when you go

everything goes
when you go
so go slow

my eyelashes
are a little heavy
from kohl
or liquor
I can't tell

everything falls apart
when you go
so go slow

is everything
supposed to be the same
or is my heartbeat
telling

of the erratic stories
you and I penned
over the moon cycles
and the waves
crashing and ebbing
on my heart

everything breaks down
when you go
so go slow

your fingers traced stories
on my back
and the crests of my waist
leaving magnum opera
and sagas
of love and a little drunkenness

now they're my story
my life
in ways I can't erase
from my blood

how easily
we draw lines
between us
between your heart
and mine
like blood on battle fields

honey, let's not
make battle fields
of our hearts
cause the rivers
of our beings
lead to the same sea

Writing of love as music

the sound and the timing
of you
your breath

overlaps with mine
in a purple haze
of dim city lights
staccato-ish
hitting and leaving me in
allegretto

the high notes
are the rooftops
which see the curves of
the planet
that you and I
inhabit
and then don't
meandering through our
existences
flitting between spaces
and infinities

while the absences
seem like stretched fermatas
ensuring my heart is bound
leaping up at so much as
half a ray of sunshine

I write of love
as if it's music
between stave lines
when really it's just me
bleeding
seeping
colouring
marking
weeping

Life as I know it

I want to break
Like waves all over you
Like porcelain when I'm hurting
And slowly when starlight
Filters through your curtains

The three lines
Beneath your eyes
Have become my stave lines
I'm the music in between them
I become a crescendo
Until you look at me
And then my heartbeats
Are very contentedly a presto

Don't you see baby?
Don't you see darling -
When you thought you were only
Tracing circles on the back of my shoulders
In the hollow of my neck
I took those patterns on my skin
To weave my time and space
Together with yours
And to have the colours
Of my kaleidoscope
Weep into your heart

I'm a fool
I'm a fool for you
Need I put into words
That if you ever decide
To up and leave
You will have taken
All the poetry from my veins
And all the dreams from
Between my fingers.

take everything

you were yellow
I, a pale lilac

on some nights
you'd paint the town red
leaving me wondering
if I, stuck in this
mezzanine space
would ever
be brushed by
what your heart bled

and then
I mixed palettes
to create a
symphony of waves
that came
crashing you by

the clockwork
of sunrises and sunsets
lunar cycles and moons
and each season of
purple wild flowers
saw your breath
on mine
and an ever increasing
stack of your old
worn out t-shirts

t-shirts
that now see me through
cold nights
spring cleaning
and adventurous days
of spicy chicken dishes
that I fashion

with the 2121 kms
that separate you
from me
it's the lilac
that you are now
and the yellow
that I'll always be
and the red-violet
between us
that will crash us by
today
tomorrow
and after that

light, dust, a little rust

you would think
that the best thing
about globetrotting
would be a worn out,
achy suitcase
stamps on your passport
in different ink
and a slightly
hazed and crazed
mosaic of experiences
collected and forgotten

but the best thing
about travel
is not even a new horizon
or a violently
free sunset

I wish I could take
your hand
and make you stand
where I stood
and show you

the dewy purple
of the milky way
the vast ocean
of the galaxies
that you won't even know
the fairy dust
and the faint lust
of the star dust
a sky celebrating
the light in your
soul
and the dreams
in your eyes
and the violent urge
in every fibre
of your being
to be, to just be
then
there
right there
and gaze.
gaze at the magnificence
of what is being written
before you -
before you feel
a little bit of you
leave you
and join the body
of the star spangled sky
and become one.

it is that moment
when you are
and you believe it more than ever
except you don't

this reality could
not be unparalleled
on the surface
of some violet coloured star
somewhere in this expanse,
where at this moment
a bit of me
must be leaving
to join the body of the
star spangled sky.

