Cunning, Cunning,
they need thy aid
who tread the earth
in human frames
from one ordinary sunrise
till one ordinary sunset,
a fleeting moment -
the breadth of a lifetime.
Thy helping hand
to smile, to please,
and sometimes
to shed a tear;
to love and be loved,
to be unmoved, unhurt,
to be indifferent;
to not be different,
to be like and be liked;
to hide and seek,
as well as to be
at two places at once;
to be the same child
to one's parents;
to be the same parent
to one's child;
to be in a family,
to be a friendly neighbor,
to go to work daily and
to change into a thousand
versions of oneself;
to write
but not give oneself away,
also, to write
to give oneself away;
to not be touched
by Art;
to not believe in another;
to not always be right,
to be a great hypocrite;
to live and let die,
that is, to survive;
finally,
to do the things
one does
to prepare for the end.

Love is like a little bird
on a rainy day;
it finds shelter in a tiny nook
carved in the grand design of a
building or formed in a
tree by the arrangement of leaves
and cloistered branches;
it remains well out of our sight
for we care little about
dusty nooks in brick walls
or tiny gaps under eaves
when the sky comes
pouring down
and forces us into our own
big shelters built of
cement and stone,
or the foliage in the garden
that we had carefully pruned and grown.
The birdie shows up,
and sings a sweet love song
at our windowsill
once the rain is gone
and the sun is out...
but it is not the little bird
on a rainy day anymore.

For your convenience
and mine, I am
kind and sensitive at times, just
enough to make you believe that

friends like me are
rare. That's why you can't make out when
I** begin to
exploit you and it is when you begin to
notice, that I defend myself, say you exploited me,
dump you like I planned and
soon become a fake friend of someone
hapless and rare like you were, while
in the meantime you become like me;
perhaps that's why fake friends are not uncommon.

I know, that night, lying on our magic carpet
in the quarter-light, floating in our little dorm,
we cared not about those details
that bother when in broad daylight,
we didn’t mind the improprieties
that pinch when in public spaces.

We were sailing close to the wind,
communicating through fingertips,
unknowing the memories that pricked…
We veered through a common dreamspace,
nestled into each others’ chests
and memorized the sounds they made…
Yes, that night I cried, like that bizarre fish
that refills its own pond of water,
copious tears that went over both our heads
and the carpet sank so deep
that all its magic went down with it.

People of the world, like me,
we wake up every morning,
brush and breakfast…
and believe we are going about our life
making our  presentations,
making it to offices in time,
picking up kids from schools,
running marathons,
travelling on trains, planes,
cars, trucks, ships, carrying cargo,
mail, tourists…
dashing to dinner appointments,
shrink sessions, PTA meets,
blind dates, getting in and out of taxicabs,
pushing our way through traffic jams…
but if you zoom out a little and look
at our trails from up there,
you’ll notice that what we are really doing
is tracing circles around you… one round at a time.
Because, we are the satellites, asteroids, cosmic dust,
but you, my dear, are the star.
The difference between me and the other satellites?
It’s just that, unlike all the others,
I shine as bright as I can when the light
from your eyes falls on me…
even if you’re light years away.
I’m your moon! And baby, you’re my lucky star!

I

If only the world's most brilliant of scientists
could somehow capture the manner the pen glides
on the paper guided by the motion of your hand;
and put that method on sale;
she'd trade all the love poems she'd ever
written in your memory, in ink and in blood, on paper,
on water, on dusty table-tops, on fogged windshields...
to hold her pen your way and for once,
sign your name against hers.

II

If only the world's most masterful of painters
could somehow capture that same glint
that sparked in your eye the innumerable times
you played a successful prank on her;
and put that painting on sale;
she'd trade all the dreams she'd ever seen, sleeping and
waking, of the future, of the past, as a child, a teen,
of the utmost improbable, of the nearly possible...
to look straight into that glint and for once,
be outshone by your mischievous radiance.

III

If only the world's most dexterous of engineers
could somehow capture the intonations in your voice
when you sung out loud the songs on your mind,
while your conscious brain was occupied elsewhere...;
and put that audio file on sale;
she'd trade all the sounds that ever fell upon her ear -
from her mother's lullabies to her first uttered words,
the music of heartbeat to the pattering of rain,
the rustle of leaves to the soft beating
of sunlight against walls and windows...
to fill the void with your voice and for once,
not know any sound in the world, but yours.

IV

If only the world's most evocative of writers
could somehow capture the deluge of emotions
that ran through her being when she was
going head over heals for you -
the first hug to the first kiss, the holding of
doubtful hands to the perfectly interlocked fingers,
the rendezvous in the coffee shop to the  first dinner
together, to the evening spent in a Lovely restaurant,
and the big-time quarrel on a rainy day;
and put that experience on sale;
she'd trade all her learning - the alphabet, the bachelor's degree,
the wisdom of past relationships; the stepping stones to success;
the laws of Newton, Heisenberg's Principle,
the 4 Ps of Marketing, Black-Scholes and Black-Holes;
to go through it all over again, and for once,
end her life by the breath-taking emotion called LOVE.