Pining For A Ghost

Gone are the glories of my peculiar youth

of guileless joys, of tales old and untold,

I was a boisterous young thing – wild and uncouth,

maudlin and mad, belligerent and bold.

The mater was kindly, the pater proud,

the Love of my life nostradamus:

his fanciful words floating like a cloud

yet Sincerity always persisted between us.

I would climb up a hill to be secretly lazy

in the sweet summertime and the verdant spring,

I watched some flowers like iris and daisy

when one day I witnessed just such a thing.

It is providential perhaps that I was there to see

how lovers became cruel and discarded scruple

There sat embracing under a leafless tree:

An adulterous thespian and her friendless pupil.

Wisdom was scarce in those days of yore,

and for me it seemed scarcer than most.

I demanded to end their tryst and more,

But my errand halted when I saw a ghost.

I fashioned myself to be a Hero and Justice demanded

that I disregard the ghost and proceed.

They needed to be shamed and reprimanded!

I wished my decision the ghost would heed.

Unbound by wordly concerns and wordlings alike

The ghost matched my pace and uproariously yelled.

But too determined by half, I missed the offending strike:

tumbled down the hill, bruised and felled.

Some say that it was a diligent wound,

that sought to bring my early demise.

But My Love always countered that I had only swooned—

that within an hour I had opened my eyes.

helplessly I sat and watched as they buried

the motionless girl alive.

yet at the time I raged and parried:

silly, foolish girl! too trusting and too naive.

the girl was me, My lover a nomad

who buried me and travelled away

to another youngling in a distant land

for whom I could now only pray.

Cursed now to everyday go up the hill,

Everyday forget, witness the girl, the thespian, and rage;

in a cycle of realization now stuck to see

Love was forced upon me before I came of age.

The Ghost is me: I shout at myself!

My Lover pushes me; breaks all that was claimed dear,

I cough and cry as dirt fills my nose

with not a soul to see or hear.

a humble crime

tiring days, restless nights

but we don’t look back, do we?

 

oh! to have oblivion again

not this symphony of pleasure and pain

 

a cesspit, a man in the shadow

a storm and a whimper

a disaster past, another brewing

terrible, impulsive, brave; silent, wise, a fool

 

we move away

and onward we go

who knows where

but I wish we didn’t.

 

the soft morning light seems harsh

the wisftulness from March

a devious turn on the road

and we didn’t see how we both fell

too frightened to look up

but we might have caught each other.

 

it is too overbearing to think of

there is lump somewhere in my throat

I hate it.

 

dear poets of yore,

I can’t commit it to word as sweetly

but I know what you mean now

you talked of the bittersweet felony

someone stealing your treasured senses

unlocking a dreaded chest

someone committing a crime

I was the victim

I was the perpetrator

I was the punished

I was the punishment.

 

they leave – must they leave?

it is humbling; they can’t bear my presence

but tell me, what am I to do

if I can’t bear it either?

 

an ancient relic.

i remember that it was a dirty beach and the water was more muddy than clear, replete with god-awful floating garbage that visitors saw fit to discard at the seashore.

i remember my disappointment at not having arrived in some Goa-like destination, and my watchful father dragging me back every time i attempted to dash away deeper into the sea.

i remember pointing out a group of little boys swimming without any parental supervision whatsoever to my mother and her sagely informing me that they were local kids who swam in rough waters all their lives.

i remember thinking that she was possibly a little daft because her answer didn’t make an ounce of sense to me, and then cursing myself for all eternity for thinking such a thing.

i remember the cheerful man with the many floating tubes and convincing our parents to let us use them, and i remember enjoying the panic on the mater’s face when she seemed to topple over from her tube.

i remember how my tube was too big for me and my body folded and sank.

i remember being completely submerged with all but my left arm raised above water, feeling as if i were slowly descending into a different world.

i remember that the water was yellow and my legs looked black and tiny bubbles rose up all around me.

i remember being pulled up just as i felt sure i was going to die, and no one exclaiming or even noticing what had happened.

i remember wishing to run back to the car in which we came but getting lost in all the directions even before i had started.

i remember watching scores of people frolicking about the beach as if it was the best tourist-y thing one can possibly do.

 

i do not remember at which point on that day the merry picture with the three dancing sprites was taken, or why, upon encountering that old snapshot, i saw myself looking delightfully engaged with my two playmates.

i do not remember having enjoyed the trip or having felt anything other than constant mild annoyance with everything and everyone.

 

but maybe i only remember what i want to remember, and i’m afflicted with the same human ungratefulness for the stores of memories that i do not care to relive because i feel so justified about my misery.

 

maybe, just maybe, we are all happier than we seem to think we are.

 

the three dancing sprites: the photograph

 

 

The White Day

Judging by the way the weather turned-

By rising mist and flaking sun,

By bloody clouds shouting at all to run,

By rushed cars and blaring streets,

By a thousand rushed heartbeats,

By indolent winds picking up their speed;

A fine white day had begun.

 

Judging by the way the weather’s crowd cheered-

The graying sky pushing them down to the earth,

They pelted on rooftops and were meant to be heard,

By a whimpering dog crying for his master’s return,

And morose children longing for the summer sun,

It was uncanny for it to be so in April month;

A rare white day was earned.

 

Judging by the way the housewife shrieked-

The clothesline drenching with alarming speed,

The children muddying without a heed,

The master soothing the dog and not her,

And the blare of the streets throwing the neighbor,

From his solitary reflections on existential wonder;

A noisy white day was gleaned.

