Good title here

An awesome start

Continuity maintained

Tense about tense

No repetition of words

checking logic(if any) for a direction

Wrapping up the story

And then dinner.

Bad poems

Are like shed skins of a snake
They glisten and glow
But inside
they are hollow.

And the poet
moves on like that snake
winding around
in search of preys.

We are stories

Untold, and eagerly waiting
to be picked up
By a grandmother feeding the child.

She narrates us while making morsels
and scraping her hand
against the edges of the plate.

Perched on the threshold
the child listens intently
and gazes at a twittering sparrow.

We are forgotten there at the threshold
till one day beyond the seas;
That twitter of a sparrow brings back
the morsels in twilight
To that child, now a man

Atop

The pharaoh laid to rest high atop the pyramid
might not be that lonely for he takes alongside
a few slaves for company.

Those slaves who tried to kill themselves
but failed, would be chosen
as a sort of afterlife punishment.

There were no equals to him in life
But death was an emergency rite.
Slaves were bound to pedestals of the same height.

They would stare at the small door till
the last light escaped.

Ropes are found now
Around shrunk mummies of the slaves
Shrunk as if detaching themselves
from their life and death.

Within the walls

The silence within the walls
has stilled the time;
But outside it is flowing,
And eroding
The crimson bricks in rain.

The imperfections appear dark and deep
like those cracks crawling towards the roof.

Moisture seeps into life
Forming ugly patches
that are expected to disappear
in no time.

Long after the rain
The smell of wet wood stays.
(like her silence)

It refuses to burn as firewood.
and stays in a mossy gloss.
In abandonment.
(like her)

Points to Remember

No.
I don't write poetry for a living.
Who would pay
a wandering soul in empty space
occasionally getting hold of some snappy verse.

Appreciation sometimes I get
But from a distance
Like that of advertisement boards on a highway
Which will be forgotten at the next lamppost.

I pretend to create the poem at one stroke
throwing all the first drafts into the bin.
They get recycled
And some one else in me
writes on them in a different ink
at a different time.

In the bus

I am part of different moments
Which stay long enough
To put them away like this
(wrapped in the alphabet)

People come with stories
And I listen to them leaning
against the window seat
And with an occasional nod.
(and half open eyes. )

Some finish them
But mostly they leave it hanging
And rush towards the exit
In an awkwardness of revealing a lot

I try to look beyond
the spots on the window glass
as people disappear along with their stories.

A more telling story occupies the seat
And we start over.

That name

The sleeping memories are tagged
with just one name
Though there were many others in frame

Later,
Paths must have gone zigzag and random
Like the drawing on a child's slate;
But it is always
That memory and that name.

Box

I guard my ego, without any scratch
like the geometry box in the childhood.

Like those circles, rectangles and triangles
I have different faces stenciled
(both Smooth and sharp)

The coldness of that iron case
Is in my speech;
Pointed phrases like the compass
often dot it.

I have different colors outside
But inside I am gray with graphite ;
Staining the hands that open me up
I leave the mark
in a fading black.

Distance

The distance between moments
is measured by words and silence
we may choose not to indulge
But still time trickles it's way

Being the moment
we mark the time like a candle
Giving out light
and hiding the darkness in us.

What's in front of me

Is a deserted queen bee
In an empty hive
pondering, the buzz of silence.

The abandoned home looks turned over
Exposed and naked
Like the truth behind the lies.

The queen waits in refusal now
Still enchained to the throne
And hears her own buzz
In the increasing coldness of the night.

I write

I write
squeezing in those metaphors
Into a bus-full of stories.

I write
Trying hard to grab a foothold
In those pressing moments.

For I know
it is the last bus home
Though circuitous.

Contentment

Contentment is found
in different things now
Not that the medium matters
But just for the record.

There is relishing of life
And not letting the moment go;
That tenacity of childhood still lingers
Like the aroma of sprinkled spices
long after the cooking.

In reminiscence
We often stretch the time
And in that longing
We some how find
A sense of belonging.

Enough

"Enough
That's enough
what you have written till now
Stop it.
No more stretching of the story. "

The words I hear
as I tease another thought to my bed
To only press it into words
Crookedly
And sometimes wickedly.

Luggage

Remembering the capital cities
was a great excitement in school
I wondered when I would go
to all those places
There are just too many.

While I press my chin
against the window
The stations rush past
and the destinations recede fast.

There is one final dead end
Where the train stops
and there
everything is emptied.

Make up

Her laugh had different colors
like that of spilled petrol on water

With that strong smell of her perfume
Something was locked away from the daily chores
But towards the end of the day the gloom appeared
like a nasty wrinkle out of the fading makeup.

She always found escape in her make-up box
And now, in that nail polish remover
Which she treasured.

Nothing new

There are no new metaphors
Just the drab old ones
Bottled in the synonyms
(Straight out of Thesaurus)

Carefulness is parenthesized
Like the laminated feeble ID cards;
Meanings are too weak to hold out
but nevertheless a filler.

So let me make it
Ergo, break it into these lines
And leave you wondering what struck you
Some trick or mediocrity?

July has

The smell of new books
(Intoxicating like that of varnish)
Fancied friends, pencils and pens
The careful walking around the puddles
While reading the messages on the raincoats.

The drying of clothes on tables, chairs
And everywhere.
The silly things written down
(Poems or just drawings)
Out of joy or the warmth at home.

Melancholy is hard to find
In such an image.
(Even years later, when you reflect)

It will take a little more time
For the pencils to darken.