Measuring life by men

Growing up feminist,
You see all these women
Suffering because of men, marriage
And you think
You don't need men

And yet, as you grow up
Why is it that only the memories
Of the moments when
Men were kind to you
Stand out vividly
Complements
Glitter like jewels
In the boring strand of life
Touches
Glow like coals
Even the memory of which
Scorches like flames

You try to deny it all
Try to convince yourself
That you don't need men
To be happy

You try to find everything
In family, friends
Work, social work
And yet,
As you look back
You can only measure life
In men

It is only they
Who give you confidence

You feel guilty
Like you betrayed
Other women,
Your ideals,
Your beliefs

It takes so long
To reconcile both
And realize that
That it is not the men
That matter
It is love
It is warmth

If you had loved
Women
The same way
You would have had
The same vivid memories
Of love
To keep you company
Give you confidence

Yes, you can survive without men
If that is what you like
But you don' have to,
And you shouldn't
If you don't want to

Sapiosexual me

Someone
who gives ideas
Someone
who makes me forget
the dust and grime of daily life
and shows me stars
Someone
whose one word
can have me googling for hours
And one conversation
produces a novel (ok, a short one)
Someone
who makes me wake up
in the middle of the night
just to check facts
Someone
who lives in the world of stories
Someone
who has a wealth of information
at his fingertips
that he can access
by merely closing his eyes
and tapping his temple

mirror mirror

i was afraid that your love
would bind me
limit me
but instead
it is mine
that restricts me

come to think of it
perhaps i knew how it would be
perhaps it was myself
i was afraid of
even then

and i just found in you
a suitable scapegoat

People with successful love stories

They always say the same things
# If it is meant to be, it will happen
# If it doesn't last, it's not love
# What will be, will be
# Things will fall together of their own accord for true love#

So easy

To make grand gestures of love
and so hard
to make little, everyday efforts

great expectations

I stopped  hoping
to see you around everyday
And when you do saunter by
I stopped yelling
I do not flood you with messages
That I send merely
To fill your absences
Not because I do not want to
Tell you about my day
But so that
I don't get disappointed
By your blank replies

It seems to have made things
A lot better
We don't fight, for one
And you don't run away
For another

but then,
losing expectations
also means
losing interest

will we survive
without the spark?

Blunt is the word

Feel free
To take my words at face value.

I mean exactly what i say.

And just so you know,
The hints you threw at me
That were supposed to make me
Introspect,

Soul-search

End up repenting sorrowfully
My apathy towards you,
And rush tearfully to make up.

Failed miserably

If anyone asks later

If it doesn't work out,

I'll say

I always knew

He held a candle

For someone else

I was just

Passing the time

path of least resistance

Armed with devastating cheekbones
One-of-a-kind eyebrows
Absolutely original pick-up lines
That made every lady
Feel it was for her

You went out into the world
that had disparaged you
And watched
As woman after woman
Fell weak-kneed
To your irresistible allure
And men looked up at you
In awe
All over again

None could stand your arsenal
There came the day
When you did not even need to smile
Hearts, it seemed,
Broke of their own accord
When you looked
From underneath your
Unbelievable eyelashes
(How can some non-living
strands of protein
express so much emotion?
Disdain, in particular)
and then looked away

And you continued to
Ring  up the charts
Though I cannot imagine
You not knowing
That each time you scored
I hurt as much as
The heart that would
soon be shattered

And yet,
When you came back
Remorseful
Hoping for acceptance
But doubtful of it,
I forgave you

Forgave you all the broken hearts
Forgave you all the tears
Shed only because you existed
Forgave you all the sorrows
That would never have happened
If you had not happened to those lives

Because I remembered
You all-consuming desire to win

How you would bulldoze you way out
of losing arguments
Charm your way out
of punishments
Make extravagant gestures
Just to prove yourself right
Bend over backwards, go out of the way
Just so people could find nothing to say

I watched as life flung
Failure after failure at you
Average academics
Below average pay
Frustrated extra-curriculars
Rejected romance
Other people speeding
Far, far ahead of you

And yet,
There was the desire to win
Tormenting you every night
What could you do but
Choose (What was for you)
The path of least resistance

Or rather, it chose you

I forgive you,
For I know why

I forgive you,
For who understands you story
Better than me
Who has been by your side
Just a few days shy of forever

I forgive you,
For I have known your utter misery
When you thought life had
Only failure in store

I forgive you,
For we are all selfish,
You no more than anyone else


And yet,
Why is it so hard for me 
To forgive her
Who, in her quest for
Warmth and acceptance,
Was no more selfish than you

In other words

When i said

I like girls

You laughed

And when i asked 

If i can kiss one

You told me 

To go ahead

By all means

I know you think it's ok

I know you are indulgent 

Of what you think

Is my whim, 

Youthful experimentation

But i m left wondering

If you really ever gave it much thought

Because if you did

You would have realized

That it just means

I love two different people

At the same time

And her gender, really,

Has nothing to do with it

my insecurities

Q: Do you think girls make such vague statements when they actually want something precisely?

A: Yes, girls do make vague statements. There are various reasons for that:

1. you are not sure how the person will react

2. you don't want t o be rejected

3. you want the guy to understand your feelings without saying so directly

4. you don't want the guy to think you are of bad character

5. if the guy rejects, you can back out n say u never meant it

honey dreams

Honey is not for everyday.
Yesterday I had piquant baked potato skins.

But tonight I want my dreams
as thick and heavy as honey
as thick and heavy and sweet

That i can get lost in
Drown in, more like

Enough, enough of hunger games dreams

how to outfocus rocks

"You know there is a dialogue. in a book. My love for everything else is like trees. "

"..."

"(Foliage, actually, but you won't know that.)"

" ..."

"It dies and it changes. And then there is the other kind of love, like the rocks beneath it, that..."

"But I am like the sky. Always there."

"But...the rocks..."

"Never changing, never dying."

"You really know how to make a hash of my literaty pretensions, don't u!"

 " ..."

"Come to think of it, you don't really need them, when you have the real thing." 

 " ..."

"Aite, I'll take the sky. But I'll take a moment, to apologize to Emily."

