The Face

Through the cracks of silence,
And the pores of distance,
She peeks at the flashes of a memory dimmed.
Yet tonight seemed different-
As the candle light reminded her
Of a similar night
A couple of years back.
Drawn, by her own curiosity,
No longer frozenly withdrawn,
She lets the soothing silence steal over her-
As she hugs her knees to herself.
She lifts her eyes towards the ceiling-
Letting her mind draw the patterns,
And slowly as her thoughts gather form,
The face she had faded out for so long-
Regains shape and its arrogant structure.
The candle lit room show silhouettes in the wall,
And dark eyes, alight with un-denied desire.
She breathes in the smell she knew so well.
And lets it linger on for longer
As she giddily recollects greedily,
Of all that she'd felt then.
The ecstasy was sweeter,
In the knowledge of  a forbidden territory.
Yet a secret shared and cherished for sometime,
Edged sharply by the duality of times.
The words that'd followed- mellow in the aftermath,
Had ringed with promises that one could trust,
But must not.
Yet intensely,
The moment was all of truth,
And strangely of a childish dream come true-
In itself, flavored with hedonism.
The face she knew so well,
Remained thus as a skeleton in her closet,
But her secret desire nevertheless.
The face, in all its darkness,
Could still bring a smile-
For the agreement was mutual,
Of being & keeping a secret well.

Lighthouse

Standing on your toes,
You have let me dance through life.
Watched the world peering over the broad shoulders,
As you'd slowed down the pace,
And the simplified the wise ways.
You'd let me love the sunsets,
Instilling in me a faith in the sunrises,
Of a newer better tomorrow.
Letting me choose my pathways,
You've always let me have my way,
Forever remaining as a silent messiah,
A beacon in the dark-
Illustrative of all of Wisdom's good.
You have never painted me a picture
Of an ideal reality.
Rather, sacrosanct,
I hold your view,
Of a fulcrum outdoing darkness.
In my ascent,
Your words ring true,
As I gain my strength and composure.
I think of  you too,
At home,
Waiting and watching with a knowing look,
An omniscient supreme.
The hearth drawer and the painter of many dreams,
I have watched the sublime dreamer in you subside and submit.
Yet the surrender - though negated by most-
Was never seen as paltry.
My rise must mark its cognizance.
The hands that have conjured smiles on many,
Are those to be nurtured and nursed.
Therein lies a feat.
And as the cherub climbs up the ropes of evolution,
The lighthouse must shine on for her too-
Panning across miles and waves-
To illumine her a way she must choose.

Charms

Some kind of madness,

Swallows me whole,

Guiding me to what I call 'home'-

With the chains of dormancy,

Fading slowly,

A numb mind regains motion.

The star-less night sky-

A joy -

As the cold showers,

Pelt away on the window pane,

In urgency.

A wake-up call from a life gone awry?

I stare mesmerized-

At the dark grey green hills that beckon to me 

In all its mystery-

A curious contradiction of the known unknown.

The haunted soul,

Hunts for its missing pieces-

Hungry as a child for its mother's touch -

As the snake like path,

Winds its way to sense,

The horizon,

Less distant than I might have believed.

Reflective and pensive,

I settle back uneasy on my seat-

Watching the familiar images flash me by-

Memories tumbling over one another

Of another day, another time-

Not too far away in the past.

But clear as crystal,

Many answers dawn on my introspective questions.

Obviating my own void.

I have weight on my feet- not my mind.

My dance will always be,

As I choose - 

Steps following my own

Space and Time.

My veins shall always

Sing with a rhythm known,

As a sense of freedom must always 

Beseech me.

Let my sense of wonder,

Remain naive-

As I can still find joy 

In the simplest of things.

Let life be uncomplicated

With people I love

As a child.

A slow smile spreads,

As my heart gets to win over my shackled mind.

Armed with decisions,

I let the sound of happy muzak,

Erode through the corrosion 

Of my eros.

And at the heart of it all,

Shines my little kingdom,

In all its silvery glory.

A 'home'

To which I shall soon return.

The Wine Wizened Daze

You've been on my mind,
As much I try to run from it-
Putting up mental walls to block the images-
But they keep coming back.
I realize there's no end to you in my life-
We go on- a flow best left abstract.
The saga continues-
As in moments of alacrity,
We seek simplicity-
Perhaps best found in our eyes.
We never seem to drift,
Nor let distance affect our meets-
Despite not being on 'talking terms'.
Close to 7 years now,
And miles apart with no knowledge
Of divergent lives,
Past conversation threads,
Still linger on -
As haunting extensions of thought.
Whenever, wherever
Our paths have crossed,
You've always restored a sense of balance
In me- made me see me in a better light.
Each time the search for each other-
Has only made us better as beings to be re-introduced.
Somewhere down the line,
Our innocence of the simple days,
Of the simple ways of earlier life,
Still prevail.
So that despite all complexities and wine wizened daze,
Our certain vintage charm in sepia mode,
Survives -  like old wine in  a new bottle.
Out of a sense of re-attachment and self-inquisition.
I need to know about you and me-
About the journey headed to unknown destinations.
With my palms pressed against the tinted glass,
I need to see how much our surroundings have changed-
Or how far we've traveled sans a certain comfort.
The onward path-
Shaped by winds of change to imperfection
And carved by incompletion of the two lives.
Seized my wonderment,
Struck by the moment,
I feel a spark of joy light up-
For I know we've left the path open ended,
And shall meet again-
Only to ascertain the background score.

Pantomime

So we met,
Like you'd wanted.
Sat, side by side-
Wordless ;
As the power of speech left us
And silence rendered us beseechless.
In our minds,
The myriad questions lingered on,
Our story played out its own roll-
Outplayed. Outlived ?
Yet the answers were the monsters,
We shied away from -
Silence stretched on,
As the clock ticked its own hour.
My dark eyes like opaque orbs -
Walls through which you never could reach within.
You did your best,
To wrest the space
Ward off the coldness cementing-
Break all the shackles of a narrow mind made up.
I knew your moves,
Knew your game.
Could thus face you - frozen.
We played out our roles,
Like empty casts in a pantomime,
Till the time came for me to leave.
So I left,
Like I'd wanted.
Walked away without a backward glance-
You moved on too-
With your eyes on my back.

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?