Category: Poems

It’s good you practise what you preach.
But only practise. Let it teach
Instead of words, instead of speech,
For talk is merely stubborn leech,
Which sucks the lesson out of reach.
So, do, just do, I do beseech.

The single Gulmohur bloomed in me
A garden-variety parental pride.
I looked at it and wondered what
Accident of soil, water, and scraped up dung
Had led to this everything-nice.

I pulled my phone to take a picture.
First, a closeup in Portrait Mode.
Click. Click. Click. Awesome.

Next, a wide shot against the sky:
A triumphant red on a whitewashed blue.
Click. Click. The focus blurred to furry brown.
The monkey plucked it, ate it, blurred away.

Maturity is biting your own tongue
When pulling theirs – with tongs! – is what you need?

Maturity is offering a hand
When ripping nails – with snips! – is what you need?

Maturity is wearing hockey pads
When hitting balls – with sticks! – is what you need?

Maturity is “acting your age” crap
When growing up – with scars! – is what you need?

No wonder rotting fruit is tagged: “Mature”

I knew it, I knew it, I knew it!
Mumma, I knew it.

But how? Did Grandma tell you?

No, no. No, no. The paper.

The newspaper?

Ah-hunh, Ah-hunh.
It said a star had died.
A big star far, far away.

And so?

And so?! Silly!
The star died, so Baby was born.

Hahaha. Who told you that?

You only, no, Mumma!
When Papa died, a star was born.
So, when a star died…

1.
“Covid testing: 1st floor”
“Covid vaccination: 2nd floor”
Inside the only elevator in the building.

2.
In the queuing area:
“Senior Citizens: high priority”

Watchman in the queuing area:
“You’re retired, no? What’s the hurry?
People have to go to office.”

3.
On the wall behind the registration desk:
“Wear your mask at all times.”

Intern at the registration desk:
“Remove your mask for identification.”

4.
In the post-vaccination resting room:
“If you have any side-effects,
Call this number: …”

Below the sign, in marker ink:
“Out of Order”

5.
On the way out:
“Avoid crowded places”

Below, on a brown-taped pamphlet:
“VIP entry at {local private hospital}”

The sugar “brings a diabetes” or two,
Depending on the nurse who catches you.
At times, you get away with stinky looks.
At times, you get a jab of insulin.

The ones in charge, the ones you keep in-charge,
The ones who live on your retirement –
The nerves on them, sometimes, do get to you –
Ingrates! Embargoing sugar cubes?!

These sugar cubes cost you thirteen pills
Of pain alleviation medicine –
You had promised two weeks, but you counted wrong,
Or so you told the Hypoglycemic.

She has no use for those, except to buy
Her favourite rum raisins off Gouty Guy,
Who gets away with every little thing
Because of all the pain he’s always in.

He’s not supposed to have your pain-relief,
She’s not supposed to have the alcohol,
And you are not supposed to have the cubes,
But this is how economies are freed!

I wonder whether I can write
A poem on a mourning morn.
A grief will may be numb me through
So thoroughly I may not move,
Forget the act of moving minds
Who come to read the crafted lines
Through different strands of space and time.
Through different strands of space and time.

Is there consensus in community
To look upon the easiness of rhyme
With those indulgent, patronizing eyes?

As if…as if…the pleasures of the damned
Are damned as guilty pleasures, damned as guilt,
And damned as damsels’ distressed liveries.

As if…as if…the tools of titans dead
Deserve the pantheon of literature
Exclusively. Excuse-moi, rhyme!

Pentameter! I wrote in it, you see?
And not a hint of rhyme to pollute it.
I dashed my diamond. Are you satisfied?

A crutch! A crutch it has become.
A crutch I must discard at once.
A crutch that holds my words upright,
Though none of them are fit to stand
Upon their own iambic feet.

A factory site it has become:
Assembly line of poetry,
Producing lines of poetry
In cycle time of seconds few
At cheapest cost and quality.

At once, at once, arrest this flow.
This flow will make me write a lot.
A lot of shallow nothingness
In garb of musicality,
Eroding all the work so far,
The work in which I struggled much.
My masochistic vanity
I must protect. At once! At once!

They:

Irrational! Insensible!
So fully irresponsible!
You really want to waste your days
In writing, for which no one pays?
You have the schooling, brains, and skills
Enough to pay a hamlet’s bills.
And yet you squander all your time
In drafting up a silly rhyme.
You were the envy of the town,
And soon you will be but a clown.
As all you have is family name,
You will be shortly off the game
And off the board – a captured pawn!
Your every single friend has gone
Ahead of you, ahead in life.
You will not even get a wife.
Renounce this crazy habit now.
Become again the money cow.

Me:

I have been writing fewer lines
Compared to what I truly can,
And thus have wasted all the time
Enrolled in apprehensions that
I cannot write beyond a bar.
And yet, if anything, I see
I write a good amount of verse
If, on a bet, I sit and think
And think on paper, not in mind.
I have a grip on pen and page.
I have a grip on form and style.
And when I get a grip on me
I can produce a decent batch
Of poems, stories, two-in-ones.
So, every day I will permit
Myself to sit and scribble on
For longer than it seems alright
To linger on the writing desk.