#hindsighted_justification
#plain_justification
#proudtobelowbrow

Why i like you

Petty things need reason

Grand, beautiful ones like you

Need no reason at all

(C) Axl

Same person

I had not realized 

That if you can give me

Love and happiness

You can take it away too

In fact

You are the only person 

Who can

(C) Axl

Riding a bike home

Pretending

That the streets of Kathmandu

And the glittery lights

Belong to some other city's midnight

The 5pm darkness

Is actually 7pm twilight

Of a warmer place

And the cold himalayan draft

Is just a gentle zephyr 

Gone momentarily wild

Doesn't really make it so

You still end up in a basement
That poses as a room

Cover

"They were having a hard time muffled their laughter as the mademoiselle's plate bounced, as if on its own, on the dinner table. When Joanna made a small joke that would have barely elicited a chuckle otherwise, they all laughed uproariously."

- Enid Blyton. Forgot the book

Too long had i dammed up

My disappointment

At your loss

And the dream of dear ones dying

Just became the excuse

For what came tumbling down 

I care so much about you

And yet,

Almost nothing

About your tears

Hypersomnia

After hours of sleep, they wake up without feeling refreshed -- re

I guess i am not hupersomniac.

After hours of sleep i don't wake up groggy

Only grumpy

Recurring motifs

How is it

That you never know

What things you hold dear

No, not things

But ideas, dreams, arguments

And what images are buried deep

Into you soul

Until you start writing poems

And the same themes

Appear over and over again

Separated by a few years

Or mere months

Written in different languages

Or with different examples perhaps

But the same,

Exactly the same motifs

Over and over again

It is as if

A mode count of themes

Could give

The essense of your soul

exception to the rule

i am vegetarian
not because i want to diet
or because i do not like the taste
but because i do not want to kill anything,
much less hurt it

but for you
the vilest human i have met
which also makes you
the basest animal

i will make an exception

sum of parts

She with her crooked teeth
was somehow more than the sum of her parts
and her less than wheatish skin
glowed with an angelic backlight
while i
broom like eyelashes notwithstanding
was always, always,
the dowdy sister
less than the sum of my parts

 http://devillangell.blogspot.com/2013/07/life-as-twin.html?showComment=1386409907366

His face

"Have you looked into his eyes, sister?"

"That i have not, sister, i fear to"

Rita and Serafina, his dark materials

And why was it that i

Refused to look into your face

What was it

That i was afraid of finding there?

Too much love, maybe

That i did not want to return

And be responsible for

All my life?

Or too little,

That would confirm

That no one loved me.

The elephant in the room

When you ask me

What i had for dinner

I know it is because

You want to avoid 

The elephant in the room

you don't want to talk about it

But unfortunately

I have nothing else

To talk about

Flying colors

When you know

The right thing to say

You always come out

With flying colors

Whether or not

You mean it

Seems like you better just

Learn the right words

And forget all about

Sincerity

At twenty

At twenty,
How do you know
That chances will come
Again and again
You think twenty two is the end of
Life as you know it
You have no idea
Of tantalizing twenty fives
And Mystifying twenty sevens
Or perhaps even blissful twenty nines

So at twenty
When a deep crimson sunset
Makes you speechless
The drum of raindrops on your roof
Makes you crave warmth
The solitude of an early morning
Ray of sunlight that wakes you up
Makes you ponder for meaning
When the first sight of a beach
Leads you inside the labyrinthine maze
Of your own soul

You wish,
You wish
That the beep on your phone
Is special

You wish you loved him

You know, you just know
That there is never going to be another
That you will never have this chance
Of happiness again

And so at twenty

you give it your all
Just because a kitten
Gave you a lump in the throat
When he sent you that beep
Or didn't

And it takes you so long
To realize
That perhaps
That was not love

Curiosity killed the cat

Whenever I think of stories
I always set them in this place
A forest, vaguely,
A dim fire
Some blurred huts
I try to figure out where this place is
where I have seen it before

And when I cannot
I let it be

Since I figured out
That the last place I used to imagine
Was my old shcool grounds
It lost its mystery

How long is this forest and fire going to holD?

Place of honor

For you there is

A place in my life

A place of reverence

Love, affection

Madness, devotion

If you choose to stay

But if you choose to come by

Once in a while

Don't be surprised if,

One day,

You do not find me waiting

Delusions of grandeur

I know i am not grand

And yet

I have enough streaks of brilliance

To give me delusions of grandeur

Enough

For me to lose myself

In reveries

Of bliss

Of conquering the world

Of extravagance

Of wild fantasies come true

I know they will not come true

And yet

I do not take them for granted

I know what it is to be

Without delusions

I know what it is like

When your mirror

Throws your reveries back at you

And tells you you are not worthy

And the worst part is that

Your very soul withers

Because the mirror has it convinced

No,

I do not take these delusions for granted

Today my soul tells me

That no matter what the world gives me

I deserve everything 

My dreams hold

Need for distance

I feel so far away from you

And you never seem to have felt

The need to be close at all

Terrace farms

Perhaps there is nothing more beautiful than

Finely crafted terrace fields

Shining with ripe golden rice

At once reminiscent of

Incredible diligence

Sciene

Art

Beauty

Nature

Culture

And the ultimate comfort,

Food

Stranger effect

For the seeker of strange new things everyday

After a week among far-flung cultures

You, the man from home,

Are finally not exotic enough.

I hope this means

That you will now stop haunting me

Gifts

When i see someone

Giving a truckload of gifts

When one well chosen piece

Would suffice

I wonder if it is because

They don't know

Which little piece it is

Seasonal affective disorder

There is no doubt

That i struggle with SAD

every year

But sometimes i wonder

If it is an excuse

I use

To be lazy

So that i can be excused from making 

the eneormous effort required 

To be happy

The dream that could not be interpreted

Once i dreamt of a man with mustaches

Who was wearing a short red ghaghra

And a sexy blouse that struggled to contain

His full breasts

After i woke up, disturbed,

I could not decide for the longest time

If it was indeed a man

Or a woman who had sprouted

Luxuriant, shoe-brush mustaches.