begonia avenue

this night is lonely
and with you
lonelier still

I fidget with gadgets
which range across
colour and proportion
stained with hues
of years spent battling
against time
and ourselves

try crawling under
the blanket
when cub and home
come calling
and leave me wondering
why homesickness
strikes but surely
even as you lie
right there

home is after all
you
and nothing
at once

it is then
that this crazed thing
my mind
takes me to the cold
pane of the window
that I don't open
for its creak
I wait long enough
marking the unmarked horizon
and for three trucks to pass by
before finding the
will and melancholy
to want to
date stamp this
into foreverness

the ghosts that haunt

irises

busy in the wait

to one night

wake up to the northern lights

the purple

and the green

reflected in

eyelashes -

eyelashes that have 

seen the lights

lights which shone

inside you

finger tips

touch memories

of your skin

the scars

from windows 

and forgotten 

rough handling

finger tips

that want to

be in Provence

among the lavender

the landscapes

and the sheer

surreality of it all

and the crazed

smear of a heart

which remembers 

hazes

blots

showers

gear boxes

choco shots

and little children

selling balloons

from 1958

a midnight conversation
with an old
long-lost friend

no inkling
where i am
or about the
whereabouts
of my heart

days were spent
roads traveled
deadlines met
cities made
homes of
and then bid
goodbyes to

the only constant
was this one love
one written in
poetry and old
hindi songs
the ones
which make you
tune into
on chilly rainy nights
when the yellow
of the cab
is reflected in
that happy yellow
place
of your heart

there's no tomorrow.
there's now
and you.
the only two dimensions
which matter.

still more immense

a street child

walked up to our car

and knocked

"you'll get married.

..real soon."

i laugh

as youth laughs

i turn around

look at him -

his laugh lines

approach the crinkle

of his eyes

i ask the child

"are you sure?"

she nods.

i tell him to give her 

paper money

no coins business

woh boli

shaadi hoga!

i tell him

he had

missed the obvious

that used to be

my love story

as simple

and uncomplicated

as that

trans-atlanticism

music in a quiet room
too loud
too much for the
fuzziness
in your head
to catch

water under the bridge
is never coming back

what remains though
and fast in place
are the scars
you receive
in love
and battles

they attempt to
fade into and
become one
with your skin
your skin.
rough and smooth
cool on a summer's afternoon
enveloping
on a noisy rainy night

across borders
and horizons
under our skies
and different ones

it's a bitter sweet
symphony
elaborate and how
varied, meandering
the empty lines
of my verse filled
with some musings
of his own

Uppercase

I heard a friend
complain
complain about work
and the pitfalls
of too much exercise

And I think
how running too much
and then stopping
to catch your breath
can be anything
other than a cause for poetry
juxtaposed with
a pink sky
which is soon going to transcend
into an inky one
one where fireflies
call out
to one another
hoping far across the globe
and the atlantic
a mate would hear
their longing

This planet is spinning
too fast for us
to be on our feet
and stand too
and human emotions
caught in time's hair
to be free
free from fear
and explode out
like his voice
when he laughs

Laughter
that is becoming
a little too intermittent
and laugh lines
a little too faded
against rain and sun

Here,
all I see
are clouds.

filmon wala pyaar

trials, tribulations

re-discovery, tussles

all that have 

made 2009

(that year!

rather, that year end)

all that it has

come to be

mean and represent

great love stories

start young

young enough

to believe in 

traditions

and annual rituals

and maintain

small shoe boxes

of movie stubs

that serve as 

memory

of the immensity 

that just happened

and then

oceans decide

to change course

and come between

more movie stubs

going into

the hush puppies box

till this moment

when life itself

becomes a moment

in transit

where two suitcases

sit permanently

beneath my bed

as i sleep

hoping someday

they will see

all the clothes

that they saw

on the one day

in september

when deep pools of brown

became only

a vacation thing

a thing to

say goodbye to

again and again

but we're 

getting there

almost there

in this time

and space

meandering oceans

and double

sunrises

are not defeats

for you and me

Cityscapes

There are two ways of discovering a city.

One is by walking through its streets, getting lost even with a map because you don't have your bearings right. But every wrong turn you take, takes you to a new street which is bustling with activity - and as you walk down the street, you switch off your GPS and just, walk. Walk without aim, without reason and without direction. Walk wherever your feet take you, walk across people outside bars and restaurants too expensive on your student-pocket. Across lights that never turn green for cars, cyclists and pedestrians all at once. So you're always ahead, and you're always behind.

