I only find a thread of thought
With turmeric on either end,
Awaiting where she always waits
Perfumed in filter coffee scents.
So tied up in my morning chores,
I must have missed her anklet bells.
And now my naked wrist must move
Unguided by her sacred spells.
Don’t try to do it everyday.
Too much, it seems. Too hard, it feels.
Instead, just do it for today.
It’s just the one thing. Just today.
And do whatever you can do –
You only have to do it once.
It’s just the one thing. Just today.
A morning comes with vacant bliss.
No thoughts, no to-dos, no concerns.
A silent rain on a silent street.
Some slurping mouths in window grilles.
Some arms receiving monsoon alms.
Some overflowing gratitude
Occluding lenses yet unwiped.
I climb a groaning tabletop,
Relieve the ticking clock of cells.
They trick you with the options, see?
They ask you of that stupid glass:
Half-empty, is it, OR half-full?
It’s not an OR at all, is it?
Half-empty it is AND half-full.
The silver lining AND the cloud.
You’re damned if you see only one.
Unbridled optimism trips.
Untempered pessimism chokes.
Don’t toss a coin for how it lands.
Just spin it. Let both sides be one.
Through pages of historic texts,
I hear a whisper in my ear –
What if? What if it had been you?
What if you faced their fated fear?
What if you’re plucked and thrown in cells
Too small to even stretch your arms?
What if you’re stranded on a beach
With nothing and no one around?
What if the scourge of war is here
And you survive and have to live?
What if you lose your everything
Including use of tongue and limbs?
What if the only thing you have
Is consciousness on fancy’s wings?
Your little tricks of solitude,
You claim they give you fortitude –
The poetry you memorise,
The chess you try to play in air,
The zazen that you daily sit,
Can they sustain you when you’re there?
And if they cannot, what’s the point?
What here-and-now do you profess
When every little stimulus
Erects in you a wall of stress
On which you hit and hit your head?
There’s more punishment than is crime.
There are no rules that will not break.
Entitlement to treatment fair
Is blowing candles on a cake.
The things you practice when you’re safe,
Unless you practice when you’re not,
Are simply pastimes, hobbies, fun,
And not survival skills you thought.
I can’t be there
For someone else
Some days
The coffee’s not enough
To wake
Compassion
Empathy
Some days
The weight
Of unsaid words
Exceeds the safety
Limit set
And cantilevered
Measured lines
Constructed
On a steady page
Come
Crashing down
In quiet debris
I sweep the floor
Towards an edge
And sit on it
Alone
Awake
Another fallen fruit now hangs
From ceilings of unpollened gloom.
Its feelings, bruised in dull abuse,
Evolved in puissance through its youth
To thunder nuisance in its heart
And rend asunder part by part.
No more all-nightly talks may pluck
Intentions of untimely byes.
No more inventions of resolve
Dissolve illusions of the mind.
No more for who could take no more
Irascible insults, deceits.
No more for who remain for more
Occasions of redemptive feats.
“So, will you bring a book to bed?”
“Unless one is already there.”
“And will you take a book to loo?”
“Unless one is already there.”
“And to the dining table?” “Same.”
“And to the kitchen counter?” “Same.”
“And to the backyard garden?” “Same.”
“What if it’s raining?” “Won’t step out.”
“What if the book is getting wet?”
“The one already in the yard?”
“I got you there, now, didn’t I?”
“It will be in the tool shed, no?”
“What if it’s in the open, yo?”
“I doubt I’ll leave it out like that.”
“And if I leave it out like that?”
“It’s just a book. Replaceable.”
“And you won’t do a thing to me?”
“You’re just a friend. Replaceable.”
“I thought we were bit more than that.”
“I’d say we aren’t even that.”
“Your mother likes me. Gives me hints.”
“She’s used to disappointments now.”
“You know I’m quite sought after, right?”
“By fools who like a pretty face.”
“And you don’t like my pretty face?”
“I do, but not enough to woo.”
“So, you don’t want it just for you?”
“You plan to stay in ghoonghat, what?”
“You always bring comebacks like that?”
“Unless one is already there.”
“Arrange your face,” the master says.
“You aren’t actors on a stage.
Your business isn’t being plain.
Your only work is getting done
What needs be done to run this place.
Believe you’re irreplaceable?
Believe we care for broken hearts?
You show yourself unready once
And readily we show you out.
They challenge us with powered steam.
They challenge us with steel machines.
They challenge us with printing press.
And here we pay you twice as much
To wear emotions on your sleeves?
You roll them, roll them, roll them high.
You show them strength of men’s resolve.
You show them what automatons
Can never craft in Christendom.
To work, to work, to work, you men.
And may the Lord be merciful.”
“You rather well arranged your face,”
The usurer applauds aside.
“You seemed an actor on a stage.
And how with words you’ve learned to chide
These honest men their honest thoughts.
Of course, you have no use for thoughts.
No printing press will waste its ink.
And that alone does make me think
Of what at all I may receive
In auctioning your rousing words.
Perhaps, a fiction: comedy.
Perhaps, the truth: a tragedy.
I hear they’re printing stubs for pass,
At pence-a-piece for spectacles.
Do choose yourself some pretty words.
It’s been a while we nailed someone.”
“Le mort saisit le vif , you know!”
“The dead seize up the living? What?”
“The dead invest the living, bro.”
“And what of it? Why tell me that?”
“Because it’s law, you dim moron –
Continuous inheritance.
The moment someone passes on
Their assets pass. No dalliance.”
“We settled all the property.
So, why exactly should I care?”
“Because there are intangibles.
That you can claim as legal heir.”
“Intangibles? His writings, notes?”
“Why not? Compile them into books.”
“And why do lawyers get a vote?”
“To save you from the IP crooks.”
“The dead invest the living, aye!
My father vests his genteel charm.
Fuck off – you get no slice of pie –
Before I break your creamy arm.”
Minakhi Misra 