as unsung heroes….

GOOGLE-DOM

Aah
so delicious
steeped in irony
be the seekers…claiming priesthood
vide mandate or as peers edict
of those lost
in search or mired
in confusion’s
contradict

Hunger
gnaws at those
who must
keep looking
to go…on and on
in line with conclusions
projecting…mere perception
cloaked in ‘absolutes’
as views forgone

So obvious
to the discerning
in grammers
of colour or of shade
subtle hues
embedded in individualized immerse
that speak out…louder
only when
the spotlight fades

Murmers
in the light
as tiny notes…whisper
in flickering chatter
scored to the dictates…of their song
between the lines
articulating predict
as relatively factual…presumably
not wrong

Questions
posed…as answers
writ in nuance
and the faithful’s prayers
an eternity…keyed…in quest
for the holy grail
as the WORD…that could be…the devil’s
work…at worst
or a God’s ideal…at best

Dancing
at a masquerade ball
of pretenders…to the crown
an entangled web of woven truths
by masters all… at work and play
as they google
fiddling as we drown
in dancing to intoxicating tunes
of our ignorance…we  sway

ins-n-outs

Stripped
of inhibition
our nakedness
exposed…in celebration
a toast, sensous
to love…seemingly
at risk…’we’ ride passionately
in throes of gushing highs
or its fall…as ‘I’…alone
into an abyss
of oblivion

with just ‘truths’…for company

So bombed out

Were we
an unknown dead
killed by mad worship
to a faith
of no real relevance
to our
demise

Our lives as
relative innocents…. blown away
As blasted souls
lost to rigors of dogma
seek…legitimacy of purpose
in politics
of vengeance

Were we
mere strangers expendable
as collateral in a war
pray who’s…?
that justifies
lunacy
such as this

Did we
give cause
or fuel agendas of hate
will our deaths bring to you…absolution
or your creed
success
or succor

Our brothers
sisters wives and husbands
children and parents
all cry…in desperation
will terror birth ever
lasting peace
or justice

Will silence
mark dead our state
or fan to flames
pyres…of a rage alive
consuming both
purpose
and cause

To ashes…and dust…of extinction

New Delhi October 05

an indian journey

I open
many doors in your mind
unveiling its vistas before you
ones not perhaps earlier seen or heard of
as you partake
from our shared immerse

My eddies
swirl around you
a country, thats as much as you want it to be
to impact your curiousity…interest you
or leave you breathless, imprinted with
my touch

Felt and seen
through prisms of exist
familiar roots, like yours
soo long a part of my antiquity too
as it pedals or speeds
distilling itself an ethos

An ever evolving one
as a bridge between times
I be so much older than many that mark
an eons passage
or as young in spirit
as fresh…dew-laden flowers

That bloom
shyly bud, revealing themselves
in my misty sun-drenched winter mornings
curtain-raisers indeed
on every new days rebirth
a rewriting…of old lives

I am a nation vast
a billion plus too many
or just one
you may share with, in interact
resplendent in cultures, that transcend the all-consuming
monotony of singularity

A diverse land
of pasts as ancient as humanity itself
embroidered with rich historical passages
towards a future…as yet untapped in potential
both, as a bargain hunter’s paradise
or a connoisseur’s…heaven

I am a cradle rocked
by mother-nature’s bounties
or her wrath
for even ‘death’ becomes me
as my old gives in gracefully to nurture my new
in a renewal of promise

Self-refreshed vitality
like a monsoon…effusive
greening life as it surges welling out from within
my every pore
in oozing lusts to live…beyond the routine of mere survival
in repetitive life-death cycles

I catalyze break-a-ways
un-shackled in freedoms
in an ambiance transliterating envisioned dreams
or passions subtle intensities
to artifacts…carved or shaped from my very rock and substance
as edifying poems in metaphor

In mediums
of fused metal or clay…fiery constructs
cast in a dance of creation or destruction…epic words
in digital encode or analogue continium
weaving tapestry in layers, that grace
both commoner and King

My people
have engineered monuments
amazing in imagine
encouraged minds that have pondered
meaningful content in zero’s emptiness…or delved into concepts
seemingly unquantifiable to most

Foundations…the bedrocks
of empowered thinking…my poetic quest
in an ode to man’s innate curiousity
or a woman’s beautiful…quintessential essence…sought
a platform nurturing minds
steeped in nuances of life

