A wise way to speak is to let silence perceive—
Yes! Yes! That is the way to live.
Arguments and violence are the norm,
While the silent ones are obviously a freak.
Enigmatic world we live in;
Society rants status, yet none pass the criteria.
Oh, you've such a beautiful fever dream—
Nope, I’m just suffering from malaria
Everyone's a threat until you get them to confront ya.
Weren’t you speaking volumes?
Talkin’ about how you’d demolish me!
Nope, that’s just my dyslexia.
Even the once stiff Language now follows the belief.
Instead of “figures of speech”, there are “figures that speak”.
They swear to follow democracy! They care only about our currency.
Oops! I meant to say they only care about competency.
I swear it isn’t a gimmick! Oh! you meant to say Hypocrisy.
Well a little dilly dally is fine for such a huge democratic bureaucracy!
Let’s change the tone a bit.
These niche little hypocrites
Care only about positions, propaganda and politics!
You think they care about us?
Sure, when the chicken talks to sheep
which causes a flock of birds to beep, just like when “Thanos” snapped the gauntlet and blipped and none of us got up our seat and raged all over the streets when “Iron man” died on that clip. Welp let me order me a figurine!
These are the things that I’d rather do
Than hear you people preach about bigots called idiots!
(Hahaha No apologies for this slip.) I mean figures! Are you asleep?
Crude words that stick to anyone. Ribbit!
But trust me when I say these figures have powerful latency.
Sure truth maybe a little twisted
Like how dark humour is now everyone’s shtick!
I just bend it so that you too can steal laugh for a bit.
I vent in verses, absurd as concrete truths!
Ahem! I mean to say as absolute as concrete truths!

That feels like a little play fight, isn’t it?
Maybe my memory is rigged but I can’t remember a time
when there wasn’t a confrontation among the fellowship.
Maybe I am a crazy little minx
But it’s crazy how they get to fully live.
A grand life with luxury
That isn’t earned since they were born with it.
Well Excuse me for interrupting a serious topic
But wasn’t there a figure who promised
To build a machine where you throw a potato and get gold on other side of it?
Such a revolutionary idea isn’t it?
Such a great figure with masterclass tapestry
Even Victor Von Doom and Reed paused their fight to gnaw upon such mastery.
Okay back to the topic
Let me remember the times of brilliant dictatorship!
Time when roads were clean.
Homelessness wasn’t a thing.
Sorry, what? You said something?
You mean to say I said dictatorship?
No. I said leadership!
Yeah. That’s what I sai-
Oh! Sorry for the little slip!

Wait a **** minute.
Wasn’t that ‘cause the Poor folks were banned from sleeping
Near the area of regime!
Because it dropped down the housing stocks of the rich
They dropped down a ****** scheme!
I mean that’s understandable, coming from a bloating blob
You’d need a brain to perform a valid thought.

A Nuke of an order to clean the “****” with the machine.
Tragic how standards change
For one of them was the teacher
That taught the **** fool how to act pristine.
Now lost his job so slept near the Bungalow
Until things turn serene.
Now that same tutor is one of the many victims.

None with morality. Not a shred of goodness in them.
All money-hungry, power-driven, slaves of temptation—
Atrocious beings.

Yet we cave in when we are presented with a bunch of choices.
Just for favour or advantage from others.
We play the cards they predict!
And just like how the house always wins.
The circus starts once again.
It's not a party trick.
It’s not a magic trick.
Just a “figure of speech.”

