April 8

“Everything will be all right. Don’t worry.

Thanks for everything.” Words that put my
Mind to sleep. He walked away, she chose
Not to return.
“Given you trouble at this age”.
“We are with you, my dear.”
Years ago,
She walked away; I chose not to ask why.
Those times I slept well. Now there are
Nights without sleep.
I walk through the day
Telling a hundred stories
To myself with the same ending –
Going away.

April 9

All our philosophy

Of millennia vintage
Turns its back
On injustice of centuries.
The lone lama wanders
Through the world
Attracting attention
To the occupation of his homeland.
There is space for him in our heart,
And we lose sleep if tribals refuse
To make way for mines
leaving their forest land.
We have time for messengers of peace,
for strong men of development,
for weak men hankering after nuclear power
and for middlemen talking weaponry.
We lose no sleep when
Ragpickers’ slums are gutted;
the city got cleaned up.
We have discovered a formula
To get rid of poverty.
Recruit the poor in the police force
And get them finished in the jungles of Dantewada
At the hands of the militant poor.
It’s their destiny. There’s nothing
More practical than philosophy.
April 10
Power supply went off again.
There was no water in the tank.
We could not run the washing machine.
We waited and when power came again
The water wasn’t sufficient
to feed the machine.
These things happen here
and we are used to it now,
so don’t fret and fume about it.
Instead watch the match on the TV.
My team lost there too.
This morning I chose to read the
newspaper from front to back – after
many years. It only carried
stories of women and their grit,
determination, kindness and beauty.
---
I have never seen an oasis;
I don’t need to.

April 11

The heat is getting on to me.

Been trying to open
My mind
With the usual key
Of solitude.
The lever turns
But the inside latch is on.
Never happened before.
Need help – the keys man cometh.
Open I must, it’s now or never.
I will be an outsider for eternity.
There is plenty of help
Coming without asking.
Try another key, they suggest.
It doesn’t work.
Nothing now remains but
To climb up, open the door
To the upper reaches and get in.
I can’t, but there is my Krishna to do it.
It’s so peaceful to be helpless!
April 12

Not happy with

The way things turned out
You tried to change
The world.
Nobody took note.
Then tried to
change your ways.
Nobody was interested.
Screamed and shouted.
Some turned to look.
You then got tattooed
On arms, legs, back and
Lower back.
They now feature you
unpaid in their columns.
The ultimate unclaimed
death.

April 13

I am intrigued
By the sheer idea.
Releasing ancestors
From the psyche
And setting them
on the path of liberation.

I am already lodged
In the deep recesses
of the mind of my
children.

How will I get release

If they don’t even know
I am there?

I don’t buy this,

Not on the 97th birth anniversary
of my father.
He passed away 24 years ago.
April 14

The fruit is in the making

even when
it is not seen.
Sometimes the wind
cheats
to blow the tiny one
away.
It could be the clouds
that play truant
to roast the young 'un.
Or the rains
that cause
an early fall.
If it lives to ripen
and fall into your lap
it is truly
Nature's gift.
A gift is not something
you earn by
the sweat of your brow.
It's from a love in the heart
to a heart in love.
Then life is in the making.

April 15

“I am waiting to walk,
But you need the money
At the end of the day, you know.”
The mind that spins
illusions
has an urge to create or destroy
but no resolve to take consequences.
It hides the fear
underneath
the illusion, the verbal gymnastics
and the scholarly search,
without moving.
He moved, he spent the money
and walked away.

(Suhas T, Sandeep A)
April 16

Here I was
going through
every synapse
in the brain
to prepare
a short presentation
on
the future of humankind;
there he was asking
if the food would be
from my native cuisine
and if
the audience
would have
a fair
sprinkling of fair sex
- his major incentives.

He had 'finished'
the future of mankind
in a jiffy.

April 17

There is this thing..

about life
that stops
you from stepping out;
makes me feel
guilty
to miss my exercises,
to stay a little longer
in bed,
to have another cup.
I hear a stern voice
from the past
that says
Miss your meals
if you miss
your studies.
I miss that voice,
for it never meant
literal.
Love and care...
give a little of it
to yourself
and add
a little respect.

April 18

They spoke of the injustice

I meted out to them
over the centuries.
“Any history in which
We don’t figure
Is not our history.”
They made it simple and clear.

It’s like all your floors

uprooted and hurled
over back of beyond.
I cling to the only thing
available –
The walls.
All my life
I put up walls
To mark my ground -
My ground.

