She walked two steps behind me...
Clutching the railing..
Years of pain..so evident in those eyes
So sick..she had forgotten her footwear...
Barefoot on the hot Delhi Railway Station...

Never had she failed to leave me till my train..

I begged I pleaded...
"Please don`t..You are sick"
She answered in silence
I relented...

Yet my love for her...
Agitated me deep inside...churned me..
My helplessness..
Helplessness of all the damn doctors..
Her refusal to see any of them...
And yet the pain....
So hidden from the world
so evident to me
and her futility in hiding it..

She is not with me now..
And will never be..

She loved me..
I miss you
Grandma

If you must

If you must be forgotten..

Be forgotten..

For your Silence rather than the frivolty of your Words..

If you must Walk Away..

Do Walk Away..

With your dignity rather than your shame..

If you must Cry..

Do with your Heart..

Yet make sure every tear is worth it..

If you must Lose

lose with your head held low..

And pray your friend wins..

If you must keep a secret

Bury it in your bosom

And make sure your eyes never reveal

If you must get wet

Do so in the first rain of the monsoon

Then Miss the one you Love

If you must Pray

Keep it simple

Remember God never went to school...

If At All..

If At All
Time was to stand still..
And I was to keep moving..

If thought was to cease..
And I was to continue living..

If love was to hurt no more..
And I was to continue hurting..

If it was to feel no more..
And I was to continue loving..

If God was to promise to answer..
And I was to continue praying..

I will stand up to Him and tell Him
"I shall trade the sorrows of my heart..
for the joys of this world..
Lend me your joy
And I shall trade you my sorrow."

And then wait...
If At All..
For the answer..

The "Other" Me.

I have thrown out the questions,
And I wait for the answers..
To the land
And to the water
To the air I breath
And to the Life I lead.

Some one who completes me..
There is somewhere another me..

In the depths of my emotions
And in the heights of my pride..
In the depths of this complex world.
And the shallowness of my Life..
I seek him..
The Answers..

But…

Its only your silence O Lord!!
That stares at me…

In that silence; lie all the answers..

And Maybe somewhere in that silence
Lies the other me….

What matters..

Whats it like to Lose
Standing next to a finishing line..
Realizing you took a second longer..

Standing in driving rain
With a drowned rose.
Realizing, who it was meant for
Never took it..

Staring at a Computer screen..
Realizing,
“We regret to inform you that you are not selected….”

Sitting in front of a Code
You worked on for Weeks
Realizing, it won’t work.

Sitting with a mark sheet in your hand..
I tried..
Realizing, something somewhere went wrong.

Staring at Victory
Realizing, it was you Best Friend
Who lost..

Standing next to a dying friend..
Waiting for an ambulance..
Realizing, it will never make it in time.


But …
“Let it not matter to you after you gave it all you had…
Because to the people whom you matter…
It does not matter beyond that…”

Yes,
Love the soul that loves you
And you have won all that you ever lost..

For what matters is who…
Do you pray for..
And
Who prays for you?

How Much do you love your Land..

Today..
Rashid, the old man, was defeated..
I
Stood next to him on the gates of Justice..
Hands folded in Prayer..
Back bent, wrinkled face. Hopeful eyes
He in the dirtiest white.
One of the crowd.
In the scorching Sun
Barefoot..
As Justice came in an air conditioned car…
Sipped a Coffee…
And said that Rashid, the old farmer has no right to his land…
A farmer lost his land
A son
A wife
A father
A mother…………..


Hours later..
On a footpath outside the District Courts..
Sat next to him.
Hands still folded in Prayer..
Back bent, wrinkled face. Tearful eyes.
He in the dirtiest white.
All alone in the crowd.
In the setting Sun..
Barefoot..

Sipping a cup of tea..
“That was all I had..
No son
No wife
No father
No mother…………..”
I tried hard not to cry for a man who had lost his land..
I succeeded then..
But have failed now..
Today..

I can`t ask him..
But I ask myself
“Oh Rashid how much do you love your land?”
As if he heard my heart..
“More than I love God ..”

Right!

There is something inherently good in every human. That’s what I tried explaining to myself as I stood in the Visitors lounge standing next to you.

Tried to look everywhere but not at you. If I did I knew I would lose this steeled resolve that I had carried throughout the day.

The terminal was shabby, poorly lit, cob-webbed enough to look like Spiderman’s stronghold, sleepy policemen at that early hour in the morning cursing the mosquitoes a little less than the passengers…

I saw all that. And I felt you.

I smelt all that, And missed your fragrance.

Saw the misery , And compared mine.

Saw the billboards, And regretted all the presents I never gave.

Saw the books, And in them all the stories I never read to you.

Saw the food stall, And rued all the chocolates we never shared.

It was kiddish

But Oh God can I turn it all back.

Maybe it was my mistake.

There is something inherently good in every human. Right!

So, is there something Good in me..

And if I have ever stood and followed what God wanted me to…Then give me this last chance.

