A grieving wife.

Recalling our cherished moments is not an option at all.
Your effortless smile & warm hugs are too painful to reminisce.

Wait. Let me recover from the catastrophe,
How did I lose the father to my son and the son to my father?

And to me, you ask?
To me, you were the face I always longed to see, months together.

But was my longing not enormous enough this time?
You have returned only as ashes and your red guitar pick.
Your precious, precious guitar pick.
It lies safely with me now.

It will remind me that you were more than your uniform.
It will remind our country that they lost a son who had a heart full of love & life.

It will remind the world that you were a thriving human as ordinary as a civilian and as extraordinary as a martyr and that your unwavering devotion to your duty did not imply that death is commonplace at our homes.

Life & Mortality; my renewed views

(This is penned after reading the book INNER ENGINEERING, ADIYOGI & internalizing some of Sadhguru’s teachings via the Inner Engineering Course).

Life used to be a mournful transience,

Much like the fragrance of a burning incense,

A series of bittersweet memories etched in my mind,

Interrupted by vague smiles embedded in my lens.

Now mortality is inevitable,

Every minute closer than the last,

I used to live in blissful ignorance,

Because time never seemed to navigate too fast.

I saw flowers blooming everyday,

And then I saw them wither away.

I observed the cycle of nature repeatedly,

Unaware that this witness wasn’t here to stay.

But now that I am able to perceive,

All that there truly is;

I breathe far more joyfully,

As I have begun to know life,

Just as it is.

The void within

Photo by Oleksandr Pidvalnyi on Pexels.com

The unsettling mind, the constant noise,
The rumbling silence & void within.

The melting masterpiece,
This work of art & perseverance,
Sweltering sweat & patience.

You are here now & then you are not,
Thoughts traverse through the fabric of your restless mind,
Like the countless threads across a handloom.
Zipping & zapping across your existence,
Hoping and praying for a moment of pure stillness,
To unveil the emptiness, the vulnerability,
The hapless core of immense plasticity
That is truly you.

The Relentless Parvati

O mighty rock, would you please speak to me;
Of how you are seated, where once I use to be?
And speak not of the things that follow a natural order,
As you and I have existed without any superfluous border.

You must recall how I would swiftly run past your side,
and you would ask if all this water was because I laughed or I cried?
I would smile at your pleasantry and splash around some more,
and tell you how I was yearning to reach my farmer’s shore.

I always brought to you stories, Of how I lived to give.
And of how I nurtured a little spirit into a tree and taught it how to live.
But now there are no buds who will ever bloom,
As you stand here in your glory sending my children into doom.

But mighty rock, please know that I am a mother too,
and I will find a way to my children despite what you do.
I will gush and I will flow through your tiniest crevice.
and you will come to fear my voice, my roaring laughter and vicious cries.

And if you try to stop me all together, O mighty rock, please do know;
There maybe a better friend than me, but there is no mightier foe.
I will uproot your concrete trees, and split your earth into two.
I will pave a watery way, To the golden sun if I have to.

And when I am again where once I use to be;
I will pardon you for all the horrors, But will you be able to set yourself free?

Fair UnFair

 

What is fair and what is unfair?

Where is that line? How does it look?
Is it as clear as the seashore – one step too dry, one step too wet?
Or is it like the horizon – deluded, confusing and subjective?

What leads to clarity?
An understanding of this abstract ray,
Or is it when one learns to skip back and forth without a cringe on the face?

How does one describe a successful relationship?
By the ratio of fairness to utter and absolute unfairness,
Hoping for the solution to make some sense,
Or by knowing that the solution is always one,
And the chemistry of the water of life has one part each of hydrogen and oxygen.

That life itself is more Grey than the greymost of skies,
Is more foggy than the highest peak during a blizzard.
And is more complex than the epicenter of a whirlpool.

Or is it when one knows that life probably doesn’t answer these questions.
Not in any pages, not with any experience.
For life perhaps doesn’t know how difficult our minds are.

Woman

A rain drop leaves the thundering cloud,
Is she running away or plummeting towards?
Is she finally weary of heaven’s autocracy?
Or has she always been an infidel lover of earth?

There at a distance, a flame lights up.
Did she happily burn herself to bring warmth to her lovers?
Or is she screaming because his atrocities make her soul quiver?

Somewhere an apple plopped on a mighty head,
Heck! She falls all the time.
Did she throw herself away to provide for him?
Or simply because her shoulders could no longer bear the weight of her crowded head?

Rain may decide to drop or not,
A wick whether to quiver and melt,
A fruit may be simply eaten on branch,
But at the juncture, she must decide.

She must choose a direction for destiny,
Either she must eat the guilt, drink the hatred and swallow with grace her fears,
Or she must jump from floor to ceiling,
Raise her voice and often others’ too.

Either way the choice is hers.
There’s not more dignity in coming out than staying within.

For each soul has its own reparative measures.
To be at peace, she must know for herself,
How to mend, sew and furnish her own mind.

Remembrance

So subtly you have made your presence felt,

Or should I say your absence missed?

How effortlessly the sugars of your thoughts melt,

In the waters that my soul has kissed.

How vainly I believed that you were washed away,

Unaware of your surging tide.

That the slightest of breeze nudges you towards my way,

For you are the shore, within whom I confide.

You could be a million miles far,

Or next to my pillow, just a toss away;

But now I know that like an ever twinkling star;

Your memories etched in my sky are here to stay.

The War Cry

Someone is singing of the mighty and brave,

Someone is taking a sword to the grave,

While someone is flowered with sweet victories,

Somebody’s soul from the body frees.

 

Somebody has won and somebody has not,

But fear defeats all, all those who fought,

The dread in the eyes, hides behind complete despite,

The most pitiful. Oh! Such a pitiful sight.

 

All of the children who are orphaned and starved,

Worse so are all the men who are halved,

blood and sweat aren’t easy to clean,

Years pass by, still the nightmares are seen.

 

Somebody new will now sit on the throne,

Somebody’s reign is now old and outgrown,

Will the poor peasants like the new king’s face?

Sorry. We don’t look in the eyes of the grace.