Jay.
He was a nineteen year old high school dropout.
He was black.
He wore his hair in dreads.
He had a few nose rings.
He wore gold chains and expensive clothes.
He went partying every night.
He got drunk on alcohol but his drug addiction was the biggest problem.
He had a lot of friends.
Because he was ‘cool’.
He was the ‘man’.

Gray.
He was 18, finishing his final school year.
He was white.
He wore his hair very short.
He had large round glasses, sitting lopsided on his nose.
He wore a long sleeved shirt and trousers.
He studied hard, and he got good marks.
He played the cello in the school band.
But he was gay.
And so he didn’t have any friends.
But he had his family who he loved dear and who loved him back.
He was happy.

The differences between the two are unbelievable.
They are nothing alike; they are complete opposites.
Yet, they are human.
They walk the same streets, at different times.
They both live on the same planet, if not the same world.
They both have a right to live.
They both have people who love them, despite all they are.

It’s their differences that make Jay and Gray human.
Both of them.
Until Jay raised his gun and fired three times at Gray.
That’s when Gray was lost to humanity.
And Jay had lost his humanity.

Coz Jay shot in the chest a boy named Gray
Killed him without giving him any say,
The boy who did no wrong, but was gay,
With his life, he had to pay.
His family cried in despair and dismay,
For their loving son had been taken away,
And now they all sat in silence,
For Gray would never see another day.

For souls who have had their lives ripped apart, and those who rip their lives apart, we pray.

What is Poetry?
When your legs are numb,
Blood parching in your veins,
Throat choking from the pain,
And the fingers hitting the keys of the keyboard ceaselessly,
Trying ever so hard to create something impetuously,
Its poetry, you type.

When you dream of the possibilities,
And in what was once unimaginable,
You make the reader believe,
And change the way how their life, they perceive,
Its poetry, you dream.

When you play with words,
Just as an artist would play with colors,
To create a masterpiece,
That reaches the depths of the reader’s soul,
And burns them inside like coal,
Its poetry, you paint.

When you thread
Your fears, your desires,
Your insecurities, your pain,
All just to stay sane,
Its poetry you weave.

When your heart is melting
Like wax candles once lit,
And drops of tears smudge the ink,
To your knees you sink,
Its poetry, you bleed.

I live in Kerala, South India
Where it's usually unbearably humid and hot.
But it’s been rather different lately,
Cool gusts of wind have been brought,

Along with some rains that have turned into floods
Poisoning even fresh water with mud
And so the people, just like the fish our local fishermen catch,
In a net they have been caught,
Leaving friends and family distraught,

Coz trapped by water, a symbol of life,
People have suffered death
And been left to rot
In the houses where water breathes in human space;
Imprinting in our minds a memory we would like to erase.

Everywhere I look I see prayers, with help sought,
But people are just having their hopes shot.
The only grace is that atleast those who have their heads above water
Are having their prayers slowly answered.

I thank God for the army,
Who for the safety of our lives have fought
Pushing through broken homes with everything they’ve got.

I thank God for the navy,
Who have sent men in fleets
Just to save our countrymen off the flooded streets.

I thank God for doing everything to keep us safe and alive,
All so that we would not have to make that final dive.
Quite literally.

Right now, we may mourn this disaster that has led to our demise,
But I promise you, our beautiful state will rise,
And when I say this, I assure you, I speak no lies.

She’s perfect,
Her adorable face,
The vivid colours of her soul,
But my heart,
Every moment without her it sinks,
Coz without her there’s an empty hole,
Loving her from afar
Has been nothing short of sadness and pain
It has definitely taken its toll,
But answer me this;
How can she look me in the eyes,
And not realize
It’s my heart she stole?

It had been almost a year now.
Scrounging around for supplies was proving tiresome.
Everything either went rotten or protected by wild beasts.
In this world ravaged by flares, animals who had seemingly taken over the world for themselves, were fighting simply for survival.
The man locked himself in a room with all he could secure.
But at this point, his sanity was at its breaking point.
He sat nursing his wounds from his last fight with a wolf.
He wondered, against which monstrous animal he was going to have to fight for his life next.
Which demonic creature was going to try tearing him apart limb from limb for a bit of food.
Which savage brute was going insane and was willing to rip apart his bones, if it meant surviving for another day.
Then he heard a knock on the door.

