Clouds in the valley...

As if, the clouds would drift From the Airport Control Tower crew In a modern dystopian version Of yesterday’s Meghdoot written anew   Knowing perhaps, I would sit there alone, Watching clouds broodier than me, Drifting past, going beyond Into the invisible hall of melancholy   Floor 13, in this newfound exiled land of mine I, in my bitter-sweetness looked out Staring – at the worlds above and far away Lost in despair, dismay, doubt   Until I looked down like a satrap snob Upon the peasants of my kingdom land Urchins dancing in the rain, Yet somehow, a joy that only they could understand   I descended from Swarga to the Martya lands As in another one of Vishnu’s dream Drenched in a second from head to toe, The rains falling like a cascade stream   That day, the city woke up from its sepia tones And seemed livelier than a marionette play It was there in the drenched cesspool of the lands You could see the ...

  Sakura season burst one day In a balmy scent of spring As more than winter thawed and dripped Perhaps deep within   Pastel soft, purpled and pink, Beneath the pensive blues Melting the moods of melancholy In the last of frozen hues   In the breath of a single, northern wind The blossoms came and went, Seen by a handful, lonesome eyes For which perhaps they were meant   The unseen eyes did forlorn cry, Why did they go so soon? Petalled wings glide like a swarm One hurried afternoon   But for those who saw, all time was stilled And nothing left to chance, As Sakura’s spring bloomed and died, Eternity in a glance…   07 th August. 2022   As a chilly winter limps away, first signs of spring arrived as cherry blossoms seem to have blossomed hurriedly - this afternoon, I looked them in their eyes and an entire evening passed away…

  Evocation in those enigma eyes, I wonder, whatever did you see - The rise of canvas on these walls? Colours to rule all eternity?   Hundreds of years that carved these rocks In ochred walls that silent fell, Alive, yet if only you could come to life What raspy stories would you tell?   Would you whisper jewels on your grace? Sapphire, emerald sheathed in gold, Or would you speak of nirvana cells Before the grime and dirt and mould   That bracelet, necklace, turban green Did they come from Scythian lands? Will our tainted ears even understand The peals of your cymbal hands?   You avert all gaze, we mortal souls Are not meant to hear your speech, Perhaps in hallowed walls of time, Renunciation it is, you teach   The sangha long has left these hills, It is a wonder that you stayed, For those who can, there’s a lot to hear In the words you never said…   06 th August, 2022   Inspired by...

  The howling winds ring still in the ear After long the hills have dried away, In a restless mind, the earth is calm Yet the monsoon clouds billow in grey   The rains in the ghats are emerald green The moistened memories deep within, Melancholy seeps from the broken walls Where once the forts would the Deccan reign   And the youthful streams have scoured a path Not just in vales and ridges old, The water runs deep in submerged minds, And in dreams that float on, yet untold   The cascades plunge through the folds of time, Some rise even with the banshee breeze, The seasons stop, the cycle breaks Yet the mizzling memories never cease   What did I lose in those igneous traps? Why pensive runs each cloudy day? One drop of rain sets forth a sea, And drenched are my deserts of far away   A whisper floats from the western ghats, - It’s not what we lose in the rains that flood Rather what we find when the earth...

The rains are gone, leaving colours behind - Hues that melancholic clouds couldn’t see As autumn beckons, the plateau now fills: A thousand flowers in a dazed melee   Like a pointillist painting all sprung to life, This wildflower land is splashed in pink, With love like this, you smell, you smile, Then in lost basalt hills, you see and sink   In August’s grace, these lands bring life, Remorse perhaps of the indigo days, Now the winds are filled with pastel hues That rise and ebb in fractal waves   But where will you be when these colours fade? Will you return again with a monsoon sigh? The rains will return, year after year But some parched hearts will perhaps be dry…   Written in memory of the Kaas Plateau in the Satara region that bursts with wildflowers after the monsoons around August

In musty browned pages old, Can you smell the past? A life passing by along, In slow-motion, un-fast   That musky smell that liberates The letters on a page, While one fettered soul finds out Keys to his own cage   In trapped a fragrance of the past, What do you really see? Deep the sleepy, sodden roots Of an empty winter’s tree   There standing in a book stall In a sea of pages pale, Bits of someone else’s life Left hanging in a sale   That smell on College Street is then, Something else you know The petrichor of life itself, Beating, heartbeat slow   A teardrop here, a scribble there A lipstick stain as well A petaled hope forgotten long, Oh, what story would it tell   A number pencilled long ago, What was that raspy voice? Did someone even make that call – Was it a hopeless choice?   Then, to caress that dog-ear That another soul had made, As if, an unknown lover lost That t...

  I saw the movie Peter Pan For the first time just today, One of those childhood memories, The best that I must say   A lovely book was all I had And what joy for me it brought – To sail away to Neverland, With Wendy and the lot   Like children all, I too had dreamt Of pirates in the bay, Mermaids in the green lagoon, And Injuns far away   To fight the nasty pirates all With the lost boys by your side, And in the end, in pixie dust A flying ship to ride   To get a book was treasure all For the kids in back our age, No TV, but your mind was all - And the world grew in a page   The memories came back all today On a weekend evening, My little one had to see something And Pan came ‘pon the screen     The pages from my childhood days, Sprung back to life anew, Tinker, Tiger, Darlings all, Were not the only ones who flew   Yet, deep within, I felt the truth The melancholy th...