abandon all hope

the skies are black with disgust,
the ocean is rearing its ugly head,
promising to drown everything in its path.
the sun does not dare venture out
among monsters such as the unforgiving wind
and the fury-filled clouds,
that promise to unleash the angriest storms.

be warned, my love
i am going to destroy everything.

and after that,
we shall talk of 'forever'.

lie with me

the tide has passed,
the oceans are calm again,
and i am tired.

ready to be carried away by the waves.

say goodbye,
don't say you love me,
because that is a lie,
and the oceans don't forgive,
or forget.

reaching home

remember,

a thing of beauty lost,

is lost forever.

i shall never leave you.

and if i leave,

i shall never return.

and if i return,

you shall never leave me.

and if you leave me,

i shall never understand.

big words

countless plates of steaming, spicy food cooked up in a hurry
hundreds of shirts ironed and hung up in dark cupboards,
several pairs of socks pulled together in invisible lumps,
many many messages sent and delivered and read,
too many signs of abandonment ignored as each day passes,
many uncomfortable movies watched with aching elbows;

and always that one desperate look in your eyes,
begging me to love you and leave you alone.

if this is love,
then i shall not believe in eternity.

please

when the seas rise up in anger,
rush towards the shores in fury,
throw themselves against the rocks that break their tide,
and retire back into the cold,
still fuming with a kind of sadness that only the seas know of,
it is not to show their strength,
but only to try and hold on to the shore
for as long as possible.

fight for me.
like the seas fight for the shore.

taking a call

should we be wise and lonely now,
or believe in love and drown in sorrow later?

only the seas know what real cold feels like,
and now,
only i know what the darkness really hides.

aa sakti hain?

we are like train tracks, you and i,

parallel and together
but destined never to meet.
but we know well,

that one would never reach destination,

without the other. 

wisdom in the mirror

just as the sun promises to shine everyday

no matter what mood it woke up in,

love promises to hold you forever,

and protect you from the cold. 

but the strange truth is,

love does not make the cold disappear,

only invisible for a while.

and when love leaves,

the cold walks in uninvited,

just like the moon that sneaks up on the sun,

to boast of darkness. 

unexpected

i've lived a careful life so far;
i have one friend from my years as a child,
one soul-mate as witness to my life,
and one man as proof of my love.

but i've realised lately,
much to my sadness,
that no matter how learned we become,
we are still shocked
to see refusal in our lover's eyes.

well.
i shall take comfort in knowing,
at least in the years to come,
refusal and darkness shall be my friends,
my soul-mates, my loves.

don't want what you cannot be

the wind rushed up to me yesterday
and gave me a resounding slap,
to warn me
not to write more poetry about the fury of the wind.
the sea joined in, in agreement,
and scolded me for the silly verses about drowning.
the next morning,
when I thought all is calm,
the sun pounded my head, and burned my eyes
and told me to stop throwing my rhymes at him,
because all it does is to make him burn brighter in anger.

and so I admitted to them,
i've learned my lessons!
from now on, i will write only of the darkness
cold and still and sharp and bitter,
unforgiving and open to bad verses.

my friend, the darkness.
he never asks me why.
only who. 

you will always be mine

i don't hate you.

trust me, it's a difficult thing to do.

i hate him,
for reminding me of you.

mark my words,

before the rain gods stop crying,
you will be mine forever. 

laughter and tears, pleasure and punishment

yesterday, I lost something very precious.
but today what hurts more than the void in my soul,
is the realisation that it was never really mine to lose.

he never did belong to me after all. 

free lesson for your soul

remember this,
until the skies and the oceans remain blue,
until the rain stops washing away our sins,
and until the sun's heat no longer makes you burn,

he does not belong to you
just as you do not belong anywhere.

he who loves, will never love again

"mein dil ka raaz kehta hoon,
ki jab jab saans leta hoon, 
tera hi naam leta hoon,
yeh tune kya kiya"

even the calmest sea
has to claim a lonely life
once in a while.

even your most reassuring words
have to surrender
to the truth in your eyes.

don't fear, my love
the darkness is yet to come.

truth: one size fits all

as the seasons move from warm to cold,
your arms envelope me tighter.
your words are rushed, your eyes are closed,
and your breath is hot from disbelief.
momentary hugs seem longer,
blissful kisses seem to go on forever,
and your desperate fingers seem to look for more
as they trace known routes on my body.

imagine if your eyes lied too!
we would both be drowned
in this sea of politeness.