Time Portal

Time portal

On some days I wish
Time portal did exist
Just a familiar knock
Would lead me to its door
To another time, another space

More than the Time,
I miss the familiar spaces
With loving faces and embraces
That are forever lost

I wish to go back to a time
To enjoy long walks with my father
Have ice creams with my mother
Or to get into arguments
With my grandmother
about ungodly behaviour of gods
(While savouring her ladoos)

I wish I could go back
To just be a naughty giggling
back-bencher in school
Or climb those Sahyadri hills yet again
To reach dilapidated fort premises
Just to lie on my back
Under open night dark sky
Beholding the starry night

Or maybe go back to a time
to be held
In a long tight embrace
by my very special little nephew
His eyes conveying fears
And a promise that
he would always
Be there to hold me tight
Wish he could return
Through that portal door
To me yet again

Sometimes dreams
become that portal
They take me back to time
That’s when I wish
I don’t wake up
To this hideous reality
Of an unsafe world
That teaches us
Only to doubt, fear and judge

I wish there existed a Time portal
And a familiar knock would lead me
To another world
Another time and space
Where I could be me
Throwing all cautions to the wind
Embracing or being embraced
By those I have forever lost

Best not Taken

Thud – will that how it will sound?
Breaking lazy monotony
Of a rainy evening
Ensuing a chaos

Miraculously
Things will be taken care of
Strangers will curse,
blame and pity
And so will
family, friends and colleagues

People who never paused
To listen or understand
Will dissect your being
For hours

Gaslighting the departed
Absolving themselves of guilt
Everyone will move on

Within a day or two or years
Presence of a life will be erased
Unloved life would be lost in vain

Is that all there is?

Pause and look up
Behold the bird
Soaring in the sky
Flying into the setting sun

Birth is never a choice
But when death seems at times
The trick definitely is to
Keep breathing

Wait for the moment to pass
Look beyond
Outside your window
There is a life that awaits
That wants you to live

Take the pain in stride
And marinate your life with it
The last desperate step
Will definitely be
The best not taken!!

Disbelief

We stare in disbelief
At life that slips away
Who knew just a breath
All that it takes to be alive

We stare in disbelief
At all the lives
Washed ashore
Becoming nation's memories

We close our eyes in disbelief
When we cannot take it anymore
Confined in our safe homes
We turn into living ghosts

We stare in disbelief
As humanity fades away
We who love wars and winners
Are the tired vanquished lot

We stare in disbelief
As leaders trade away our lives
And our deaths
To build their empire of glory















Just Like a Driftwood

Don't behold me 
With contempt
Because I floated in
Just like a driftwood

I had a name
Born to someone
Isn't it enough
To qualify as a human?

Do not fear me
Do not hate my folks
Simply they couldn't afford
- love, pyre or a grave

They probably thought
Water should be my grave
Instead of fire or earth

River being the river
Did what it does best
Buoyed me back
Just like a driftwood

I had love to give
But there were no takers
In the land of hate

River could have set me free
But it returned me to you
As a nameless corpse
To be counted among
The countless

River will remember me
Even if you don't
This beloved river is
Our memorial!

#CovidDeaths

If Dead Could Speak

If dead could speak
I wonder what would they say
To every
'Rest in Peace'

They gasped for breath
They waited for beds
They trusted
They hoped

They left behind
Mounting sorrows
And bills
And plans
And dreams

They simply got erased
Without farewells
They got dumped
They got duped

Don't ever think
They are
Resting in Peace

If dead could rise
From the ashes
And graves
And rivers
They would certainly
Rise in rage

Waiting in the Dark

When will it be dawn?
I ask in desperation
Peering at the night sky
Stars too seem grim tonight

After the endless wait
There is a dim light
But, someone whispers
Hey, you missed the day!

What arrives is another dusk
Followed by the dark
Moonless night
Stars without their shine

Another endless wait
For the dawn
That never arrives
A dawn
That never arrives

Spin

What kind of a spin is it?
What goes around, does come around
Yet, its never the same!

Laws teach nothing is lost
Yet, much cannot be retrieved
The top is also below
A walk on the mobius strip

In a world so self-similar
Nothing is familiar
For – What is, is never,
What really it is!

What we know, is actually,
Only the depth of the unknown
And that bond also decides the drift

Stuck on a blue planet in a vast abyss
Where war literally is sold as peace
I wonder,
What kind of a spin is it?