Images - 2

Shades of green & blue...& in them the various shades of the market. Black hands plucking old leaves...starched shirt accounting for them all. A nameless shade of 7-up flutters in the summer breeze. Another crushed tomato underneath. Underpaid lives sort food for lavish lunch that I eat. The dead leaves make their way through the bizarreness of lives unknown. Noses flinch as the raw smell wafts through the kitchen door. Outside black hands still struggle to separate the good from the bad. Droplets of sweat at the forehead & back of their necks drip, I sure can't see them from the top where I stand...

The glistening red & the greens spotted with the stalks of white in between, almost like the day after Holi perhaps. I am forced to think of my hometown...I hold my thoughts as I don't want to think of home. I wanted to capture the image...but home intervenes & I think of what Ma would be doing, Papa would have left to write & print. Ma retired now, would stay back & make unwanted lists for my wedding & my brothers. I wonder what else would be keeping her busy? How would she be passing the day? Its mostly the evening calls with my sister & me that keeps her pass the day in a dullness I only experience when I think of home...most times I can keep myself from thinking...I know I am getting better at it with each day away from it.

& this is exactly how I relate every damn thing I see to home...damn me & my nostalgia...

Images - 1

the colorless sky
breathes
the scent left behind
of the sweaty black backs
filling water
from a dry well.

children
bare foot
unborn
learn from organisations
the ways of modern living.

parched lands
evoke hopelessness
in old hazy eyes
which stare far away for rains.

Amongst all this a dream
forgotten
crumbles & scatters
on a farmers crop less field.

I stare
& allow the pain of it all
settle somewhere deep...

Judgements...

I Judge.

I admit to anyone who mistakenly has had any mis-conceptions about me (usually people think I am a snob...so hardly anyone would have the misconception.)

It is a different thing that I like & try to be less judgmental about things, concepts, thoughts, & people. I actively try doing it...as a result, I realize...I am more accepting of things, concepts, thoughts, & people that are not the norm. I am good with accepting things which are 'usually' unaccepted to the social world of middle, upper class Educated India. I specify the subset only to be clear to me...you may choose your own. I am therefore unable to accept things which are the norm...this is where I find difficulties. I am not able to comprehend leave aside accept the routines people follow to live a hassle free, homo-phobic, chauvinist, insensitive lives & think all is well? I try to understand & live a life caring for all these & other such ideas & ways of life...& when I don't accept the urban, party going, loud, dressy lives...I am called a snob...when the whole of India has given themselves the permission to look & sneer at all things thats important to me...why I can't I judge them? Everytime a group of young people hear the word feminist from my mouth...they scatter away & whisper in corners & more so are scared of me...everytime I say no to going to a posh place for a drink stating my reason of feeling guilty for living so lavishly...I am looked upon as a looser...so why can't I smirk at their la-di-da lives?? 

I choose the fact that I can...& I choose to not feel bad about it.

Inspite of all this self-proclaimed theories about me...I continue to work for a multi-national company...& live an urban life...you sure can go ahead & judge me.

Colors

plums all around
unicorns ride the sun
& the green asks the yellow for the moon.


embroidered pieces of heart
fly across the ocean
& the red sneaks a kiss from the blue.


patterns on the floor
swim over a sleepy face
& the white smirks at the black.


rosaries on thin fingers
turns & twists in cubes 
& the purple escapes the charade of the pink.


drums beat in a frenzy
legs across the verandah
& the ocre spills over the blue...

Old Poem

It’s not the birth
But the death 
Of a person
That creates ripples
And you are left alone
To clear all the mess your life
has created around others
Who are living
And who might not
Want the cob web
Of your memories,
Your dreams,
And your life.
Life then perhaps seems nothing
But an empty
Age-old room
Of an old mansion,
the oldest family
In your town left
As a gift
to a dying town.