Not Just Yet...

You made me feel I could hope again
You made me feel that I could be whole again
You made me put the pieces of my broken heart together again
You became my closest friend again.
You strove past the barriers I had carefully built,
Barriers that effortlessly slipped away.
You willed me into giving in,
And became the friend I didn't know I had been yearning for-
That friend I saw myself being my truest self with...
The friend I aspire to be,
The friend I had always prayed for.
I wished to be your best friend,
The friend you quickly became to me,
The friend you said you yearned for too.

And somewhere deep inside,
Long gone, lost, forgotten and well-hidden
Was the memory of this little girl who had played silly games with you- partners in crime.
The girl who built sand castles by the sea,
The girl who played with dragon-flies.
That girl who grew up to dream of white horses and glass sandals,
Of fairy tale endings and princes.
The girl whose dreams got shattered by a fake prince.
That girl who turned into a woman stern,
Strong-willed, stubborn and unyielding like bitter cold.
Then you sauntered back in like a summer breeze,
Springtime, refreshing and inevitable,
Tapping memories of a past forgotten,
Did you notice how old we had gotten?
I was exhilirated and petrified...
What if I was chalk and you were cheese?
But we worked our way past through niceties
Without pretence or formalities!
It was like no time had passed
Between the children we were and when we met at last.
You were a stranger I knew so well,
A familiar strangeness, a charm of its own.

And dare I say I hoped again,
To look past barriers, so not there.
And as the hope arose
Of calling a friendship so cherished something more,
I ventured into unchartered territories
Blowing sometimes hot and sometimes cold...
As I questioned my intentions and yours
I was guilty of daring to hope
Of something I have refused to acknowledge- a distant forgotten emotion,
Was this it?
Could it be?

And so I confided in my new found friend,elated,
One who I hoped would understand, reciprocate and embrace...
Then watched the assurance slip away
As I watched the familiar yet strange back turn away
Something dimmed.
A closing door...
Something shifted, the familiarity slipping away.
As I watched the water slipping through my fingers,
I quietly hoped for it to be a returning tide...

I made you literature,unrequited...
Weaning myself away, building up my old guard again.
I withdrew, strong-willed and stern,
You would never know how much I yearn.
In all earnestness,
Pulling away
But not giving up,
Not Just Yet...

A Tryst with the City...

Out in a city, so familiar and yet so strange. Walking through streets unfamiliar,unknown to me in a city I claim to know so well. It was one of those long weekends, when you plan to run away into the hills ...what do I say so was I longing to run away from the hustle-bustle of the city. Claustrophobia. And then a sudden decision to walk out with a kindred spirit into the lanes of this city that has taken me in...Both of us in different places in our lives, caught up in our own preoccupations, stepped out to experience this city that had made us what we had become. She, cherishing every moment as she prepared to start over anew, me an unwilling tourist in my own city.

Something about the rooftop restaurant, Sam's Cafe, hidden in a corner of one of the streets of Paharganj, touched a chord in me, making me feel like I was in a new place, a side I had never seen before to a city so familiar.Something about seeing the city in a different light, from that rooftop, answered my wanderlust and made me find peace with myself, putting the restlessness stirring within me to rest for a while at least,if not for good. As we both sat there , lost in our own thoughts, no necessity of conversation, the ease silence settled in, oh so precious and rare and only possible with truly close friends.

Conversation interspersed with bites of food and sips of beverages of our choice. She, looking around disinterestedly, me scribbling away in my journal. Conversations surrounded us, some in foreign tongues, some familiar and some just static. But there we sat, preocccupied, satisfied for the moment, over a meal, as the lazy sunny Saturday afternoon gave way to a pleasant evening.

We sat there, lost in our own thoughts,watching the birds fly homewards...

Sometimes Me...

Sometimes I want to fly,
Sometimes to stand still...
Sometimes I am a fighter
Sometimes I struggle to survive.
And then there are times that I gush like a waterfall,
At others still am as still as a smooth flowing river.
Sometimes am a dreamer,
Sometimes a cynic...
Sometimes questioning
At others all knowing...
Sometimes the student
At others mentoring.
Sometimes game,
Sometimes unwilling...
Sometimes emancipated
Sometimes repressed
And now something stirs deep within me...
A divine discontent
Of what was
And of an innocence lost
An overwhelming of the self
With inner struggles and private conflicts,
With things said and others left unsaid,
With loud victories, unvoiced expectations and quiet disappointments.
Adulthood or self discovery?
No one knows
And no one can tell...