A varied grammar
of many inter-related philosophies
and varied…religious callings, are my people
people, who in humility
have greatfully accepted without much rancor…so much and many
from the worlds outside

Domains far beyond deemed borders
or invasive spheres of influence
that have…in giving or taking
in reasoned consent, or absorbtion…sensitized my nationhood
anchoring it…in geo-political compulsions or divine faith
my multifaceted spirituality

Belief reflecting endlessly
in mirroring civilizations
in  their perceived colors of worth…in perspective
a fortune uniquely ours and seen so, as inertial or progressive
empowered by a generous predisposition
to be more

Atypically…like my environ
with jagged spires touching impossible highs
draped in ethereal white…a reaching out, to the gods themselves
with offerings of unspoilt pristine landscapes
a raw challenge
to an alternate less-tamed universe

Grained in sparse
surreal strokes of earthy colours.
my  desert canvas of sand-seas and weathered rocks…sculpted
in light and shade of a full moon
or the harsher glare of the mid-day sun
as fractal clouds or tidal oceans that lap or rage
at my maritime shores

A man’s island, or a beach-head
where communion meditates
in-search for answers….from eternity
in fecund bowels of the mystic…rain forests harboring countless
in their bio-diversity…humanities last reservoirs
of genetic deliverance

Come
meet my people
my civilizations teeming strength
as representatives of my depths…a citizenry wide ranging
building worlds within worlds…and beyond
in their heat and dust…knitted not divided by karma

Expressed…in  languages
in stratified connect…a chorus of my many sides
voicing their song…an aria melodious
strummed in classical notes, firmly rooted in their ground
that subliminally beckons
and stirs within

A forgotten self
born again…to what really matters…
and counts, in awakened introspects…spelling out
to a jaded mindset…I am this…yes
but…have more to give
if…you so desire

I am India
do come, and  visit me
Atithi Devo Bhavah…our guest…is god

just mullings…

There is
a world out there too
some times…to grasp
though we may strive really hard
we can’t…that elusive dream…seemingly
ever clasp

It eludes us
like the rainbow
beautiful in construct, yet distant
vaults across an abyss…ever ethereal
a reach…grounded…in colours of communion
a never-meant-to-be…instant

The here and now
are just that…
stages interim…in passages which transpire
to be more a journey…not of goals
but dreams…internalized within
that inspire

Its just…defining
like a milestone passed
a mark…of mere…a ‘by-the-way’
not a vista…of paradise envisioned but a menu
limiting…one’s allowable ‘choice’ 
to ones you make…’today’

Embeds in love
a chimera…so becoming
the very ‘measure’…of our lives
a veritable garden of Eden…to seed in hopes
our very best in…that may flower
or distill…what survives

Until we have
seen it…touched it
felt its magic…cast-a-ways…of its spell
verily …we have not yet lived a life…imagined
so touched…by feeling
if-at-all…too well

To give ones all
for passion
of few moments…of such time
to meet…’ones’ maker here
earthy heavens…grasped…not lost to death
or life…pedestalized…as sublime

Dawns that ease
ones deepest gloom
and warm the cold of lonliness…to shine
on the fortunate…a fate desired…
but only if…one nods to say
‘Yes my love…be mine’…

Dec 26 2002…

eros…checked

arms
opened wide…in welcome
as legs quiver
in urges squeezed
uncontrolled…in anticipate and surrender
yet you cross them…decorously
perpetually guarded in gender habit
a virginal ‘potential victim’
of wild animal instincts
allowed to come only…in missionary zeal alone
soo very ‘proper’…in conformity

not quiet
the simmering undercurrent
‘sinning’ as waggling fingers point
in exploratory probe as rapacious intrude
clamors and claws..at the hidden
depths…subsumed in veils
of frustrations emptiness…in nooks waiting…for fulfillment
in primal seeking driven
for satiate…denied
in dreamy pursuit of an assumed immerse
an unreal…reality

a scenario
in which luck
a notoriously fickle lady
abandons formalities…in love
to churn in distress…and tidal spillovers
as waves of lust assault the senses
thrusting and parrying…to rip apart defense
oblivious…to cries that rent the air
or raw wounds that bleed
with hurt…inflammatory in express its mocking scarring
within its dying flow…ebbing
echoes of lament