But You did not..

And as the voice uttered those dreaded words “This is the last call…..’

Me: You should be on that plane.
You: So should you..

And then you walked, never to come back..

There is something inherently good in every human.Right!

The Tearful Rain

I Feel all churned up Inside as I sit on a drenched balcony..
Drunken to a stupor..High on the scent that rises from the wet mud..

And down rolls a tear..
Where did that come from..?
Maybe
A deep entrenched sadness in my heart
That I don`t remember..

It was a mute storm then..
Rains ago..
Standing in the rain..
Hoping the passerby saw the rain drop..
And not the tear.

And now..
Rains later..
After the rain..
The Storm within…
A Tear outside.

Its going to be monotonous

Its going to be monotonous..

So if you don’t wish to read whatever I write..Then forget it..

I have been a sadist most of my life.
You may hate me, you have the liberty to..
Or you may like me, you have the option to..
But it really stopped affecting me a long time ago.

I live for you..
And live for myself..
Who carries more importance?
I don`t know and will never wish to know..

Let it be oblivious to me..
Because it tells me
That what I do is not governed by who gets what..
Its governed by what I see to be right..

The moment!

We all have to give up someday, invariably that moment will come. When you are expected to turn around and walk-away from relationships, friendships, break old ties and walk towards newer ones.

But it’s the rare kinds who walk away taking with them no regret in their hearts.They feel they were too attached and now too hurt or the pain that they did not give it enough, with every tear comes out a story, an anecdote, a lonely rain or a sad evening...

The orange sky with wandering clouds mourning the demise of a thing you held dear.

What we never know and will never ever know is the moment when we ought to cajole our hearts, hold our tears, fight back the despair in our eyes as we glance upon our loved one, for the last time..

And then turn away..

Ah, now it does no matter…Let the tears roll down and drench me in my misery..
Let them pierce my presumably rock-hard heart…And drive a dagger through my bosom.

Let Them not see what I feel…

Oh God where is thy strength..

Aaj tak tumhari awaaz se behtar geet nahin tha humare liye..
Bus aaj khamosh raho..
Tum.
Aur hum bhi..

Rumblings of A Madman

Mata ke liye putr ka
Moh amulya hai..

Par Prabhu tum to Jag ke dukh harta ho..

Is puure sansar ka dukh tum main sama sakta hai..

To kya ek Maa ka nahin..?

Tumhari bhi maa hogi aur tum uske putr..
Tum ek Pati bhi ho..
Aur stiri bhi…

Tum Ardhnarishwar ho..

Aur main tumhara putr..

Kya tum main bhi mere prati wohi Moh hai jo meri Maa ko hai..?

Last Night I saw a beggar woman share the food I had given her, with her child..

She never ate a bite, though I could tell from her eyes that she had not eaten for weeks..

And then I stood there stoned in the cold as she cradled her content child to sleep..

Providing him with the most of her body warmth that she could gather
From her chilled bones..
Poverty is no limiter to Love.
A mother’s love is closest to heaven, we can ever get!
And still the source of our greatest Pain in this world.

My first hand at Hindi poetry...:

Tum Ho.

Abhi peeche se ek aahat hui hai
Lagta hai ki Tum ho.

Mudhkar dekhne ki himmat nahin hum main
Us khaali darwaze ki muskurahat main kab se gum tum ho.

Taakte hain veerane main, Lamhon se jhagda hai
Jeet lenge har woh jang, jiski jeet main tum ho.

Hara diya kismat ne to, Sanson se bagawaat kar lenge
Unke har pal chalne ki vajah jo Tum ho.

Clues...

I am back after a long drive and as I sit here I feel I must write…

What ?
I don’t know,
Why?
I don’t care..

I can’t tell you how I feel..
I know I feel something, but what I don’t know…
Its there inside slowly gnawing its way up…
Fighting my spirit, who wants it locked….

But what is it … Do I feel sad, or Happy
Or tired, or depressed, or emotional…
Or hated…..

Wish it was easy to define, easy to say, easy to give it a word..
But it is not…
My heart , My feeling, My spirit and yet I don’t control it..
Let it come O Master..
Let it drown me…
If it is my smile, bless me with it…
If its My tear I shall accept it with the same Joy as I would accept your love..

If I am too hard a stone to realize the pain in it. Give it to me in my Dream..
If I am too foolish to see through it…Give it to me as your love..
So that when it’s gone…I shall miss it with pain in my heart…
If I am emotional enough to drown it in my feelings…
Give it to me as a reality so that I may always accept it.

If I left it out somewhere on the highways when the wind washed my face..
And the sun burned it…
When your dust cloaked me and protected me from the cold..
And when your rain drenched me to purity..
Where ever I left it…
Give it your wings O Master..

Let fly and seek me out. In sleep or when I am awake…
And lay to rest this uneasiness…

The feeling is there..
The intensity confuses me..
All it needs are wings…

Yours ………