The girl of fifteen that i was then

Knew that this was a dream

No dream interpreter could explain

For the answer to this

I would have to dip deep into my own soul

But only now

Long after gaining the confidence

To tackle the dream with ease in daylight

Can i own up

To what it means to me

Hounded by insecurities

Inadequacies

Of not being beautiful enough,

And as a result, not desirable enough

By a man,

According to the standards set by

Smooth, hairless models and heroines,

The girl that i was 

Only found expression of her fears

In dreams.

Fears

That the extra padding that

Puberty was putting on her body

Would leave her hirsute

And unable to face any man without shame
Fears compounded by  the natural hairiniess
Of her race
And the unnatural capacity
Of her brilliant peers
To get rid of this problem 
That in her social ineptitude
Seemed impossibly beyond her

Dreams often tell you
What you do not dare acknowledge

In daylight

And this one told me

How deeply 

Images foisted by the ubiquitous mass media 

Can root themselves

In a subconscious.

Images idealized so thoroughly
That they are beyond recognition

Even by the subject herself

How do i know they are deep?

After years of

Threading

Veeting and anne frenching

Wax stripping and epilating

Many variations of the image

Of a full breasted (wo)man

With a shoe-brush mustache

Still continues to haunt me 

Leaving me breathless and perspiring

In the morning,

And ultimately,

Inadequate

(Perhaps they continue to haunt me because

I am unable to stop the

Waxing anne frenching epilating

Despite knowing 

that it has been foisted upon me) 

(Who sets the standards of my beauty?

How can they take away my free wil

And squeeze my subconscious?

How can they enter my sacred space

My dreams that i share with none

And that i believe feed on my very soul?

How can they tamper with my soul, just like that?

Why can i not compete with faceless entities

That tell me how i must look?

Why can i not tell them that thy are wrong

And i, with the natural hirsutism of my race,

Am right, am perfect.

The story of my hatred for

rivers of money that 

multinational cosmetic companies

Spend on advertising

Should maybe be put aside

For some other day)

So many lives are destroyed - II

Love can backfire

In so many unexpected ways

Her quietness gave her

An almost ethereal aura of dignity

He noticed how

She demanded nothing

Of anyone

And yet was content

With her lot in life

He 

Who believed he deserved 

Everything that life could him

Believed she

Who gave without asking for anything in return

Was perfect for him

And yet,

When he was lost

Even to himself

Within wells of despair

It was her very quietness

That turned against him

For she had not the ways

To reach out to him

Having not the smile

To take away his tears

She cried along with him,

Which bound him to her all the more

But doomed them both

To a lifetime of prozac and its equivalents

If only he had chosen

Someone more effervescent

Who would have taken 

Quite a bit of him

In his happy times

And yet

Would have acquired from it

The strengrh to reach out.

Maybe his story

Would have ended differently

If only

He hadn't spurned their vivacity

When he still could

So many lives are destroyed - I

Words come to his lips

They play on the base of his tongue

On the edge of his eyes

On the tips of his drumming fingers

Many a time he tries to get them out

But every time, 

Something or the other stops him

Sometimes its the memory

Of his uncle telling him

What a fine big boy he was and

How big boys don't cry

Sometimes of the girl

Spitting out as she left

To stop crying like a girl

And most of all

Of his father

Biting back his bitter words

To let out a smooth flow

Of reassurances

And of his mother

And everyone else's mother

Admiring him

For being

The calm man who could 

Take care of everything

He wipes the half a drop of tear

Beginning to form at the edge

He curls his fingers

Into a tight fist

And the words?

He swallows them whole

The silence of a storm

That has imploded upon itself

Is often inaudible.

But once you hear it,

It is stunning

The silence

In the hunched shoulders

In the half-glance

That looks and then looks away

In those impatient, impatient fingers

That will never again stop drumming

On any flat surface they will come across

How many stories they would tell

If only they were held

Until they calmed down

The sound of that silence

Is absolutely defeaning

Once you hear it,

There is no way you can unhear it

The loudness of it makes me wonder

If men are the truly oppressed species

At least my stories

Are greeted with hugs, not jeers

This alien creature

I am what you asked me to be

What you yourself wanted to be 

And now that

I have surpassed your expectations

And become what 

You could not

You realize, too late

That you don't kno

What to do with this

Alien creatur

That it was not 

What you want me to be
After all

You understand

When you do everything right

And still don't get loved

And someone who has no care

For how anyone else feels

Is smothered with affection

The world seems grossly unfair

And then you go fall u for him

Who breaks every rule in the book

Just to see you smile

It's still not fair

But you understand

On your "indifference"

"You complained when i was out of touch"

"I did"

"Now i am in touch, but you are  not happy"

"It's good to get your message once in a while"

"But what's the use, you are still sulking"

"Is it enough to live on?"

foolish, foolish girl

Exactly what i feared is happening

But that is not to blame you, however

if i had feared it all along, 

shouldn't i be prepared to solve it?

 

I am not, 

because  I was hoping for the worst

but preparing for the best

Your eyes

Are like stars

Shining, sparkling

Tantalizing

And forever out of reach

Through

I knew i had to get you

Out of my system

I did not realize

The only way was

Through

look beyond the face, please

maybe it seems to you
 that i have no sorrows
or that i am self sufficient,
can dispel them on my own

Do not be fooled
That is only because 
I expect you to give me

What the world does not

To heal me

Where it has hurt

To make up for everything 
The world has done to me

In the first place

You, I expect not to be deceived
by my sunny appearance 
But that is what

has charmed you in the first place,
Unfortunately

Platitudes

i remember the days when
talk flowed freely
when you felt you could offload
the cares of your heart
the chaos of your mind
easily onto me
and i listened
and tried to lift your spirits
send you a warm hug in words

i lost track of
when my assurances
stopped convincing you
and you stopped believing me
and our conversation
became mere platitudes

you offload your troubles no more
because you know exactly what i will say
and you also know
i only say it to make you feel better
i don't even connect to your problems

I love you

those words really make me wonder
If you want to make me happy
Or if my presence makes you happy

The blogger app

A poet's best friend

Dynamics of a tiff

When you fight with me,

I just want to win the argument

By the time i realize

That my winning

Does not make you happy

(Why should it?)