The other is by looking at a city from outside. It is only by being an outsider can you see a city in its wholeness. An airplane landing always has people craning to see the city beneath them. London Eye saw me looking at London the way I had never thought possible - with a little bit of fondness that I may have unconsciously developed for it. I also wondered how different life would be here, if I shared it with someone. If there was some familiarity to hold on to. Someone who knew me beyond my nationality, the tongue I speak or the year I was born in. Beyond my interests, my course and my student ID.

There are two ways of discovering life. Two ways of discovering who you're meant to be.

names that can't be pronounced

i believe you need to be in love to write poetry.
you need to be in love to appreciate poetry
and to think about it later on
even if your computer shows new IMs
or your phone new messages

i believe you need your dog to fall asleep
to look at him with your heart full
and a-gush
(i believe you need your dog to fall asleep
to coin words such as a-gush)

i believe distance breaks
as it is breaking right now

i believe age should never come between people
and neither should circumstances
it makes me want to tip the world
upside down
and send the water of rivers
flowing from deltas to
the highest tip of melting glaciers

i believe people need to feel so alone
that they finally feel complete

i believe it is important sometimes
to believe in the power of divinity
external to oneself

i believe late nights
cause melancholy

neon lights

it's shadowy and loud

with not a moment of

quiet

or relief

until they turn on

the lights, spot on

it is in the music

and the revelry

that you realize

tum ho meri

main tumhara

chota sa

sansar humara

aage jaane

ram kya hoga

kehta hai jo

kahe zamana

tera mere

pyaar purana

aage jaane

ram kya hoga

fingers cling

with the hope

and the knowledge

paradoxes entwine

themselves

with the waving

mobile lights

and suddenly both

your hands

are held by

the same person

but not one

obsess

fret

cry

scream

fear

run

but come back

to love.

moonlit are the nights

gushing

and a lot of it

like the first

awkward moment

between you

and the one

you couldn't stop

thinking about

the night after

your first dance

you really did throw

your heels off

and dance like

a mad person

she tells you

how he still

gushes over

that one night

and inside

that eighteen-something-ness

takes over

you don't know

whether you wanna

turn old and grey

or stay right here

longing

and being longed for

summer songs

winter nights

monsoon rains

autumn leaves

and the colours

they bring

how many adventures

are you to bring

the smiles

and the tears

to continue

just don't

run out on me

not my playlist

a sunlit morning

i'm alone

but i'm not lonely

bring the sunshine

back to my eyes

wait for me

i'm not ready

to string words together

without music

to face cities

without you

as i turn page

over page

the thought

and smell

of my city

return

there's a different design

and purpose

behind that skyline

your fingers streak

sunsets there

as your breath

clouds my thoughts

i can only ink -

you can paint

Flipside

There's a reason why

all the love songs

on my playlist

are lying ignored and dusty.

They feel

I don't love them.

Anymore.

god knows I want to break free

It just so happens

love of my life,

the roads I travel

and imagery

and phrases

I come across

greens and wild blues

inherently

become a part of me.

Increasing my love

for me.

Love of my life.

but life still goes on

Jaana

Slipping away

and a tipsy moment

when all control is

willingly abandoned.

But then again

haven't I willing

abandoned?

Everything?

I'm in a place

where tugs aren't

strong enough

and roots

not deep enough.

Routine revisits.

And

et cetera.

Or maybe it was love

This was meant to be happy.

I swear to god it was meant to be happy.

As was life. Everyday. Happy.

Not darker as I delved deeper. Not brighter as long as I remained on the surface.

I turn to Ritter for comfort. Maybe we have the answers all along, but we just like looking for them. As an excuse for something to do. As an excuse to be human.

Walking between the racks in the library and taking books home - just cause the cover illustration is nice, or the woman on it beautiful - is something I've always done. And enjoyed.

I've loved rain, and cake batter. Wearing the same pair of jeans, creating ripples. Cocoons, a few songs I can hum, and drives around dusk. Fighting for inane reasons and laughing when I didn't want to. At all.

Yes, I've loved. Cause at the end of the day, the purpose of loving is the pounding it takes.

Ritter.