of thirsts…unrequited
quests steeped in hesitancy
as renewed doubts rear up
in fear to open all
once again…in trust and fond connect
to share unmasked…private spaces
devoid of the artful…graces, shed in wild abandon
as true nature expresses itself
in musky intrigue
its mysteries…layers un-cloaked
in innuendo….seductive wisps…subliminal in their whisper
but so naked in its posturing

and acceptance
of sugarcoated illusion
a self…revealed
as fig leaves of inhibit fall aside
blown by lusts
as passions seed surges forth
to bud..in free air and full cry…setting aside claims
of this is NOT…’My way’ or ‘Mine’
this chosen path explosive in potential
a heady high in-deed of liaisons unconscionable
yet still sought

in tangibles
and attachments nursed
in dualities..milk of human kindness
nurturings…embedded in tomorrow’s hunger
or yesterdays pasts and today’s…staked
in hope of forever
for second comings
a pipe dream…never meant to have…or be
a relate duly acknowledged
reduced in eventualities…to
the tired ‘just friends resolute…a lets play
even if only…’games’

a ‘defensive’ play
discreet and relatively safe
inset…within norms
or if possible…saucy suggest
nuances of wordplay framed
in windows of distance and dalliance
emasculated of most guilt
as desires remain
repressed in ethereal realms
of streaky flash…not substance
in peek-a-boos…perceived and bound by self-define
always…so alone

as Eros stirs in sleep…of dreams

crazed in re-actives

a relate
built over time
left to mature…like aging wine
a connoisseurs repast envisioned to share at lesiure together
not a high peak sought
but an eventual happenstance

and then
you let go…you have to
by force of choice
made for you, by someone…and some by you made…in falling
back…to grounds you trust
even as it fails you

a dependence
on one…misplaced
in ‘hungers’ blind over reach
a much too much from heavens sought…even as a hell burns
churning restless…beneath the grounds of ‘paradise’
in symbiotic waltz

to erupt as ‘others’
intrusive and parisitic…catalysing decay
into death…of the once beautiful
a sequestering infect…suckling now’s sweet fruit…as theirs
‘substance’…to taste and savour
while expectations  whiff…be yours

in unrequited desire
yet a life…yours now
to relish…in its myriad colours
some framed in shades of lonliness…a ‘raw’…untainted with remorse
un-mired in burdens of embroidered maintenance
of one…too committed

to freedoms…cheer
from empowering bonds
subtle chains…tuned to demands
of past immerse in hooks…potential paths or crossroads…left behind
in a move away from duality…to breathing easy
the singular air

of mountains…conquered
virgin skies cleaved…in the clean break
of a ‘dawn’ in yesterdays lives as fresh todays
available…not lost, to an evenings long shadow in inertial embrace
of ‘pasts’…that suffocate a soul
now spirited…in release

unravelled twists and turns
charged in lusts for life…or dashed on rocks
smashed on heady spirits…be its ride
a gushing…eventually majestic in its calm flow…from primal roots
the once turbulent white water…transmorphed
into limpid…mellow swirls

of an oasis…pooled .within
palm fringed…shaded from the outer glare
of  harsh and dessicating immerse…a desert surreal
wherein…even ‘strangers’ be welcome in cool openess…to share all
whatever be left…of their shrivlled worth
in what remains…on offer

giving…into weakness…

zephyrs in nuance

In reflection
the  ripples glint
a frolic of pale  sparkles…in the light of poetic  play
their murmers…a hum in attenuated  words…
of underlying  brooding…
couched…in feelings  stirred

Their abstract lament
one of…’dead-end’…arisen  to  language…
and so expressed…in a communique of   ‘residuals’…
consecrated  in worded  constructs…faint records…
snitching  on
archival  soul-searching impacts…

Of immerse
sought…in  ‘equations’ pre-n-post-set…
of  evolve…caught in throes of empirical dynamics
from the quivering transient forms of  un-shaped jelly…
to the ‘hardened’ crystalline…of rationale  pragmatism…in act
as they resolve…themselves

In firm adherence
to patterned norms ‘enforced’…or  ‘chosen’
in fitted  moulds …as ‘this’ caricature of acceptence…or ‘that’ one
who  knows…or  can tell or spell
without hindsight…on which way to go
tilt…be  led…or lead

Where does or will
this ‘muse’…like a zephyr  wind…oracular
gust-n-blow…?
Is it seeds of a storm front…meant to  dissipate
or just the eye…a disquiet in understatement
of the hurricane  gathering…