Rolled by fast the weeks
good times leave in haste
past few eggs and chicks
death laid her to rest.

Like this they came and went
seasons of joy and grief
the ones my love I lent
stayed but for too brief.

Now stalks me the claw of age
my plume are shedding fast
all I have is a cage
to ruminate loves of past.

Those marble plaques in the cemetery
hold no dead beneath them
yet in the rising mists of winter evenings
when night like loose dark pebbles
fall from the sky
can be heard hooves of trotting horses
from the rows of cold white stones
and on nights favored by moon
is visible cavalry in scarlet serge
with pith helmets and carbine rifles
piercing the terror paused wind
with cries of vengeance
mirthful in washing blood with blood
on the fields of Cawnpore
dissolving into marble white stones
steeped in the peace of moonlight.

He skims the haze of the day
like a cat seeking its food
prowling lane alleyway
to find you in bitter mood.

On your door the unwelcome guest
you would not call him to stay
with him time is a waste
he would better be shooed away.

You hate when he starts to speak
his sunburned face is a bore
must cut him short pretty quick
behind him close the door.

Like you are nine of ten
but he knows his job is done
is rewarded all his pain
if he can charm just one.

The one that ears lends
a carer who knows well
how it greatly depends
a family on one sale.

He was engrossed in his performance
in the enthralled silence of the audience
catching the subtlest notes from the instrument
as his supple fingers played with the strings
erupting into the finest blend of ragas
freeing the souls of all the stress
converging his heart into his music
eyes closed as in a transcendental state.

But I could not concentrate.

The face behind the beard and the unkempt hair
was familiar.

From a long distant day
I remember those fingers performed in a different way.

The afternoon I came back from school
and mom told me her monies were missing
and he was the only visitor to her room
waiting in the pretext of meeting me
but after a while leaving hurriedly.

He confessed and the money was recovered
but never again the breached trust.

The audience rose in ovation fingers clapping
my own frigid in remembrance
of another performance.

when i last met her
her ******* were bursting with seeds
her thighs plump as stems of plantain
and when in the December sun
she dried her hair behind the acacia
i dreamed of lying with her on the grass
drunk in the moaning song from her navel
till the evening drove us cold and old
and darkness stole her flesh from my eyes
and it's almost December again
as she walks with my hands in her
along the field after crop
just tugging my hand once to stop
delicately drawing from her breast
an Agfa snap of two unreal people
in the most unlikely place
looking awestruck into the lens
passing into the evening light
before leaving me halfway
of her cottage and a home.

Detective Dalton is all confused about the ******.

Mr. Smith's head was bludgeoned with a heavy object
the impact reveals the vengeance of the killer
Bill the Butler had before closing for the night
heard the couple quarreling over something
Junior Smith was having a night out with his fiancée
and Daisy the daughter had retired to bed early
for she was to set out for an excursion early next day
Mary the maid had taken her leave by the evening
to attend to her husband ailing for some time.

Dalton has no clue about the ****** weapon
nor any lead to point to the possible suspect
but for a scribble on the page of an old diary
found neatly folded beside the victim's body
that reads as follows:

behind the humble mask is a ***** man
time and again he has ***** a beautiful soul
all just for the pleasure of his flesh
mauled her with his ugly tooth and claw
constantly used her to feed his lust
lost the right to live this man
and he deserves his place in hell
a mighty blow to his head
will for sure end this monster
will do that with my hand
and see his blood oozing out
to recompense for the sin
he forced on her.

The murderer has kept the name hidden in the letters,
Detective Dalton has only to find out.

When moon like an empty plate
mocks the hunger
the famished bones hunt for a morsel.

Clinks of cutlery fires the belly
aroma of meals calls like a melody

there's a table full of happy faces
chewing and chuckling and chattering
picking eating dropping and littering
their plates are full aha never less
food after food over food always
a fire in oven a bed of clean sheet
never they're they're never short of heat
eyes that are heavy droop easy soon
behind tightly shut windows to the moon.

Snuffed out will ***** out all traces of light
they break into wails rending the night
nothing now moves over the dead town
except the bones with moon as the crown.

When we were eighteen
sang the three women in chorus
and the bus burst into Spring.

When we were eighteen
they giggled and sang

the bus was a garden
the seats swings in the wind
the passengers angels and fairies

When we were eighteen
sang the three women
men beamed and the women blushed
as they broke into chorus
when we were eighteen

the ride was free
and they all stood up
their bones bellowing the chorus
their skin shining in the Spring

the child grew into eighteen
the old descended into that golden year
never knowing when their stoppage came
when one after the other they got down
and again it was a bus on the road
but with the whiff of Spring
eternal in the crimson blush
of the sun setting and rising
its engine and axle and tyres whirring in chorus
when we were eighteen

Huddled in the lantern light
they sing of life and death
of love long lost but living
in the ashes of time
a yearning for home
walking the long roads sunburnt
in blistered feet
in the knowledge
healing of pain
is only a rain away
and life is too short
but never too short
to bathe in the power of god
that makes a pauper
be a king
under the canopy of stars.

Have you ever been madly in love?

The old man broke my reverie.

On the long faded green bench white with bird droppings
he was peering at me through his silver grey beard
looking oddly out of place in that college squire park
where only the dreamers at the prime of youth
would sit between classes to exchange love notes
and steal a kiss when the passion couldn't be reined in.

