port code

full circle
and / or numbered squares?
will I be punished
for trying to play
tic tac toe
with this great plan
that is life

I sit wondering
what cities and people
skylines
and names of rivers
mean for you and me

it's a bad idea to
return
to read old poetry

You'd think you know a city

... but then one Tuesday morning

you take a particularly rickety bus 

down Calcutta's oldest streets

named after forgotten zamindars

but one which is lined by derelict buildings

and ruins

which still speak of colonial times

in the typical tongue of 

red-brick-yellow-shutter-windows

the yellow of the windows

has long leaked into paths

that found their way into the sea

to be replaced by the wilderness

which has mauled its way into

balconies, crevices, ornate carvings

refusing to be overshadowed by

this world

and its neons and its fluorescents 

your bus struggles for your eyes 

to meet the Grand Oberoi,

peep into the now-empty

lane of New Market

before you chance upon the 

vast expanse of the Indian Museum

it takes the commercial towers

of Chatterjee International

and Tata Steel to lull you

further into mental notes

of the poetry happening within

before the suburbs are hit

and these words are buried under

the noises of everyday

deadlines and subsequent futilities