The dawn and the swan

Home
Threading the mist, eerie and white,
Weaving a day, the dawn and it's light,
As a love to the lone swan afloat,
In a lake that was the old castle's moat,
Asked if she well knew what heat would bring,
And why isn't she North, where there's spring.

The swan
The swan had flown in before her lake froze,
The home where she grew, her feathers rose.
The waters near the nest where she hatched,
Would have it's ripples, with ice, patched.

Across the skies, over varied lands,
She flew with her flock, swinging hands,
And finally reached this cozy lake,
Where winter planned little to shake.
It was then that she met her swan prince,
The ruler of her heart for then and since.

She levied him love, for love she gave,
With promises that ended with their grave.
The world of their own was a shadowed smile,
They played and they swam dreading the while
When they'd chose between her place and his
In flying back North, after winters seize.
This was when she chose to never go,
This was the palace of the dreams she'd known.

Her love, of course, left with memories and spring,
For he led the flock lest duty sting.
The swan embraced joy in the hope of next year,
What if? What if? Oh! The answers she feared.
Hoping the wraths of seasons would ease,
She waited for Northern waters to freeze.

The Dawn
The light knew enough on losing love,
Chasing it's muse forever and above,
Knowing all well both can't stay,
Darkness had to part, there's night, there's day.

But seconds they'd meet, there is bliss,
Sunsets and sunrise, heavens amiss.
It adds no news, there is no love for noon,
But hours of luring the sun and the moon,
Where the canvas and ink exchange grace,
Inseparable but divided unless they brace,
And create beauty for the world to see,
Knowing naught's closer than they would be.

The canvas
But the wait is feared for eternity nears,
What if the painter is deaf, can't hear!
Or may be the view is not overly appealing,
Or may be the colors are there for stealing.
Or may be the picture's a trial and done,
And some other canvas held a happier one.

The Open

From the open space, the wake begins
Tearing screams and gun fights belied.
Wishes pull a hunger strike,
Dreams take a holiday from life.
For the things you've wanted,
For the ones you have loved,
Lad smile.
From the open holes, the snakes slither
Piercing defenses, tears run a riot.
In a second that lapsed, flashes hire
Ruthless priests, gospels bore the friar.
Not the one that was stranded,
Not the one who had won,
Had smiled.
In that openness, in a second,
Waiting to be found in a pile,
Only if you want it to be,
You'll stop and smile.

Waterfall - a prelude

On the morn, of the end of all queries,
We'll slip into peace,
We'll slip out unwary,
Renege on all void and reach
For
The Glow.
On our day, in the land of the fairies,
The winds of the meadow,
The winds of the prairies,
With memories of two lives will,
Flow.
Flow, till it snows.

Immortals

We evolve. Trespassing spaces, ages, experiences, people and void, we have so little left to ourselves. The puniness of our existence and the adversity that accompanies separation, together, descend upon us unlike the smoothness of a child's skin. There have been a plethora of subconscious choices and untraceable footprints in our road to this moment. All these are, but, symbols of our ungratefulness to the past.

The First Hearing

In the summer of 2004, three things fell into synchronisation- me, the only single storeyed house in  Vigyan nagar Kota's main road, the 6 computers inside it. The cybercafé was called 'Heart to Heart'. I loved the people who stayed and who frequented the café. I had grown such an addiction for the place, I can spare the exaggeration and still say I spent 2-3 hours a day there. My friend Sumeet would often pose the proposal of hanging out there, and I would never say 'no'. Those were the summoning of my days of Counter-Strike, FIFA, Yahoo (and internet in general). I last visited 'Heart to Heart' on 29th April 2006, two days before evacuating my residence in Kota.

I have been to Kota five times after that, each time ensuring good food, hearty entertainment, but memories?  I am not fond of memories, specially good ones. They are the source of what poets often refer as 'blissful agony'. I had, each time, decided at the back of my mind that I would never wander near H2H, for it would only bring out memories that I cannot relive. In my last visit, while searching for an apt room for my brother, I hovered towards that familiar neighbourhood. I had made it a point to walk in the farther side of the road, so that Raju bhaiya and his family do not recognise me. I had my head covered although the weather did not demand it. I promised I wouldn't look any more than a faint glimpse towards the only single-storeyed house in Vigyan Nagar's main road. And when I did give the house that fatal look, I felt a chill conduct itself through my spine and a part of me shivered to death within my warm clothing. There was no Heart to Heart, but rubbles.