Figures that, you’d speak.
Careful though or you may get the “Slip”.
                                                               — Asher Graves

"गो कोरोना" म्हणत म्हणत,
आले रस्त्यावर आठवले
शाळांना सुट्ट्या दिल्यानंतर,
सगळ्यांनी गाव गाठले

सरकारने केलं आव्हान सर्वांना —
"घराबाहेर पडू नका!"
बाहेर पडायचंच असेल तुम्हाला,
चेहरा तुमचा मास्कने झाका

मुंबईत झाली जमावबंदी,
झाले सगळे सोहळे रद्द
गर्दीत प्रवास करायला लोकांना,
लावण्यात आले निर्बंध

झाली बंद थिएटर, जिम,
लोकं राहायला लागली घरात
कोरोनाला रोखण्यासाठी मात्र,
तयारी चाललीये जोरात

कोरोनाने पाडलं स्टॉक मार्केट,
सोन्याचे भाव पण पडले
लोकांच्या भीतीमुळे मात्र,
मास्कचे भाव वाढले

कोणाचे गेले आईवडील,
कोणी पाहिलं मुलाला मरताना
कोरोनाच्या विळख्यातून वाचव —
हीच देवाचरणी प्रार्थना

I chiseled away at my marble,
chipping off the faults they proclaimed,
carving the weird, the unworthy,
leaving veins of 'truth'
Fingerprints linger in the dust on the floor,
where the best remnants lay forgotten,
the shoes that were too goody,
the hips that were too round,
the laugh that was too loud,
the silly khaki-less fantasies tie-dyed
and woven with moonbeams.
I stood in galleries,
tying my approval to wanted 'yays'
but no one recognized the girl
who was still holding the hammer.
I sat beside her,
my hand upon the chasm,
where a heart should've burgeoned,
and felt only stone,
pining for her name within the dolomite.
The crows brought me a mirror,
reflecting the squareness I had tried to shape
from my hexagonal being,
edges missing, sanded down
to match the softness of the world.
'rebuild' they cawed
recementing, unhallowing,
letting the fractures bloom moss,
and the rough edges catch the light,
we are not meant to echo.
Let the gallery grow wild,
breaking through the sedimentary,
sparkling eternal agate
from the stardust of which we are made.

I set the table before dawn;
the woodgrain clothed in white linen,
adorned with embroidered daisies stitched in hope,
fraying around the edges,
six chairs lay in wait,
none of them needed.
The wind RSVP'd weeks ago,
she brought ash instead of sugar,
while the silence stirred itself.
The roses arrived, already wilted.
I placed them anyway,
in the vase my great grandmother used
for holy water and secrets.
The cups are chipped,
the silver lining of the rims rubbed away,
but they remember the hands that held them,
once.
I pour tea, lukewarm,
for ghosts who do not thank me,
only mirror the steam,
their cries echoing in weighted air.
The sky cleaves beyond these hedgerows,
a throat that has swallowed thunder it cannot hold.
Still, I pass the cream,
to no one,
savoring the semblance of civility,
drinking down decorum,
a peace offering
to those who do not deserve
not even a lump of compassion,
nor a second thought.
I raise the fractured bone vessel,
"Drink",
I spit to the air,
"a toast to the burning
and the stoking of fires
that you just couldn't keep from feeding".
The kettle screams.
The world tilts, cracks, crumbles,
the crumbs unable to be swept from the table,
clinging to edges of lace napkins,
impossible to fold away.
Pinkies out,
I face the heat,
with a fascinator veiling the curl
of a smirk that knows it won't taste victory,
just finality,
steeped in bitter black.

A mere click of a button and you’re jumping for joy

A long way we have travelled from pure chaste intentions but how outdated we still are

Faded memories are what we once called the best of days

Now the faster the earth orbits, the feeble our minds are now becoming

What do we do?

Resembling sharks in the dark, deaf ocean

the wise harbour conceit in the pit of their heart

the language of egotism defining from their faces

Sermons fanning the flames of Ego's swirling smoke

Bold they stand as defenders of the Din

After themselves, who else have they deceived?

Pip
Permanently imprisoned, Peter
The generation aren’t suffering anxiety
They are trapped as Peter Pan
With the ever increasing house prices, the lack of good jobs, the inability to form relationships.
We left our kids stuck, never able to grow up, so they rot, became more unfulfilled.
Imprisoned as a child.

