The Cello

The cello plays a poignant tune -
Crying for all that is worth,
And yet not meant to be.
The eye is not to see,
But be-
As a reminder of a mirror,
That it was held to be.
The chastened soul,
Must travel the bruised path,
Set to the tune of another's design.
For that's how it must be.
An impassive face meets stony silence,
Icy winds down the hollow graveled road.
The paradox pervasive in its duality,
The truth versus the unknown.
A silent need versus the expressed shared.
When the rage subsides in me,
Out of sight,out of mind-
Shall reign in a sense of wonderment.
In itself a peace.
Or is it?
Confusion runs in circles,
There is more than meets the eye,
I realize, or make myself to.
Or maybe delusion is all I seek.
The cello is more sitar like now.
The pace faster,
As I still reel answerless.
The raga more known.
As I remain immobile,
Clutching at straws.

Chasing the Noir

She sips her frothless coffee,
Sitting alone outside the cafe,
Delicate her actions,
Lest they perturb her train of thought.
She dwells furtively,
On the meaningless mirages,
Her life seems filled with.
Her answers have no questions.
Or perhaps, she lacks courage to find
The right words to question her inner demon.
Twilight sees the hurried footsteps
Rush by her,
In their efforts to reach the shelter of home.
Mundane - she scorns with disdain.
What is home?
What is anything?
The abstract absurdity of it all,
Sinks inside- sedimenting and rotting within.
Her fight for truth and normalcy,
Wages a silent painful war inside.
Id pit against Ego-
As she meanders,
Chasing the Noir.
Outside her mental  fences,
Stand the people who love her,
But somewhere,
Her twisted mind ,
Questions their intentions.
Judgemental of motives.
Guarded strong,
Her defenses,
Search for a loophole,
Or a catch to peg her negation on.
Far away are those,
Who must remain peripheral to vision.
But in them she finds her meaninglessness more meaningful-
Than ever before.
She wants none to cross over and reach her core.
So she runs away from the only one,
Who chases her,
For he sees right through her facade,
And yet -
Still loves her albeit.
But - what is love?
What is anything?
She sighs- unhappy her childish mind.
For she cannot make anyone understand.
Her 'who' has translated into a 'what',
As she struggles to give her id an identity.
The black coffee-cold now-
Stares back at her balefully-
For it too, cannot furnish her reasons enough,
Of her plight.
She stirs it,
Wishing it to be a crystal ball,
That would frame the cobwebs of her mind-
To a rigid form.
She loves him too,
Or hopes she does.
For he is the one,
She  likes running to,
Chasing the Noir-
When nothing seems right anymore-
Or then again,
What is right after all?

Unhinge

There seems to be something to seek,
Not sure of what to search for.
Some answers evade,
Of questions unframed.
A break from monotony- mutiny?
To unhinge.
An irrepressible desire,
To be closer to the roots-
In touch with nature and natural.
Succumbing to the wealth and warmth
Of human bondage-
In contact with freedom -
And all the 'beams' it may espouse.
Harmonize inner being,
Find a core - a self.
Re-gain a depth,
Afresh- refreshed.
Is it clarity or catharsis?
Or synthesis in symbiosis?
Strange the twists of irony-
As it unfolds its manifolds.
A 'knight' shining like a surprising beacon,
To illumine a certain path of life.
Subtly, unknowingly highlighting,
A course of action.
Peace, in solitude,
Gravity in retrospection.
Mistakes seem heavy-
Not a burden anymore.
To be kept away,
Locked in private shelves,
Away from prying wonders-
Never deleted,
But fodder to be ruminated on.
Random, generates more concretes,
Than any planned structure.
Some more time then,
To crawl out of the shell.
To give the voice,
The much needed choice.
Break free, from all that constricts-
To think and feel again.