Here come the yuppies

To question my
Foundations speaking
Some alien language.
They can’t take a location
Ha! There’s no floor left.

I make a suggestion –
Let’s pull the walls down
And see if we can make a floor
Out of those.

The yuppies are still thinking

With their stuckness,
I have become the wallclock.
April 19

What better thing

to do
on a weekend
than
to clean up
your masks?
I took them out
and while
doing it,
a faded
newspaper fell out
too
showing
the faded dolls on it.
A cord floated in
from nowhere
with words
strung into it.
Even faded dolls
can be attractive
to children,
it said.
I couldn't stand
it, but then
one of the masks
said,
hey let it hang
in there;
it livens up
the room.

April 20

It’s the place

that pulled us down
and now
we are going
to pull it down.
A clean break
doesn’t come
easily
to either the young
or the old.
Only a cold
calculating machine
can do it.
But there’s something
out there
and there is some place
in the mind.
Mind is what we carry
and mind is not what
I want to lose.

April 21

Have I lost it?

I want to get over it
- be done with it.
It’s gone too deep,
you know.
Will make sense of it
later. Let time take
care of it.
I will take care of it
and may pain flower
to bear the fruit of wisdom.
But no more words for now.
Just silence.

April 22
I am stranded this side
not able to reach out
to him and to her;
you are already on
the other bank.
Did you acquire
the power of walking
on water?
Anything is possible
for you -
the milk of kindness
flows
through
your veins.
I check from
time to time
if my heart is
still in place.

April 23

Not here,
the mind says
searching for
a stable footing –
it’s all sand.
All my houses
were of sand.
It was fun for
the waves,
for the sand,
for others.
Not for me.
This big thing
About building –
Why not simply
Be sand?

April 24

It’s by accident
That I discovered
I am an artist.
I want my work
To be just so,
Not a line here
Not a line there.
I don’t have time
For others’ ideas
In my work. It’s my
Creation and let me
Have the freedom
To do it my way.
It’s a work of art
After all and not
The day’s work.
“All my life
I have swallowed
Your irritations
And carpings.”
Agreed, but aren’t
Artistes to be pampered?
Every detail has to be in place,
If it has to fetch appreciation.
The purpose of art is to
Imitate God in controlling
One’s creation. My life’s story.

April 25

You asked me to get

a better mask
for myself
and
I have been shopping.
What will
I do with the old one?
You'd throw it
away,
but who knows?
I might need it again.
I wonder,
if between you and me
we never needed them,
why should I need
one to face
the world?
Shops for masks
don't close.

April 26

Always taunted for

not being practical
I repair appliances
by telling the repairman
where the fault lies.
This morning
I mistook
in the market
gourd for
cucumber
only because
the paper slip was
not written legibly.
It's quite
practical not to read
what you once
wrote
famously.
Poet it is whose
finger moves
on having written...

April 27

With the morning breeze

float in memories of
Home, far away, distant.
Her pace quickens
with the rays of the sun
to meet the day ahead.
She has to sweep
Wash
Clean
Cook.
Winding her way
through the lanes
she has to mind
the stray dogs
that stir at her footstep.
Suddenly words
drop on her
like a summer shower –
Words spoken in her tongue
in this distant land;
She looks up –
someone her age
but in t-shirt and pants
and shoes, going for
her morning walk,
briskly, talking on the cell
disappearing
in the morning mist.
There is heat
after a summer shower.

April 28
When he started and kept up barking
at her
I was stabbed to my past -
heartless, drunken with hubris,
insensitive, dictatorial.
And she, a picture of composure
firmly centred, not paying
heed to the commands;
quite unlike mine.
Then he lectures on
the harm done
by higher education
and empowerment.
At least I supported
liberation by word
if not deed.
Here was future
calling
for liberation of the past.
Men too
shall rise
and follow
women on march.
April 29

The sun has scorched

some and not other
plants on the terrace.
Not more water
but more shade
they ask for.
I am that old tree
on the road
giving shade to
passers by.
I am scorched.
I am free
with a big hug
to anyone who brings
water to me.
What a little bit of love
cannot do?

April 30

What a weak will

can do
with a little help
from friends?
To the parched earth
first showers
of summer
do very little
but mean so much.
I was lost
in wilderness
of dried dreams
with broken backs
and then
suddenly
a downpour
without warning
swept me
to the edge.
It’s clear
Blue
Sky
Now
All around.