Lack of hope, regression into computer games,
Fake achievement, never seeing a friend.
Trapped at mom and daddy's, enjoying a house price rise and a pension.
Knowing on an Asda salary their best hope of owning a house
Is to mortgage themselves to the point coffee is too much.
A holiday a dream, travel done after uni, not later.
And retirement at 75, ready for a care home.

Odd winner getting graduate jobs and escaping as Wendy birds.
If that was your life, wouldn’t you be depressed?
Score.
On PIP.

They finally get a house — mom and dad die, if they avoid a care home.
The American dream at 65 — homeowners, no hard work.
But not killing yourself before mom and dad
With ****, drink, or a rope.
Even a car, boy to see his friends — with insurance is too much to ask unless mom and dad help.
Three years at university — that being out on license.

Mom and dad need a care home, it will all be taken away.
Ironically being orphaned at 40 is winning.
Take another spliff, try to not look forward.
You will lose your PIP, have your last bit of freedom taken.

Oliver's son is still asleep on the sofa.

The only way to get a house
Is to get a baby when you’re not ready.
Hope the state gives you one.
Enjoy the poetry.
This generation doesn’t have Charles Dickens.
The beauty being made into delicate snowflakes,
To be crushed under Jackboots of a failed system.

Only the old work-from-home people don’t have to worry about the snow.
You don’t get a waterproof house as you walk to work.
Child unable to build even a snowman, let alone a life,
While mom can’t see beauty in a snowflake.
From their house, tax you to pay for their pension.
To envy mom's frozen tears, leaving no trail to tell of the suffering.

Of course PIP is gone.
Your low wage is the old greatness gift.
If you get a snow shovel, food, you might make your own path.
But I’ve Deliveroo food.
I don’t want to go out there in my boots.
I will catch a cold or COVID.
It’s number 9.
Close the gate behind you.

You step off the path — 3 stars.
Think about that.
I enjoy my meal.
Don’t ask for more.
Oliver sings and dances on West End now.
No dancing in my conscience for you asking for more, sir.

Bing bing — one delivery of gruel.
Get walking.
Time for sale.
Don’t eat my gruel.
Better be warm and delivered with a smile.
A second 3 star — you are on the sofa.
Hope mom got nice house.

Good news — it’s Oliver’s house.
Wasn’t he fortunate to inherit so much.
Now Charles wears a crown,
Doesn’t use a weapon of pen and ink.

No how dare u ask me for more
I lost my free tv license I will have u know
God snowflakes how much is the wagu today
Not frozen wagu I don’t like to defrost
How was job search son ? Find anything?
Well you’re only young me at 36

black spores on the mildewed walls
peeling over the wood
rot that even the vultures shun
it grows in cracks and in dark places.

the disease sticks its spiny fingers
down your throat, so you can’t
scream…
silence, silence, it wants
silence.
it wants
absence,
no self left to 𝘣𝘦.

outside, it has been night for years
babes born bawling, not knowing
what stars, moon, sky, sun used to
look like, nothing but the concrete
sea.

and yet, though Purity
has her headstone with the
rest, though there are no longer
prayers
to be blessed
there is good,
there is GOD in this
God-forsaken world,
there is GOOD
there is GOD—
you.

nothing but a scrap
of paper from a make-up catalog
saying,
“Real Flawless™”

but here i am,
unable to stop
thinking
about what it markets to me
what it asks of me
what it stipulates to be
true.

“Real Flawless”

modern day doublethink:
“my body is mine but
Yours
to look at and
Yours
to judge and so i shape it
to the eye that is
Yours—
i am proud though i make myself
small”

“Real Flawless”

mandatory affirmations, prayers more like,
repeat repeat repeat
how much i love myself even
as i consume comparisons
and then calculate the calories.

“Real Flawless”

the only reason
beauty is pain is
because it tears
us in two.

a slap on the wrist;
unguided hand rolls a fist –
knocks back the favour.