Spaces And Faces

Lost in the star shine,
My eyes on the horizon-
My mind a thousand miles away-
I feel the subtle flow of space,
Embrace me in its core essence.
Soulful moments of solitude-
Precious moments of loving silence,
I ruminate on the abstract - distractedly.
Red eyes - half closed,
I deep-dive into the granular depths,
Of the many concentric circles of lies,
That beseech me.
Holding me ransom -
A captive to their bonds.
A strange ennui sets in,
Ringed by revulsion waves.
The Wisdom's prediction,
At the predicament -
Cackle Cackle,
The old soothsayer laughs,
Pointing at her crystal- now foggy.
I imagine the waves lapping at my feet,
As another image brings peace.
A much loved face in sharp contrast-
Near - yet so far.
And shall always be so,
Aloof -  in inadmissible silence.
The trusted upturned face looks up,
Its soft features blurred.
The child's trust- indelible.
The mother's love,
Inexpressible.
Yet, ironically,
The weight of the chains,
Burden me,
The escape routes shine brighter,
As I creep back stealthily,
To the haven that space alone creates for me-
A shelter from the noise.
My world away from the symbols.

27 gb of muzak

Its funny how through,
An odd contrast of contradictions,
A curious middle path persists.
It strengthens and gathers a shape -
The amorphous subtly  resembles a starfish.
So what binds the trajectory?
Words? Notes? Keys?
Or a certain milieu of the Undefined?
Let the sleeping dogs lie.
The bark may as well spoil the hark.
The easy camaraderie the days slip,
Themselves into-
Is a sudden but expected stalwart
Of an unquestionable support.
The simplicity stands out steadfast.
The steady seeks the confused-
The 'wor(l)dy-wise' meets the 'no-vice'.
The aura of peace - accentuated.
Words pelt out to the greedy ears,
As the mind races to gauge the understated.
Lichen and Moss,
The grass 'green' ,
In the yellow sun hues.
Supernatural ?
Nay.
Just a "27 gb of muzak" bandwidth.

Stolen Moments

,

She hurried along,
Her sharp heels a clatter
Against the hard pavement.
The white sheet of rain,
Clouded her vision ahead.
But she knew he'll be there.
Like the old days.
As she took another step,
She clasped the hand she knew so well.
The crafted face looked at her-unsmiling.
The grey hair flatenned by the incessant pour.
The haze of the streetlight a mellow glow.
Soft yellow set the tinge,
As the lips met.
Hands held, they braved the rain-
To their shelter away from the prying world.
No hurry, no rush-
They sought peace in their well known enclosure.
Grey and green eyes- a familiar entrapment.
The love they made was not without fire.
It was one of knowledge of the past.
They spoke through their volumes of silence,
Words seemed paltry anyway.
Peace in a sinful comfort-
Their battered minds,
Powerless - a combat of conflicts.
Rueful at the passage of time,
That never saw them together.
Victims of the dreams of others,
They had ended up pawning lives.
Pawns themselves.
Their lives now,
Drained of emotions,
A mechanical existence without reason.
The stolen moments shared were,
Akin to prayers for the bliss of innocence.
She looked out-
Towards the night and beyond.
Secure in his arms,
Yet a mother now-
No more the carefree girl he had loved.
She fretted silently,
About her child.
And her husband as he drove back home.
She moved - he knew.
It was time to go.
To pick up the pieces of a hollow marriage.
He watched her as she stood-
Still regal despite the age.
Always the one woman he had dared to see through.
And submit to ceaselessly.
She looked at him-
Her soft eyes moist.
They would meet again-
Like this.
Shaded and jaded.
But no part of them incomplete.
Except their story.

Photograph

A part of me,
Stares in awe-
At the photographs,
Remembering the tangled.
Disbelief at suspension ;
Mesmerized by the meanders.
A wry smile suffuses,
Humor mustn't be lost.
Specially if its self-inflicted.
So should I question myself now?
The voluntary blindness that
I had sought refuge at?
Must I berate myself to my self-degradation,
Degenerate into a composite waste ?
I reach across,
To tear away the cobwebs-
That cloud my vision now.
In my ears ,
The banshee sings out  loud-
The words heard.
The words drilled in thus.
With the photographs,
Have died a lot of dreams.
A lot of me too.
The answers to questions,
Only bring despair.
As truth begets truth,
It negates efforts to search
For meanings not truly there.
The erstwhile peace,
Now steals over me like a disease.
Truly, we had no love-
But a beautiful deceit.
It seems, we were never united-
To be divided now.
What we had had-
Was just a dream.
 I've found visions of many things that never have been
Adrift in memories and your specter behind me.
And now I feel free of the misleading nectar,
Of your lies - and the folly in my sweet surrender.
Affirmation is supreme,
In my way to glory-
Sans an effigy of you-
That is fast receding.