Shelf life: Indeterminate

(for oldness)

These are the libraries

of our land,
made of novels and epic poetry
rarely perused
seldom cited:
and yet there are letters
words and metaphors
tapestries woven
with labour
and the threads of being,
the bartering without permission
wheels that turn
despite impediment and age-limit,
the fruits of our today
the catch that fell through
the butterfingers of political economy,
the story of a child
and her tomorrow
and the transcripts
of a timeless,
careless
civilization.

[From the collection 'Some texts are made of leaves,' shortlisted for the Gratiaen Award 2011]

LEAVE A COMMENT

The ebb and flow of life and death

One man’s liberator

is another’s terrorist;

but life is often black and white

and frequently coloured,

necessitates killing and death

it’s a tug-o-war

with elemental configuration

battle of hook and knife,

hearth and coin

this way and that we pull

and in the play of clutch and release

probabilities and despair

the drowning on the sand

and burial at sea

the kleshas come

as wave-weave

and wind-twist

sweet nothings and bitter love

pieties and paramitaas

gathered, chopped and sold,

there is short-change in purchase

in small talk and silence.

We come from water

And like water we go

Each to a receptacle

of love and forbidding

some as fish,

some not.

[From the collection 'Some texts are made of leaves', shortlisted for the Gratiaen Award 2011] 

LEAVE A COMMENT

Un-freezing

Spectre of frozen-moment

carried in heart

incognito,

yes, unknown to mind

to the rolling years,

secret to all encounter

witness to path and pain,

smile to joy;

it took decades

for you to un-freeze.

Or so I thought.

[from the collection 'Some texts are made of leaves', shortlisted for the Gratiaen Award 2011]

LEAVE A COMMENT

Some texts are made of leaves*

They are flipped with the fingers of the eye

unwet and wet

read with care by those conversant

with the language

of colour, texture and passing

and passed over too

for there are preferred texts

and ones tossed aside

for later and never;

but leaves

come from dust and to dust they go

without complaint

through gaze and ignoring;

they conspire with sun, shade and wind

wear the garments of the day’s seasonality

without shout, let us repeat

but whisper

the eternal verities: ‘birth, decay, death’

all laid out in leaf-texts

that need no words,

not even these.

[*This is the title poem of the collection that was shortlisted for the Gratiaen Award 2011.  I have posted this earlier, but starting today I will post the entire collection of 56 poems, one per day]

LEAVE A COMMENT 

Drops!

They fall

they stay

they slip away

drip and disappear

they stain

leave mark on dust

and trace

again

again

again

ebb and flow

birth and go

of things delicate

and things hard

strong and weak

faithful and irreverent

colourful and dull

love and forsake

dismissal and embrace

and without word

or music

etches an old story:

where I came

and where I shall go

forget,

read me in this passing

that’s enough.

LEAVE A COMMENT

The mother of all wars

 

Fighting is gender-neutral

even war, even men-men war

is femaled

for men take wife to frontline

take mother and daughter,

and war visits as anxiety and wail

but this war was differently femaled

for it came with fighting women

with some among them

made to explode;

but in the uneasy fleeing

from tyrant shooting to kill

into the arms of considered foe

timeless tenderness

was a flower that burst

through war-rubble,

a flower

easily crushed,

easily ‘warred’. 

LEAVE A COMMENT

My father

(a note to Mitsi)

‘The old house is still standing’

I recite, and she asks

‘so why do you have to say it?’

I’ve never been questioned on this,

for the grasses of home were always green-green

even in the driest months

and unkempt seasons

and though the paint was cracked and dry

at times

there was nothing to explicate

home was home,

familiarities don’t come off the walls

like plaster does,

and that’s why my appachchi,

your ‘Polo Aththa’

is firmly defying

his infirmities;

he’s an old house

paint-cracked

but here the grass

is green-green

and will be

as and when

they all,

we all come

to see him.  

LEAVE A COMMENT