And only makes you withdraw

Into your shell

It is too late

And i was bedazzled to blindness

For the ruins of this

Temple of our love

I take responsibility

Even though it was your words
That fired the canon

The fire of my expectations

Burnt so bright 

It was no wonder

That you burst

dark circles

the first time i noticed
how deep they had dug
was when
freshly bereaved of your company
i thought of you
night and day

the day i decided to stop
they lightened, inexplicably

perhaps there is something to be said
for letting go
if it can reverse
withdrawal symptoms

Anyhow

"What if I had never come to you
We would both have led peaceful lives
Without pining for each other"

"In the next birth I will come to you,
then you won't feel responsible"

"I will be the guy then,
waiting for you"

"Yes, let us take turns"

"What if you are also a guy?"

"Then we would be gay"

":)"

Wasted hopes

Writing poems for you

Is like a blind man's lover

Dressing up for him

The world can see

What you will not

Should i have?

They say

A girl should make 

Her lover wait

But it seems to me

It depends

On what the girl wants

To be pursued

Or

To be loved

Not making you wait

Was worth it

You remind me of

When a smile

Became an obsession

And a whisper

Lit a spark

When a word

Had several layers of meaning

When a furtively passed note

Was literature

When evenings brought magic

And nights seemed to last forever

When dreams seeped into reality

And saturated all colors of life

You are the key
To the door to memories

You remind me ove

Sunny days

Never having to wear sweaters

Towels thretening to burn your skin

Drink after delicious drink

Of exotic juices

A splash in the water

Not ending in sneezes

An hour long ride without a jacket

Being perfectly normal

Going home for lunch

Eating rice for lunch

Dusty playgrounds

The smell of rain on parched earth

The smell of jasmine in the eveving

The smell of sun dried books
Books, books, and more books
The sight of ripe fruits
About to burst from their skins
The welcome sight of dust
Suspended in yellow sunshine
At all hours of the day

you know the day is not going well

when the cataclysm
does not end the PMS

You know the day is not going well

When you run out of

All the mood refreshers

That you hoard for bad days

--chocolates, joke sites,

Coffee, old love letters--

Early in the morning

wanting new friends

I keep trying to make new friends
and when I meet you after an interval
I realize
I was only trying to fill the void
of your absence

I don't need anyone else, really

How do i deal with answered prayers

You are

The gift i gave to myself

To be opened in account of

Calamities

The message in a bottle

I set afloat

Hoping it will float back to me

In a catastrophe

The favor i hoped to exchange

For everything i hold dear

When nothing is going right

But i guess

In this disillusioning world

I  had not really expexted

The gift to be delivered

Inspired by the blog Zero

Assured

I run, i twist

I experiment

I move away

I walk into fire,

Stare into the devil's eyes

Because i know

I can always come back

To safety

Like the rain that falls

With the certainity of the earth

I walk in a trance

Certain

Of your protection

Following me everywhere

Inspired by the blog Zero

Weighing questions

It seems i remember things 

That are not so important

 The prick of your stubble

 The changing looks on your face 

    As we grew more familiar

 The water that was unexpectedly

    All over the floor we planned to sit on

Trying to compensate

For not remembering

The important things

 What words did you say

   To tell me of your love

 What words gave you hope

 What tells you we will make it

Trying to get at true love

A young widow crying

At her husband's funeral pyre

Lovers' tearful embrace
When he is off to
Find his fortune in the world

And we don't know

If she is crying

For love of the man

Or for her lost opportunities

And the years of loneliness

That she sees spreading out of her

If only she were free to choose

Any number of loves

We would know

The strength of every love

On the edge of the ocean

Nothing should hold you back

From immersing yourself

Forgetting yourself

Drowning yourself

Letting yourseld flow

Finding yourself back

Nothing should hold you back

From exhiliration

Nothing does

Except for

That flowing black cloth

That some think

Protects your modesty

Hello, darling

Sure, i would leave you

If i found you were sleeping around

But what to do of the little flirtations

Sweet endearments

Where you mean no harm

But are not completely harmless either

Its always the grey areas

That are the most troublesome

Long distance relationship

Celebrating both birthdays

Months away from either

Because that is the only time

You will meet

What you mean to me

Some of us get dipped in flat,
some in satin,
some in gloss.
But every once in a while,
you find someone who's iridescent,
and when you do,
nothing will ever compare

-flipped

It happened once
Just once

And it was enough to tell me
That nothing will ever compare

(I wish it happened once in a while)

Why some people's self esteem never rises

You shouldn't let others
Tell you what you can
And cannot do

Easy to say
But hard to do
Especialy when you have nothing
To compare it to

Men

Do we hate them all the while
We pretend to love them?
Or do we love them deep inside
While we constantly attack them?

With devotion poured into us for generations
And rebellion drummed into us constantly
We have such a hard time

Trying to deny our own love
That we feel for them underneath it all
That is neither
But includes bits of both
And many other things

That awkward moment

When people take your niceties
For passionate interest
In their lives

i will never be with you

your appearance online

never fails to dampen
my date

repeating it enough times

 will make it true

The magic of secrets

What attractions can beauty hold
Or erudition
Or charm

Against complicity

Against a (wo)man
Who will tell me
All the secrets of the heart
And swear to me
That I am the only one to know

Thing of beauty

I remember being so tired of men
Writing about women's breasts
I knew, when i shed my inhibitions,
I would write about a man's body

But, the words fail me
As
In my imagination
I turn away from
Flat (pun intended) chests
And find myself describing
Things of beauty,
Curiosity,
Complexity,

{
What is it?

(Let's face it, we are ALL obsessed with
Women's bodies?)

(I am bisexual?)

(Ubiquitous male literuature has
objectified women so much
That i have internalized it?)
}

What do women want?

Of course i want you
To do
What i want you to do

But i would rather
You choose to do so
Than take my word for it
And blame me ever after

being a poet

why should life treat me
any different
because
i m a poet?

few people know
that i m one

but then again,
why shouldn't it?
life knows

about my poems!

@bhoju

when was the first time

you realized you had feelings?
someone said "I love you" to you?


- Bhoju

Promise of forever

You promise me forever
And I know it is not mine to take

But i can still let your promise
Make me happy

Who knows

Soon the promise
May not be yours
To give

First thought

Some day
When he was the first thought
On my mind every morning
I wanted to be his first thought

Today
You are not the first thought on my mind.
Because I know I am in yours

I fall into this knowledge
Like into an extra fluffy bed
And wake up in oblivion

Is it fair?