 

Judging by the way the master escaped his penance-

From a scorned woman who still got no chance,

Because the children won’t relent their dance,

Of merry woodland creatures and sprites,

Of kings and queens and damsels and knights,

Then the clouds relented their hold on light;

The white day was the neighbor’s trance.

 

Judging by the way the weather turned-

And how the neighbor mystically learned,

That the noise of life is shrouded by the sun,

Yet it inevitably comes forth,

When white days descend on our comfort,

And become the harbinger of discord;

They are something we can ill-afford,

Our semi-content days wish to see no dearth,

And our routined lives wish to pass the earth,

In dull, unsurprised candor.

dreams of dystopia

helpless and fragile

the shadows in my dreams,

and the people in my home,

their bodies – small and weak;

the captors of light

at large in the streets;

we rot in a catacomb,

nasty, derelict and meek.

 

 

they cage free souls

where there once was a park

bind them in locks

and bellow and hark;

there used to arrive

a singing skylark

and bright eyed girls in frocks;

the frocks now dark.

 

 

it has never been hard

to raise my ire,

when a dimwit casts

lousy verdicts in high towers;

but of jibes and slurs

I never quite tire,

it fills the void that lasts

for hours upon hours.

 

 

a pauper’s share

has never been much

but more it has been

than my paltry lot;

my twelve year eye

has never seen much

but more it has seen

than I care or ought.

Ballad of a Bastard

A snowflake brushes against her cheek

Then two, then three, then a hundred more,

Carefree, she saunters down the peak

Sings fables of rife histories and lore.

 

She rants about deceit and vengeance,

Disdains being wronged and misled,

With sparkling eyes and hair like the angriest blaze

Enough to raise mad visions in my head.

 

Takes my measure with the archest smirk

And proclaims being wild and free;

Strange, audacious, sinfully glorious –

All ungodly thoughts take a hold on me.

 

She provokes me with her wily ways –

Calls me a sad, ignorant boy,

Was she my captive or me hers?

I stumble and sink under her ploy.

 

Onward I trudge as a prisoner,

The veriest greenhorn who lost all his friends,

I adapt falsehoods to stay the rumors astir

To keep me walking till the tale ends.

 

I contrive for myself security and trust,

Make a fool of all but her,

Yet she beckons my timorous lust,

To her sanctuary and a thousand promises of wonder.

 

A kindling flame can burn the brightest,

A shadow can outlive the flame;

A bastard can ­have the luxury of choice,

But the wild and the free cannot be his to tame.

 

A peculiar thing to find passion in distress,

One loathes leaving it just so;

But choose I must for my brothers’ sake,

And all desires I must forego.

 

The course is set, the journey afoot,

The offenders ready and the plan made;

Yet how do I lie to those fiery eyes,

And walk back to days of blackness instead?

 

The betrayal is done, my love is lost,

I can feel her seething breath,

I corrupted her warmth into frost;

My treachery outdoes the damnedest death.

 

We toil to ignite the deadliest fire –

Wreak havoc and horror and blood and gore,

And I at the helm of it all,

Fearing yet yearning her form at my door.

 

Battles and wars were never my destiny

But that is how I am granted reverence,

Carried not on shoulders but on hearts of brothers,

Call it fate’s ironic deliverance.

 

The firelight has died, the room grown cold,

The rages of the Watch still ringing low,

But the loudest whisper that steals my sleep –

‘You know nothing, Jon Snow.’

A Measure of Hysteria

The room was choking, insufferably tight

A flash of light outside

Woke her up, drenched in sweat and the fleeting aftershock

Of another wretched nightmare

As it teetered at the precipices of her mind

Irrevocably dwindling and yet not,

Never releasing her from its ceaseless, haphazard vacillation

She has no sense, no memory of the hallowed reality

Forever out of her reach – sometimes it bothers to extend an arm;

A half-hearted offer, a dismal display of help

But just as soon withdraws it-

She is back in the pits and trenches

Of her demonic reminiscences

Yielded to these tricks of her mind

Accepted the widespread infamy, given her consent

To the office of derangement and sickly hysteria

At least it stops the flood of hows and whys

And the pities and sympathies she has no room for;

The room is insufferably tight.

 

 

The flash comes again and retreats

Designed to tempt her out of her stifling confines

She walks to the window, and is astounded

At the endless black of night

‘Slow, soothing, gentle,’

She gazes at it in awe, so different from her thundering heart

Oh! To be able to touch it!

The best of happiness lies in its outreach

Never does she wonder what augments her belief–

The allure of the night’s silence, the luxury of escape,

Or the tact and delicacy of the night,

The night that deigns to invite her

To an hour of violent abandon

A sarcastic offer;

Yet she indulges her naiveté

To clamber out of the recesses of her soundless hell

From all the indelible tortures, the asinine memories-

That claw at her skin and shrivel up the walls of her soul-

Bound to her like the night had decreed.

 

 

The wind howls at her, the trees shake their trunks

The sounds of the night rage at her folly,

Mock at her with all the sincerity

Of the disgust that follows her everywhere

She cannot escape – there is none

The implacable anguish – her constant companion

A guiltless soul mate

Till death do they part?

The epiphany of that moment is more pragmatic

Than romantic;

She devours that ephemeral consciousness

And in a quick bid to follow it,

Breaks her bones and cracks her veins

And rips apart the tyrannical shroud

Of godless and faithless remembrances;

Now the night stares, its sounds rendered speechless

As she spills blood on the frosty floor

A punishing red against hues of white

She becomes one with the night.