Have you ever been madly in love? he repeated,
and then as if growing impatient by my silence
mumbled, pausing between words,
like they stung him like thorns
it extracts a price been paying all my life
living with a void no other woman could fill
a commitment that breeds only pain
yet makes me insanely boastful
of being madly in love.

It was recess hour and the benches were being filled up.

How many, I wondered, would still hold hands
when the classes are over.

He hasn't buried the baby within
but today he buried the ashes of his baby
crying like a baby
as the river devoured the bone dusts
and all the remnants
of the cuddles and kisses
hollowing him to remember
the guest of his blood
that would feed on his grief
for the rest of his life.

Don’t come to the cemetery at night Peter Xalxo would say
If you are so inclined make your visits in the day
For often in the evening when exam worries were gone
I would go to the cemetery and sit on some tombstone.

I think boy the ones from the other world make visits at nights
And they would not love to find living souls upon their sights
Why intrude their peaceful home and not leave them there alone
When the time after the sunset they think to exclusively own!

Having said this with a grave face he would lower his voice still low
While on nightly posts at the graves I’ve seen in the dark some glow
And at moonlit nights on duty’s round heard footsteps around me
I would advise boy not to step into at night at the cemetery.

He used to tell more such tales to instill in the boy some fear
But come the next evening and at the cemetery I would reappear
For I loved the moon bathed solitude the trees’ darkened shed
The tranquility of the place in quiet company of the dead!

All said I wouldn’t leave out in this account one truthful fact
Uncle Peter’s stories had some effect some impact
They colored my times at the cemetery spent at nights alone
I seemed to feel they were moving the graves’ marble stone.

Then one night as I was coming out around nine o’clock
To my horror found the gate closed with an iron lock
Bewildered I stood there knowing no other ways to go
When there appeared a shadow heard the voice of Peter Xalxo.

I told you boy not to loiter here not disturb their peace of night
This ground here the dead walks now though beyond your sight
Run home and never come back his voice in whisper talked
Some more words he mumbled before got the gate unlocked.

That night at the dinner table my father told mom this
He was such a good man and a great friend to miss
But God only decides in his garden which flower to pluck
Peter Xalxo died this evening suffered a heart attack.

Up the steep steps
as you reach the age old fort,
you breathless behold
the green valley down below
and that magnificent mound of rock
by the name Robinson Hill.

In the sweet silence of birds' chirping,
the winds reek of rifles and gun smoke
and you hear not the rustling leaves
but bullets echoing all over the valley
one more down, another down
as they held the fort till fell breathless
passing into tombs and memorials
you read to pause for a breath
up above the green valley
where the grasses grew over the blood.

Heavy chested I breathe
as the moon whitewashes the night.

The season is changing
and in the wind is the vapor of hyacinth
in the thick of which
the glowworms drink the nectar of night.

They have no philosophy and I have many
like while they dance just for the sake of life
my mind enveloped in obscurity
has shackled my feet and clipped my wings.

I wonder if the glowworms have a mind
that knows when they dance
they have an audience.

Maybe the stars know the same way
when they twinkle.

The fiery wind burns our skin
this simmering summer noon
but our resolve is not paper thin.

the river is all ours
I tell her
and she whispers love notes.

When we retreat under the banyan
she scans the grey for clouds
and I her eyes for a mystic hint.

how lovely it would be
if it rains now
she says.

it would
I swear by the river.

We walk away
dreaming good crop
swaying in the river wind.

When winds at night on windows roar
wax runs out dies candle's flame
you would hear a knock upon door
a familiar voice calling your name.

Don't respond nor open the eyes
the voice is keen over winds' howl
grows it louder its pitches rise
scaring even the brave barn owl.

Pull the blanket up your head
you are safe so long you hide
lie dead quiet not move on bed
with mom asleep by your side.

Between the pause your fears mount
if is a chance to be found out
one two three the calls you count
but count it right leave no doubt.

Three times the voice would call your name
for it has no power to do any more
but move onto where dies a candle's flame
and a child is awake behind closed door.

O Devi, awaken the good in all,
there's no demon, nor devil
but in our mind, our will.

Raise our spirit, O Devi,
to the mountain's height
so we can use our might
to leave narrowness and rise above,

learn to live in amity and love!

So far the story goes
Miss Place keeps everyone on their toes.

For her finding things is not an easy thing
Most of her possessions invariably go missing
Nowhere to be found are objects of her use
And the ones she blames find some excuse
That she is unmindful and blatantly unfair
Her missing comb is there only in her hair
To her desperate hunt for an important file
She's told she's sitting on it all the while
When she lost an earring and was sulking morose
It so happened they said she wore it on her nose
She wonders why her family should at all blame her
If her car keys are found in the dickey of her car
and why on earth should the blame be all hers
when her money is in a book and not in her purse.

Miss Place thinks she knows the reason for such mess
others' gross negligence in putting things in place.

Another day falling
from the crack of yesterday,

a patch of pearl
burning in the amber west
flaring up heaven
firing me up
in the pains of solitude
and poetry.

Home beckons through a dark way
where hope breathes eternal
as lanterns of moonlit leaves.

I won't mourn the loss
but fill all the void
with paper and ink.

Do you remember
The fairy tales we spun
On those blazing summer noons
When the road tar was melting
And we bunked classes
To be under the forest flame
Shadowed from the world outside
When we thought time would be immortal
As you wiped the sweats from my forehead
And with every thread of yarn
I would grip you harder
In an effort to prevent gravity
From letting those moments fall
Into the abyss of memories.

Do your eyes still see the Prince
That never took you away
When you tell your grandkids
The fairy tales?