Badge of honor

You weigh your honor like a suite of armor. You think it protects you, but all it does is weigh you down
- a game of thrones

How true,
And reminds me of those who
For their (undoubtedly) good deeds
Expect to be rewarded by the world
Feel entitled to respect

And are bitter
When fate treats them
Just the same as everyone else
And people
Treat them no better than
Indifferent strangers

I wish

We could sit for hours
With our feet dipped in a river
And sing songs as we listen to the water

That awkward moment

When i talk about how you hurt me
And at the disbelieving, half jesting
Look on your face

Can neither pretend i was joking
And laugh it away
Nor plod on like a battering ram
And shatter your mood

Becoming and being

When you spend all your emotions on the journey
There is sometimes nothing left for the destination

of my smallness

It was the kind of love that, sooner or later, cornered you into a choice: either you tore free or you stayed and withstood its rigor even as it squeezed you into something smaller than yourself.
- And the mountains achoed

This time he says it so well, that I have nothing to add

Straitjacket

A person changes a hundred times in a single day

I have found enlightenment so many hundreds of times

I wonder what it does to an enlightened guru,
Buddha for instance
When appearances forbid him to change his doctrine
After he obtains a second enlightenment

Middle aged rage

Unhappy little boys sloshing around in their own rage. They feel wronged. They haven't been given their due. No one love them enough.
- and the mountains echoed

And when they deny that they need affection
And make it even more plain
For all the world l see
What they truly want

Why do i still stay away
And refuse to give them
Exactly that

Because people like them
Are like wells that come out
On the other side of the world

Take and take and take
Until my resources are depleted
But still pine over
Their wasted childhood

PTSD

Dead fifteen years, but in my dreams, i murder him anew every night.
- george r r martin in a game of thrones

Twenty years gone
Of you throttling my innocence

Ten years I wandered the grey forests
Of despair and confusion
Blaming myself

Ten more i took to look it in the face

And at the end of every day now,
I tell myself I have
Come to terms with it

And yet,
Everyday
In my dreams,
The shame surrounds
And drowns me
Anew

what happens to stacked negativity

the keenly sharped arrows of arguments
that i will never use
on the person i intend them for
whom i will hurt at no cost

instead, from inside my head
they will poke and puncture my mood
to bloody tatters

(and when they lose their edge,
their rust will seep into
many genial moments in the future,
giving me the worst version of sunset evenings)

Not enough II - children

She will not plant the seed in their mind, that a parent is capable of abandoning her children, of saying to them You are not enough.

- Khaled Hosseini in And the mountains echoed

i already know

that for me

it will not be enough

and thank god
that i am born in an era
when i do not have to be
ashamed of it

i don't need to hear

what i should have done
after i have already
not done it

Poetry

More of a relief
Than a fulfillment

More like a pee
Than a drink

Leaky faucet II - unfacing phantoms

Her mother would always be the leaking faucet at the back of her mind.
- and the mountains echoed

Sometimes i do wonder
What it would be like
To have never known a leaky faucet

A presence that grows
The more i try to pretend
That it does not belong to me

Leaky faucet I - drama queen

Her mother would always be the leaking faucet at the back of her mind.
- and the mountains echoed

And isn't it strange
That when i am lucky enough
To turn off the leaky faucet
I am unable to enjoy it

Sometimes it seems
I deliberately leave
Another faucet open
By an almost indiscernible
Half millimeter

Just to fill the void

Not enough I - parents

She will not plant the seed in their mind, that a parent is capable of abandoning her children, of saying to them You are not enough.

- Khaled Hosseini in And the mountains echoed

What if

You always knew

That you are not enough

That their priorities

Lie far away from hearts

In the shadow world of 

Appearances

Hinged on ifs

Projecting emotions
On stories and scenarios

"if she does this,
I will yell at her."
"if he had said that,
I would beat him up."

Because it's so hard
To confront the perpetrator
Right then

not wanting children

not because
i don't like children
or because
i am not motherly
but perhaps because
i know
that my instincts are
of the compulsive type

and because i prize other things
over
spending many hours
teaching a child
how to tie his laces
i would rather not bring
the all consuming maternal instinct
into play at all

(again, the prediction of feelings)

Aquarius

Talking to people
Just to get to know them
Prodding them for explanations
Overturning old rocks for answers
Discovering what makes them tick
And moving on

While the other person
Is exuberant at the spontaneous connection
Flattered by the interest
And thinks it will be life long

In relationships
As in every other thing
Looking only
And only
For answers

wish it was so easy

in movies,
when you are in confusion
a rakish guy says something
you disagree
but you think about it
and decide he is right
you take unprecedented decisions, 
turn your life around,
and fall in love to boot

in real life,
you think about what he says
decide he is wrong
and let it rankle forever
(plus the rake is an obnoxious prig
you will never even like)

Confession hour

My relief
At the cost of your pain

Moth in fire

Tired of waiting for
A grand love
And hunkering so much after
My own story

I took
The first chance
That came along
Which happened to be
A half-hearted one

(How was I to know
That you would come along?)

And perhaps
I would have done the same
Even if I knew
That you would come
But it would be many years
Before you did

(Such is the hunger
Of the youth
For experience:)

I wish i had saved myself

Now I have nothing to equal
Your intensity
Your enthusiasm
Your virginity

Took so long to find out

On the one hand are
Commercial dream producers
Telling me men are
Fountains of love
Out of my dreams

And on the other are
Shrill cries telling me
That men are beasts
Out of my nightmares

And no one to tell me
That men are just men
Just
People
Who laugh, cry, and hurt,
Just like me

Why should I shiver

When you touch the screen
with longing
and proceed
to run you fingers along it

just because i am
at the other end of the
skype call

Force-fed monogamy

like a round pitcher
that feelings, like water
exapnd to fill

forcing one to dismiss
    best friends as friends
    girls crushes as best friends
    lust for them, and for strangers,
    as unholy
making us feel guilty
    for "improper" feelings
    let alone actions
forcing us to
    stop loving many
    and to think of one person
    as the be-all and end-all
making complicance with it
    a matter of pride,
    and the uncompliant ones
    the objects of our
    disparagement
   
and in the end,
even convinving us that
it is the water
that was shaped round
in the first place