A Beautiful Violence...

I stay calm in the face of rage
A rage so tangible, I could reach out and burn.
And I wish to burn,
Burn in the fury and the rage I feel.
The passion I want to be devoured by
Burn whole!
Oh how I hate this need,
This desire,
This need.
The craving for a touch
Discreet and some more.
And yes the sheer violence of it all...
A Beautiful Violence!

Reacquainting the Selves Within Me..

Standing at crossroads, I don't know where the paths lead
I tread tentatively on that path that appears to promise eternal happiness
Unsure after a loss of faith;ready to flee at the slightest turbulence and am no coward!
Of star-crossed lovers and fortune-tellers,
Nomads and travellers...I wonder ever curious, ever dubious
A willingness to be swept away but held back by an old friend,
My old friend who has served me well, saved me from blunders
My friend- the good old voice of Reason!
The cynicism that set in a while back makes me apprehensive and dubious...
Someone inside me wants to break free with reckless abandon
And I didn't even know she was trapped in there...
I struggle to reach out and know her
The dreamer in me...
Sometimes I fear I have come too far to tread back
But rediscovering the self is more often than not an interesting journey
And what triggers it no one knows
Sometimes something an old friend says,
Sometimes a line you read in a book,
Sometimes the yearning to share yourself with someone
Sometimes the need to be something more...
So my ever curious, ever dubious self reaches within to my past dreamer self
Daring her to dream her dreams
Dreams of all kinds
Of achievement, of love, of greater truths
With a quiet guarantee,
A silent promise of deliverance!!!

Void...

Lost in thought, utter confusion, I often lose sight of realities, of actual possibilities, more often than not, projecting my wishful thinking onto people and things. However sometimes I wonder, if this delusion is only mine or a shared human experience. One can never know for no one will ever admit to this vulnerability. This vulnerability which one desires to makes one strength yet again wishfully.
How often have I have thought that there is reciprocation when in fact nothing existed there, nothing at all!

Of Desirable Disasters...

When a schoolgirl comes alive
In a grown woman
Caution goes out of the window
As emotions take over.
When the heart wants to do somersaults
At a single sight.
When all you want to do is
Scream from the rooftops
And you simply have to hold your silence.
Know that when your mind wanders
Into unknown places
Out of the blue.
You are headed for disaster
That desirable disaster- LOVE!

Bittersweet Defeat...

In this life of dreary habit
You offer some solace.
And yet I hate you
Not for who you are
But for who you make me.
Silly putty,
A plaything
My heart is at your will
To twist this way or that.
Precious ego
A battle of wills.
I want to give in
And flow away in the river,
The river of utter emotion.
And yet I refuse to,
A refusal to accept defeat
Self preservation.
A defeat which would be sweet
If you gave in too.
Two souls worlds apart
And yet poetically similar
Two halves that could come together and mesh
Mesh till they are inseparable
Homogeneous.
As I drown
Reason
My last straw
A struggle for survival,
Constant and endless.
I await the embrace of defeat
Which holds much promise
Bittersweet
If only you could embrace the courage
To give in too...

Un-inspired

Lack of inspiration
An intellectual drought
Emotions tapped dry.
The poet muses
The artist despairs
For art suffers.
Tragedy,
Heroism,
Romance and varied passions
Human emotions
Source of poetry.

The commoner is immune
To such troubles
For to him it is but a passing fancy.
As art dies
An inconspicuous death
The commoner lives on in ignorance.
Mediocrity rules,
Inglorious bastard!

When shall justice speak up
Poetic justice?
A lost, forgotten history
Pain-stricken yet wasted.
Disheartening
For the Artist who thrives on art
To watch from the sidelines
This ruination.
Hopeless and helpless;
An eternal suffering
This famine!

A Different Kind of Faith...

"The world is afflicted with death and decay, therefore the wise do not grieve, knowing the ways of the world"--- Old Buddhist Saying

When one is rational, practical, whatever, is one truly heartless? Is that what one is doing when one is doing the right thing?The strong, the sensible thing?
It is not that stoicism is above and beyond pain or grief. It in fact is the realisation and acceptance of the 'Big Plan' that one has no control over. And this has nothing to do with whether one is spiritual, religious or an atheist. Even when one lacks faith (or what is the popular idea of faith), in true stoicism over loss, over pain, in hardships, one is exemplar of true faith. If nothing else, for the want of a better word, faith in the human condition, with all its connections and failings. And therefore I believe that the true stoic is all heart. A braver heart maybe but still all heart... :)