The Second Hearing

May 11, 2009. I have an assignment demonstration that would buy me a grade higher in Computer-Aided Design course. I have an ache in my neck that rebelled against every horizontal movement of my face. I have a precious overcast weather amid summer that would facilitate my meeting with the love of life after 4 months. Needless to say, I chose to meet. She was a goddess in all her charm, and an unspoken answer to all my doubts. After walking for half an hour, we found a lonesome bench beside an enclosure for deer in a park. Besides the blabbering, which I usually perform relentlessly, I was relishing the very fragrance she enveloped the ambience with. The world seemed such a better place to be living in and my heart had all the life to do so. With closed eyes, I could still feel the comforting rays of the sun dodging the leaves of a stout palm tree in front of our bench.

Months and seasons transcended before I made an impromptu visit to the park with my Aunt's family. The lake of the park had dried up, with the ducks stranded to the damp bed. The palm tree had grown a few metres leaving the ground below it a lost cause for the Sun. The bench, on which we sat and decided to change our lives forever, was demolished. Only rods, that were probably subject to mercy, weren't removed. A day of joy in my life has no memorial.

The Impeachment

When I reiterate the puniness of our existence, I do so with humility. It emphasises how I am slowly coming to terms with things I cannot alter. We are barely ourselves without our past. It makes up for so much of our present, conflicts with it are disturbing and destabilising. We are the providers of our own ignorance and commotion, shelled in an ever pliable self-realisation process. We never change. We evolve.

Sanctuary

Stay, where, there is no glimmer on my face,
It's quiet and you could build a sanctuary,
A cloud fighting rays for your escape.
Lakes,
Wake, up to a dream wide-eyed,
Roses will bear thorns, you'll know
For you too adorned sunset scenes.
Holy herds of grace race against my voice,
As I see lustre behind their silhouettes,
Towards the land behind me,
Seemed to be heaven,
None the time.
Stay, sway, from every road our fathers built,
Build a way, and I'll light its vigil lamps,
And you'll walk alone,
And you'll hide in your refuge,
And you'll call it home,
And you'll have a lesser world to lie to.

Calm

Guilty of the words, the same memories,
I felt forever lonely on a crowded Friday night.
I wish you'd be here, and I'd still hold you dear.
I wish I had learnt to pray when there was light.
Like an island, stuck within all I wanted,
Like a beach being haunted by waves,
With all the water, and but all salted,
The world I've known, I wonder if death saves.

Poisons stealing the breath of its fluency,
Blood plodding for strength and haste,
Fallen vows wait deeper than my sleep.
And without a shout that would seek help,
Or a noise that would announce the pain,
I let the shadow of your calm take over me.

Empty Curse

Voices ring, like horses in
A shelter from the world.
A word to be heard wasn't said.
Branches swing, kites of spring
With winds against flight,
In a sky otherwise dead.
Greens bloom, like painter's loom
Out of the nothing one could see,
Passing stories never read.
Wrinkles spread, like it would they said,
Carry the truth on your face someday,
A death which life led.
Far from life,
On some hill,
Far away,
Its all so great, and all so brave,
All the cheer and plight.

Aftermath, the first

Darkness' retention lazed, in wait of my dreams,
And I lay in emptiness, within and without.
Across trenches that my mind barely swept,
I now bear the rot of yesterday's doubts.
In adherence to perception though, I will
Drink that wine, I remember its land.
A place to forget, in lieu of solace, I drink
To the world and lessons learned first hand.
Daylight hazed, amid the night it seems.
I wouldn't know, I wouldn't tell lies.
It tastes longer, now with the wine's betrayal,
I still recall being lost in your eyes.

Creepy Fog

On the note of dawn, the leaves were struck by dew.
Not quite the smog, the song that bled in the air,
White fog  and pure, whining over Creepy Bog,
Her sombre waves, her motionless crust.
A sword for greens that would face the day,
The drips that fell from the thickness of morn,
Feeding life for tomorrow's dream, while
Sun and its owners plan to rankle who reside,
Proclaim itself the bog's only morning bride.
The oak in the southern marsh though would still smile,
For it has heard  the ballad of pollens flown,
Once when it first learned, then again every May.
True, life bred itself amid death's promise and trust,
As it's seeds of hope ply unnoticed in fog.
Chirps of the sparrows  amass in spring's annual fair.
In stealth of the summer, of course, pollens are few.

Froth

I crossed the road in a boat,
When the levies were drowning in asphalt.
You may want your life in parables,
Or take my problems if you want some.
And, like a wage too high,
I see the morning bride,
Boasting of shine through the day,
Toasting to none but itself.
Alike the froth over snow,
Within winter's wicked lore,
The light through sunset will fade away,
As daylight calls it a day.
The night and its mermaids will remain,
As memory of a life kept in pain.
A furrow in the face of my dreams,
A boat I bought last birthday,
But needed a river too, not today.