Chicken hearted

The chance at something
That previously made me happy

I turn back because
I know
It is not going to be as i expect

I could
Make adjustments
Form new expectations
And go back
With renewed confidence,

Instead,
I convince myself that
It's a bad idea anyways
Because
It's not going to be what i remember

(There is nothing
that time does not ravage,
so nothing is ever going to
as it was)

Because I would not go anyways
Because I was scared of the jump,
I found a logic so watertight
That not even I could argue with it

Cold feet

The unwillingness to express feelings
Now
Fearing that they may not last
In future

And i will have to live by loving words
Even after ceasing to feel them

What we want

(or at least i)
Is someone who is not bored
When we repeat the same things
Over and over again

And instead understands
Why they are
Important

They say women are mysterious creatures

But you know you are not
Mysterious at all
And you think it is because
You are still just a girl
You wait for it to come
And wait
And wait

And it never does
You realize you are only what you
Always were
Cyrstal clear

And it is the trying to be
"mysterious"
That discombobulates you
And twists you
Beyond your own recognition

Which of them are closer?

The two
Who share feelings
Talk and laugh and commisserate
And are willing to do
Anything for each other

Or the two
Who may not like each other so much
But know each other inside out
And can predict
Every breath
That the other will take
Every response to any eventuality
They will make
Every expression
On their face
Every word
They speak
And every thought
They don't

The most important person in your life

May not be the one you love the most
The one who loves you the most
Or even
The one with the strongest (love)-hate relationship

But
The one
Who recurs most in your waking dreams
The one
Whose words you turn over and over in your mind
The one
Whose very unspoken thoughts poke and prod you everyday

In short,
The one who you strive to prove yourself to
And end up orienting every action around

(And may not even know it)

woman reading siddhartha

Madam Wu
Whose feet her mother had tried to bind
But whose bandages were cut open before the bones were broken
Always retained
Due to that early binding
A narrowness of feet
Unseen in even the most deliactely bound ones
(pavillion of women by pearl s buck)

And she
With her early attraction to renunciation
Always retaining
Even in her later, sensual years
A tranquility of spirit
That went by unnoticed
     In many wiser, more diligent women
     Who had it also
Made many believe
In her angelhood

million dollar

the question at this point
is how to avoid degenerating into
the excesses of plenty

loose ends
pointlessness
attaching too much meaning to trifles
melancholia without a cause
looking for melancholia where there is none

No words for it

Dispersion from an erstwhile homeland
Is diaspora
Often characterized by
An inability to make a home
Anywhere else

What of those
Dispersed from a land
That was never theirs
Also characterized by
An inability to make a home
Anywhere else

A longing for ancient roots
Is atavista
What about an attachment
To roots that are not your own

Where the heart is

Though she spent just one night in the house
And many many years in several others
To her that house would always be home
Because it was to there she always wanted to go
In her dreams

(only she could never get there
even in dreams)

Merciless me

Just a few faults you have
Swimming in the sea of goodness
And yet i say
Having known him i know
The person i do not want to be

Excuses, excuses
For taking less care of you
For investing less into the relationship
For exonerating myself of being lazy
Emotionally lazy
(you are not a nice person, after all
What do i care if it hurts you?)

It scares me to imagine
What I could do
If you had given me
Enough reason
To really hate you

In love

The same person always says
The first sorry
And the last goodnight

soul mates

people might call her foolish
but she always maintained
that he was the love of her life
after just one meeting

because even through all her lovers
that she changed like handkerchiefs
and her happy  marriage
and her loving kids

he was the one
she continued to address in her mind
when she wanted to share a secret

fleeting romance

i often wonder
what it would be like
to have piles and piles of memories to choose from
to be confused
whether it was on this day you went out
or that friend who said something witty
to have so much love in your mind
enough to live on, dream on


instead of
every detail of every memory
standing out crystal clear
not because it is important
(which it is, by the way)
but because there is so little of it
that you can count on your fingers

disconnect

when you encounter
what really matters
everything else
just seems so inconsequential
like tinny voices
struggling to get through
to the inside
of a closed bubble

when the house of cards comes tumbling down

i thought i knew myself
until i realized that
the unique aspects
of my personality
that i cling to so fierceley
are just bits and pieces i made up
to fill the void
of the loss of the
real me

the old me
seems so alien
now that i have found the
even older me

yearning

i jsut need two extra days
i need a week, i need a month
is what i say
when i do not have the courage to say
that what i need
is a lifetime

anxities of writer's block

the lull in my poetry
is just the calm before the storm

(hoping against hope that it is so,
and is not an example of
happiness
that takes the fuel of creativity
away)

Coming

Full circle

Blessed

Realizing
The reason for a charmed life
That i forever took for granted

The shadow of an angel
Over my heart
The hand of an angel
On my head
The thoughts of an angel
Following me around

Get out of my life!

It is true that
Without you
I will be at peace

But a peace
Llike the pin-drop silence
Before a storm

Raging with the agitation of
Several tornadoes

Monogamy

Aren't we all
The victims of a suffocatig system
That idealizes
Denial
Austerities
And renunciation?

Art saturation - I

Someday
when all the artists
know all the techniques
and every piece of art
is a technical masterpiece,
will we be saturated of art?

Is there a term for

Attraction to half baked ideas?

So disconcerting

A chink in your armor

(Is it even possible?)

Art saturation - II

I wonder if art
Is meant to be preserved at all
If it is not meant
For a single generation
To delve deeply in
Discuss
Find meanings and layers

When art was not stored
Every generation created it anew
And it struck every audience as new

But now, everything we see
Is just a better version
Of something we have already seen

Or worse,
Just a different version
Of what we have already seen
The meanings
Have already been discussed
And become cliched

And there is nowhere to go
Because everything has been
Done before

Foresight

The long stories of longing
The ambiguous words
    Used with perfect knowledge
    Of what they imply
The unassuming hints

That i pretend not to hear
And let pass

Will i regret tomorrow
Not taking you up on your
Invitation?