He stared down into those deep brown eyes.
He loaded the gun.
He took a deep breath.
He sighed.
It was now or never.
The small, gentle hands of the young boy were trembling, scared of the reflection, showing him holding a gun to his head.
He decided.
He couldn't take it anymore.
He pulled the trigger.
But not before he moved his hand away from his head.
The mirror in front of him shattered.
Society's opinion of him was in a similar condition.
But for the first time in months, he smiled.
Unlike the millions before him, he defied the world.
He was alive.

Shaky hands reach out
Wrinkled hands, bony fingers;
All for a little bit of salvation
From the heat and the hunger.
Ribs sticking out of his chest
Lungs wheezing,
Struggling to breathe properly
Inhaling the unforgiving dust and smoke.
Sleeping on the cold concrete
With a frayed mat for warmth.
Worry lines permanently etched
Around his weary eyes
Realizing he can barely support
His family because of his sorry state.
But still he gets up and works;
Begging in alleyways,
Rummaging through trash bags,
Working in factories that tax him
Making him look gaunt;
All so that his loved ones
Can sleep with food in their tummies.
A poor man with a responsibility
Is the toughest soldier
This world can craft.

Every scar narrates a story.
Just like every drop of ink illustrates wars fought.

The worst part of writing with a quill
Is when the stories don’t flow no more.
After a point, there are no more secrets to spill,
Without sounding shrill and repetitive,
And falling to the floor, tired of this ****,
Trying to make your words sound ‘lit’,
While in fact just disappointing your readers
Just that little bit.

The church bells went for the last time in the day.
Bands played music in the streets.
The wanted man was running home.
Scaling the rooftops, he jumped from building, unawares of details as he evaded the cruel, corrupt cops that chased him down the long winding streets.
Eventually he stopped, seeing the distance between the pursuers.
Thats when he saw it.
The sky was a stunning shade of purple.
The peace that the set sun had brought about made him realize that it simply wasn't worth running anymore.
He stood on the ledge, getting ready for a leap of faith, when She stood by his side.
He reached home, he realized with a shock.
"Time to go?" She asks.
Her startlingly green eyes bore into his deep brown ones.
With a smile, he realized what she was asking.
Turning towards the sky, and glancing back at her, he figured.
There were worse ways to die.
He nodded.
And they jumped.
And they kept falling.
And they never stopped.
Turns out that was their punishment for their life's crimes.
But they didn't care.
They were dead.
But they were together.
And they were finally free.

I wake up seeing bruises on my body.
Huh.
Turns out self harm can knock a person out
Just as much as her smile does.

The monster that has no name.
The faceless beast that makes one feel
Utterly helpless
Simply by pretending to be
As warm as a blanket on a cold night
But really wrapping one
In a layer of despair and melancholy
Wound so tight that
We can barely feel the heaving of our chest,
Reducing the bravest souls
To a weeping, dishevelled mess
Curled up in a ball on the unwelcoming concrete
Eyes shut tight
Trying to block out anything
That may ever inflict pain
Ever again.

He started walking quicker.
Deep inside, he felt scared and hollow.
For as long as he walked under streetlights,
He’d be leaving a shadow to follow,
But if he walked where light didn’t shine,
It’s the darkness that would consume him whole and swallow.

Coz it started by seeing the crimson on the concrete,
Dripping down the street,
Cop just standing there, standing on both feet
But doing nothing to the man holding a ****** knife sitting in the Lexus’ backseat
And not stopping the passers-by from taking a pic and putting it in a tweet.

But our main guy, he’s no saint,
He saw the whole thing go down,
He watched the killer plunge the knife with little more than a frown,
And he stared at him slamming the Lexus door and rolling on downtown.
But he just let the murderer get away.

Because on his hands he’s got the same taint,
Just a bit greener coz all he does is steal,
And after all, isn’t there a gun right below his heel,
For later in the night, when he goes to make a “deal”?

But seeing a fellow criminal made him stop and understand something,
He rips off his mask and begins to kneel,
In his head, the whole feeling is so surreal,
Because the big question on his mind was, “Is a sinner finally beginning to heal?”