* the friend *

Amid the constant chattering of the rain, alone in the impeccable black of the night, he was walking hastily down the road. The mild breeze of the evening had succumbed to the violent air currents in the night. Nevertheless, he kept wading through the restraining tumult.
It was 2 years ago that he had embarked on his journey to pursue his dream of becoming a writer, to personify those lifeless words in his heart to peer at this subtle world.
He would spend hours carving stories out of the world. Sometimes, a gazillion of thoughts would assail his mind and he would lose his story in the delirium and sometimes mere endings to a story would flag off a quarrel. Yes, there were stories on his papers depigmented of their endings.
But this did not deter him; it did not portend of any despondence in him. He would ceaselessly fumble with the blending of words to embellish every sentence, to stuff every sentence with the marrow of life, the feelings. For two years, he reaped stories and etched parts of his incomplete tales together.

-- The road had come to an end. His watch was poised at 11.30 pm. Drenched completely; his jacket was dripping the rain water it had gulped. The street light above him needed urgent repair. Ironically, it colored the night even more raven. He was standing in front of his old friend’s house, a friend who was more than a brother for him, a friend who was both a benign critic and an ardent applauder and a friend who was the ubiquitous observer of every story scribbled onto those pages.

He again looked at his watch. It was late.

Nevertheless, he rang the bell.

* avenge *

I have grown up. But I need to tell you that my life dwindles as much as I live each day. I live each day to mend that one dreadful day, to fuse some moments of stillness in that day. Had that day not dawned, had the clock died before those moments of carnage, I would have helmed my life more diligently. I crave for that stillness in this ruckus of my life. Had my life been serene, I could have framed my dreams, I could have extolled the bliss of my life, I could have exhumed myself of my orphancy. But now, plots to avenge my loss guard my sleep of any fantasy and dream, echoing wails proliferate in the silence of the night.

I hope you remember whose wails barge into the avenues of my sleep. I hope you remember how stoically you sprayed the biased bullets on my parents.  I will never be able to comprehend the extreme callousness sheathed in your soul.

That was the day of revelry. My father had received accolades for something in his workplace. He didn’t tell me much about it. He just said that today he will sit and play with me, that he will listen to my stories from school, that he will be my accomplice in splashing colors on the walls of my room. The air inside the house was more ethereal than ever. My mother cooked dishes that invoked the insanity in me and my father to eat like a horse and the next moment the bell ranted. Yes, you were the one behind the closed door. My father received you. I actually didn’t like your interruption and then further despised you from the rudeness you divulged in your talks with my father. My mother took me to the cellar as my puerile self quivered with fear from the heated altercation you commenced with my father. My mother ran upstairs again.

Few minutes later, doleful wails permeated into the cellar, did you recall the wails that barged into my sleep?  My father tried to dampen your anger but you had been obliterated of your senses of right and wrong. That’s when I came to know that my father had been adulated for uncovering some corrupt deeds going on in his vicinity from which you were being benefitted. The sprouting anger inside you culminated when you started triggering bullets towards my parents. My parents ran all around to dodge your bullets when finally the taps on the floor above were silenced in the room just above the cellar. You still didn’t stop. You searched frantically for me, deranging every decorations of my mother but you couldn’t.

Here I am waiting for you to search me because the plan that guards my sleep is to retaliate against you, to search you from your deepest havens and snatch your breath.

Tragedy - an elegy @ bhopal gas tragedy

That yonder land cries in dirge,
factions of people, all departed into the sky.
Every sight was rued,
their fate had turned capricious.
Progenies, who cherished their eclectic dreams
now slept in the cemetery, innocence all preserved.
The newborns, trailed diligently by death
died by their mothers’ side
and the world remained a mystery for them.
May they meet the angels of the sky,
may their lives bloom, although in oblivion,
may their loss awake the keepers of justice.

* oyster *

-- a bird spilling my emotions --

Perched on that beige twig,

she would not fly.

Peering through my window,

she seemed to daunt me.

Obliterated of every melody

she would never chirp,

abandoned, I sensed she was.

The perpetual sky, till furlongs was her courtyard,

but she wouldn't ramble there,

wounded, I perused she was.

Exagerrated wings, she was sheathed in

but fettered, they all were.

To conquer the yonder mountains,

they would never embark.

Withered, thus I painted her as.

A divulged oyster she was,

painting her, I sketched myself.

Rapunzel

Do you know I look complete with you,
with you, my life rambles in
gaiety,
in gaiety,  now I mock all the odds,
the odds that had once endangered me.

Your puerile chortles caress my soul,
my soul, a silent and sepulchral abyss,
till abyss, I can run just to see you,
to see you is the sole penchant for me.

You anoint sentience to my soul,
my soul, it breathes and dies everyday with you,
my rapunzel you are, I die without you,
you are mine in that sky full of stars.

There are people and there are winners.
Losers are mere poltergeists.

THE ORANGE DRESS (PART 1)

It was 10 of September. I was hesitant but anyhow expressed my desire to her to accompany her in her shopping trek. She knew she needed help and gladly validated my proffer. Out of a thanksgiving or a formality or just out of happiness, I don’t know but she hugged me, a hug that departed me to an abstract world of reveries of freaking but delightful feelings, a hug that appeased my wailing heart. My heart, which I knew had dried up of all hope and happiness, was suddenly recuperated and it thumped harder than drums as if wanting to jump out and dance like a lunatic.

We set out together. My heart wanted to roam with hers on my bike and just when I was directed by my stupid brain to take out the car, came from her a voice , “ we are going on bike, right ? “ and I just managed to say, yes. So, two hearts rolled on two wheels inside bustling markets, through jammed roads and over abrupt speed breakers. I kept a track of every expression of hers, everyone one of them caressing my heart more and I felt more and more happy about her. We barged in many shops and hurried out of many and I kept wondering if any attire could embellish her flaring beauty anymore. Finally, we grounded ourselves to a showroom of some acquaintance of hers. She faked many dresses on herself, discarded many more. I was mum all the time dwindling up every emotion of mine but when that orange attire decorated her, I blabbered out. “This one is for you”. She didn’t muse over much and ordered the orange one and hugged me again. I was stoic this time. Well protected in a rectangular box with the tagline, “dressing up two hearts “, came her wedding dress. I was satisfied albeit my heart withered.