Perhaps i will
Most probably i will not

But i will certainly regret it
Fifty years from now

mother

Isnt't it strange
that all food tastes better
when mother is back in home

even the cow milk
that she has nothing to do with

Tears of shame

Because i could not tell you my secret
And watch you hurt

It decided to come tumbling down my eyes

That i was happy about leaving you behind

Pants on fire

While i bounce off
The shiny, squeaky clean surface of
The straight-talker,

I find the layers upon layers
Of your personality
Oddly familiar
And for that reason,
Inviting.

Every layer
Has something different
The softness of fluffy candy
The smell of roses
The prickly thorns
The moisture of blood and tears
The mysterious past
The glamorous sadness
The cauldrons of stories
The alluring loneliness
You have it all.

The comfort of love.
The promise of adventure.
And at the center of the layers
Even the warmth of crisp blankets
That i could cuddle up and fall asleep in
With the layers of your petals
Protectively keeping watch all the time

And if you know which layer
I do not like
You will give me another
Even better
More dazzling than ever

I could just walk in your maze
For hours and hours

I could almost forget
That it is humanely impossible
To be so many things at once

Unless you are a
Liar,
Liar

Coming of age

You watch american movies
And read lifestyle magazines
Chick lit full of etiquette tips
And think that is how the world is

You begin to believe
That if you are polite and nice
And in the company of polite and nice people
Who will ask you about your day
Remember what you like to eat
Open the car door for you
Bring you flowers
You will be happy
There should be nothing more you can ask for

Until someone comes along
Who touches the very citadels of your being
Rocks your soul
Makes your entire existence worthwhile
Just by his being in the world

And in one moment,
Shatters the illusive world you built
To smithereens

Why i was dazzled by you

Because no one else had thought
The nerdiness in me
Was attractive
In the least bit

The moment when you realize

That it's not about the qualities of the other person
Not their clothes,
Not the school they went to,
Not their choice in music,
Not their level of intelligence
Not their tendency to niceness
Not your shared childhood

It's only and only about
How they make you feel

i was once a cranky soul

unloved,
and uncomprehending
that being unloved
was the reason
for my crankiness

It is not love if

It does not make me kind

I know it is not love when

You say you love me
But i know
I can never be happy with you

I know, because i have known love

Love is that
Which makes you soar
Makes you smile
Makes you happy
Makes you kind
Makes you creative
Makes you give your best
And smile through it

Love is
When you don't mind waking hours
To complete an essay
When you don't mind
Making efforts for those less fortunate
For the unhappy souls who are always cranky
Because they are unloved

Love is
When you don't mind
Giving them their share
Letting them win
Listening to them whine

Just because
The one you love
Is in your life
And looks upon you kindly
Just because you have so much love
That you don't mind sharing

I know,
Because i have known such love
I have been
Inspired by it

And what you foist on me
Is nothing but
A heavy burden
Of your love
Piled years deep
That you expect me
To be grateful about!

If it does not make me soar
Does not make me kind
Does not inspire me to make an effort
For those less fortunate,
It is not love

No,this is not the love
That i can live with

Why i am so sure

Life has fulfilled
Every little wish of mine
Even the ones
That i dared not
Acknowledge to myself

You are far away
But you will come back,
I am sure

Because life has to give me
A proximity to you
In some way

in moments of grief

it is strange how
everyone says the same words,
more or less

and only the words of some
comfort

Conversations

the best conversations
never leave lasting memories
of what they were all about

in days they are gone
like footsteps in sand

leaving behind only
a warm glow

which is all you remember
no matter how thoroughly
you search
the corners of your heart

Years later

The more I think  of you,
the more I fall in love with you

The little nuances
of your personality
make all the more sense

We were meant to be together
for a long, long time

we just weren't

(How can fate cheat us so?)

(If there was a god, he wouldn't let this happen)

The magic.

of the outdoors.
in summer nights.

And my dreams

Will certainly heal me tonight

Falling in love with you

Like falling from way way up
To land with a gentle splash
In lukewarn, green water

Premonition - III

Getting ready
To be blown away

Premonition - II

If i already know that something is going to make me
- exactly how happy a meeting will make me
Or how sad a parting,
Will it make a difference
When the moment comes along?

Tonight

I need you
With every fiber of my bein

Brilliant

I should be complaining
That you smile so little

Instead
I am surprised to note
That
Because it so rare
Your smile
Lights up the entire day

The day you smile at me
I go to sleep with a smile :)

The only high worth having

Being so attracted to someone
That it makes you dizzy

1. an is m(e)

The dizzy haze with stars exploding
In front of eyes,

When every song sends you back into
Paroxyms
Colors twinkle and shine
Migraines take a long holiday
And smiles
Threaten to settle permanently
on the face

The warm post coital glow
(without the coitus)
Of discovery
Of euphoria
That you are, after all, a woman
And not a frozen log

(why should it take so long?)

Am i more needy today?

The dogs!!!

(They knew what they were doing
When they confined women to seperation
Just when they needed the touch
The most)

No mood to dress

In the summer,
Even if i m depressed
And in no mood to dress up,
Any shapeless thing i wear
Is going to approximate
Rough-tough chic

But now, in the moodless gloomy winter
My shapeless jacket
Just makes me feel like
An oversize amoeba

Date a girl who dreams

Date a girl who dreams.

You will recognize her by the faraway look in her eyes, even when she is doing the most mundane things. 
She is the one whose answers may not really match your questions. 
She is the one who ends up somewhere she never meant to go, because she followed a song there. Or a brightly colored bird. Or a book in a stranger's hands. 
She is the one who comes home with an assortment of weird objects, because she thinks they are cute. or interesting  or wants to do DIY projects with them. 
She is the one who plays with a stray kitten for hours, and sometimes stray iguanas and porcupines, or whatever she finds. She is the ones that kittens follow home.

Rabin Sayami

Date a girl who dreams, because she is the one who can create your dreamland for you, right here, on earth. She is the one who can blow your worries away, like she blows the bubbles from a cheap soap water solution in plastic rings. She is the one who can make an ordinary day special. She is the one whose coffee warms up not just your hands, but your heart and soul. A day with her, lasts in your memory for a lifetime. And a lifetime with her, will pass by like a moment.

