Minakhi Misra

Arrival of this chequered guest
With specs he only wears for dress
Reminds me to beware of his
Interminable games of chess
He plays with pawns of uncles, aunts
And cousins close and far removed
And even their domestic help
And strangers in their neighborhood.

He keeps himself away for months
But come Diwali, Puja time
He shows up with tobacco teeth
And choicest fruits of winter clime
To sit and peel and chew and spit
Invented genealogies
Of ancient slights, fraternal fights
And yet unmade apologies.

He crochets up a yarn of time
Into confusing pirate knots
Of narratives that apparate
As Conan Doyle, Christie plots.
And then he waves his crochet wand
With flair of wizards masterful,
And holding knots in either hand,
Untangles with a single pull.

My parents, full of gratitude,
Declare they are so fortunate
To have him have their bullseye backs
Against the darts of envy, hate.
They shower him with sweets and praise
And tell me to be more like him.
I shut my mouth and meekly smile
With dimness of a knight on rim.

I try to see his board entire.
I know it’s but his zwischenzug –
His move between the obvious moves –
Before his queen and pair of rooks
Coordinate and capture pawns
To grab more space – ancestral land –
But then I fail in making sense
Of how he has his endgame planned.

He has no wife, no legal heirs.
He lives his chequered life alone.
And though he’s only fifty now
He’s peeing through a bladder stone.
His BP’s low, his sugar’s high,
His lungs are often out of breath,
So even if he captures all,
How does he plan to deal with death?

I see. He too is just a pawn
In hands of mighty Loneliness,
Who keeps us all engrossed in some
Interminable games of chess.

The day devours many hours
From right under your nostril towers
If unprotected by the powers
Of calendars with coloured stars.

The night then slips into the mix
Its AI-ML engine tricks
Which keep suggesting content picks
That throw your calendar afar.

Some poems come quite instantly
In moments I’m waking up,
Or working through a coffee cup.
They come with sudden urgency,
As if whatever’s left in me
That didn’t assimilate in me,
That didn’t become a part of me,
Is now coagulating down
Into a coloured poignancy.
They bring me great relief when out.
A moment’s lightness pervades me.
Expressed in right consistency,
These poems have a stickiness,
Endowed unmistakably
With airs that shock and move the eyes
That risk even an idle glance.
No wonder they are simply shit.

I wonder if the fairy tale,
Where mermaid turns her mermaid tail
Into two human appendage,

Which feel impaled by thousand knives
With every step of grounded stride
And every second’s idle life,

Is just a warning tale about
The pains of leaving water out
Of daily diet, getting gout.

“I’ll come to you in half an hour”,
Was what she told me every hour.
She asked me why I did not help
My mother clean the dusty shelves
And pick the fallen shiuli pods
And stitch the garlands for our gods
And check finances yet again
And clean the clogging washroom drain
And boil the cups of lemon tea
And buy some better fitting tees
And entertain that sudden guest
And join him on his scheming quest
And listen to complaints all day
And nod my head this way that way
And work and talk and eat and rest
Before arriving at my desk.
But even at this midnight hour
She tells me, “Yes, yes. Half an hour.”

So much depends on waking up
And knowing you have woken up.
It’s commomer to open eyes
To manufactured dreamy lies
Repeated everywhere you see,
Incepting deficiency.

By reinforcing shame and fear
With ads unnaturally clear,
We steal your powers to question, doubt,
Your time and space to figure out
The things you have, the things you need,
Penumbras of your growing greed.

We call this theft a service done
To help you choose our chosen one,
Thus freeing up your precious hours
That you can spend on watching stars
Who twinkle on your OLED screens
And show you all your neighbours’ dreams.

It’s okay to be scared, alone,
But not okay to overwrite
Your every single line of love
With frenzied, foolish, futile fights.

It’s okay to be full of flaws,
To feel inadequate, ashamed,
But not okay to throw away
The solemn promise you proclaimed.

It’s okay to repent at night,
To cry, submit your will, and pray,
But not okay, upon the dawn,
To not atone again today.

“A silver lining”, “brighter side,” —
The fragrances of fairy fart —
Are great for textbook moral science,
Or even fortune cookie lines,
But spare me those on Monday morns
When all I see is pending work
From people taking happy hours
A bit too early Friday last.
My mind is not a clear pond.
The shit they’ve dumped is bobbing on.
The water’s gray with moldy green.
In it, the only good I’ve seen:
A Narcissus won’t smile, but frown.
Won’t fall into himself and drown.

I’ll take your sweetened holy ash
Prescribed to me by horoscope,
To swallow what is left of me
In bitter shots of espresso.

The horseshoe ring you put on me
I’ll make my fidget spinner toy
To turn throughout my highs and lows
Or punch with when my anger boils.

The calling cards of Hindu Gods
You slip into my wallet sleeves,
I’ll use to clean my dirty nails
Or scratch under my sweaty knees.

I’ll do the things you ask of me,
But seasoned in some blasphemy.

I feel a winter creep behind
To freeze over my idle mind.
The sense of complacency’s cold.
My fluid’s turned a fragile fold,
Deceptive in its solid state,
Adept at distributed weight,
But not at concentrated stress –
Emergencies that need address.

The winter swallows autumn heat:
A fire-eater on the street
Who makes me hold my breath in awe
To only spring a summer thaw
For burning out complacency
On logs cremating urgency.