If you are attracted by her ethereal presence, smile at her. Let her know, that you know dreams matter, whether or not they come true. Hold her hand, and let her take you wherever her imagination flies. Hold her hand, and let her know that she can fly as high as she wants, because you will not let her get lost. Hold her hand, and hold her close. Close enough for her to see that your eyes hold dreams, dreams of her. Hold her close, and let her know that's where you will be, when she wakes up.

Because if you date a girl who dreams, you date a girl who loves life.
Because her stories create magic. 
Because her presence reminds you of everything you ever wanted.
Because, though she has a faraway look on her face, she will always be close to you.

Because, for you, she will always snap out at a moment's notice, from wherever she is.
Date a girl who dreams, and you will be dating a girl who cares.

Date a girl who dreams, and be prepared to let go of your hold on reality.
Date a girl who dreams, and be ready for the ride of your lifetime!

Maybe she carries her heart on her sleeve. Maybe she hides it behind he big glasses. big clothes. extra big bag. And if she does, you will just have to look. Because she is there, right there, behind the owl glasses. 

You might recognize this girl by the flowers she grows. Or by the poetry she spouts at short notice, because she knows it by heart. You may never have heard of it, but she doesn't exactly care for labels or climb the bandwagon. Or you may know her by the mud color she insists on putting on her walls, though she calls it chocolate, and maybe by the shiny stars she has stuck there.  You might recognize her by the silliest limericks she sends you at midnight. 

But the surest sign of a girl who dreams, is that she is a girl. Look closely, and you will find, whether or not she fits the list, that every girl is a dreamer. 

Date a girl who dreams, and you will be dating a girl who loves.

(Inspired by “Date a girl who reads” floating around online)

why i love you

i once tried to ask myself
why i love you
you are not
especially
i don't love you because you are
nice
kind
loving
caring
supportive
and always there for me
(though you are all of them)

i love you because
like my
father
mother
sister
my old house
the kitchen with the leaking tap
the oft thumbed book enjoyed in childhood
that i loved even after
knowing to be decidedly sexist

you are a part of my life

I luv drowning

In your scent

i hate people

who want to know everything
(about me)

What i fear about marriage

Wat will happen to
my collection of beloved books
when i get married?
Will i cart my heavy mahogany bookcase all the way?
Will my new rom have room for it?

If not,
WIll my husband consent to make room
among his oviously numerous books,
for my favorite book, at least
(he might, until  he hears that its a seven-book series)

Lucky boys who get to keep all their stuff

The place of escape

Whatever house I may live in
- full of whichever kind of
  smells, tangles, persons

Whatever city I may travel in
and embrace its dust and grime

The temple that I worship at
- the place of mystery, awe, wonder, transcendance
will always be your heart

i will

be the embrace that keeps you warm
be the kiss that wakes you up
watch your face as you smile

i will have you know

that you  do not bring me pain
but love, only love

fears

not wanting to talk about your stories
because someone else will come along
n say something more touching
n make ur story look pale in comparison

The shackle called marriage

Where goes the desire for intimacy
After you are no longer attracted to
The only person
That you are allowed to share a bed with?

Anger?
Pettiness?
Depression?
Moral high ground?
High sounding morality strictly applied to rest of society?

(if only we were free to seek what we wanted
Maybe we would have less grumpy middle aged people)

And wonders why

The generation that took its relationships
For granted
Watches
As years of accumulated unkindness
And negligence
Razes their relationship down

Which is more painful?

To have your innocence
Blasted to smithereens

Or

To watch it happening
To an innocent of your liking?

To have your relationship crumble

Or

To watch a relationship crumble
That shakes the citadels of your faith
In relationships?

I am amazed!

So little
You give me
And yet
My dreams manage
To make so much
Of it!

As you pass by

Trying to catch a whiff of you
(because, that is all you will give)

Why should anyone get married?

After thirty years together
If two people
Cannot bear to be in the same floor
Let alone the same room

:(

How comfortably
My hands found
The nooks and crannis
Of body
As if that's how
It was meant to be

And how awkwardly
They try to snuggle
With themselves now
Twisting and turning
In the most unrealistic poses

No, this was never meant to be

Why do i call you my sunshine

When you are as dark as a (k)night

If the world ended right now

I wouldn't be unhappy

i know it is love

when you make me laugh when i'm crying
and hold me until my eyes are dry
i know that's rare

when your words bring me hope
from the depths of despair
and teach me once more
the meaning of love,
i know what you mean to me

when only your heart feels like home
i know it's love

when a furious blush
steals across my face
as your thought comes to my mind unbidden
i know i want you

on an idyllic summer afternoon
by a small, dreamy lakeside
when u give me goosebumps
just by a simple touch
i know i will remember it forever

there is more, much more
but for now, the warm glow of our love
will have to suffice
as we try to savor every moment,
weaving a string
of fine golden pearls of memories
that we will wear on our heart forever

hindsight

At this age,
It is hard to meet someone u magically connect with
Easier to have found someone at thirteen,
connect magically, define urself according to that
and believe that's how u would have turned out anyways

hmm

When
The end
Doesnt make you as sad
As free

that's safey

I would like to have someone by me
That i don't have to wince when i touch on a bus

Phatic conversations

the mountains of separation
behind the veil of politness
as we talk of love

i cannot walk into you

knowing that if i do
i will lose respect
for both me and you

smoke

living in a strange high
even though
having said all i wanted to say
means that
it will never be the same again
with you

like papaya seeds

it eats me up from inside
that someone else is free to give you
what i am not

Skyping

I see that u see only my eyes
And though i hold my phone staright
Your image is sideways
Distorted, dismembered, mutilated

And yet , we would rather have those
distorted images
As a reminder of the person we love
Over nothing

my tragedy is a luxury

since i had no other problems
i can afford to shed my tears
solely for love

PMS -II

It burns
It stings
It makes me erupt in yells
It runs around my head like a ball full of spikes

And yet,
it gives me the fire
to create
to write

the angst
the anguish without a cause
that men will never know

and that
is behind so many of my favorite works

Epic material

Few lovers are worthy of their poems

- Kathleen joy

And then there are some
Only worthy of epics

And a foolish poet like me,
Who tries to contain you
In haikus