The Sunshine

You looked me in the eye
And said you loved
And I guess what I saw
In your eyes was nothing
But just the truth.

In just a span of a year
We weaved dreams of our own
Of building our fantasy into reality
And I guess all I did
Was just believe that
Your eyes could never lie.

But soon all of the sunshine
You showed my eyes
Were drifted away
By rain and hail
And amidst the snow clad meadows
I search but you
And the dreams you’d shown
Are out of sight.

Barren

I won’t lie, but yes
I do miss you,
I miss you on days
When the rain strikes on our bedroom window
And the wind threatens to break open the glass,
You running into the room
Barefoot, in your boxers
Steaming cups of ginger tea and plateful of pakoras
In your hand,
And we both would watch the rain
Through the night, till the morning.
On days when the snow sticks to the ground
But in our icy cold indoors
We would both be warm
Huddled in each other’s embrace.
When the bright yellow flowerets
Of Amaltus, festoons our balcony,
You plucking a few for the vase on my table.

But then again I’m reminded
Of those rainy days
When the water sprayed on our bedroom floor
For you weren’t there to lock the window,
The cold on the side of your bed
Colder than our frozen indoors
The branches of the Amaltus tree
You chopped off for they
Ceased to bloom,
Not any more,
All of this because you didn’t want to be home,
All because of my barren womb.

If only you had waited
a year longer.

PC: Instagram

Champagne Kisses

//champagne kisses//

‘to the love that shall always thrive’

• You toasted the day we tied our wedlock
  Over a glass of sparkling, golden champagne.
  With our lips glazed with the wine
  It’s lavish taste lingering in our mouths
  We began our forever with a champagne kiss:
  ‘to the love that shall always thrive’

But the taste of this sweet wine wears off,
Easy as its intoxication
The bubbles rise
And fall to an abrupt plop
With just the remnants of its taste
Dawdling in my lips
‘to the love that shall always thrive’

• That was over our champagne kiss.

PC: Instagram

Unplanned love

/Unplanned love/

You came as a waft of shiuli
In the blaring sun
An unplanned cool autumn
In the heat of summer.

Soon your calming breeze
Brought tranquil to my restless soul
And the mellow fragrance
Teased at my nostrils.

Your beauty in simplicity
Brought a new meaning to my life
In shades of white and orange
You brought love into my life.

But would you be the one
Lasting only the autumn,
Leaving me alone in the cold of winter?
Or would you walk with me
Lasting an eternity?

PC: instagram

The love note

Dear Love,

By the time you find my note/ Half of your wardrobe would be empty/ One pretzel less in the jar/ Half of the flowers in the vase withered/ The photoframe that captured our seraphic smiles absent from the coffee table/The dishes in the sink all done/ The bed made and all of my strewn poems on the floor tidied/ You wouldn’t find the birds in the cage/ And the hamsters would’ve run away/ All of the curtains in my room changed to your favorite blue.
But don’t worry your room is still a safe haven / Your files all stacked up/ Your guitar sits on the club chair by the window where you write songs for her / And the wrist watch I gifted you on your birthday locked up in your secret drawer.
Like all of the halves I’ve taken with me, I’m taking just half of my heart/ And none of my love for you/ It’s yours/ And it shall stay with you/ Even if we’re continents apart.

From,
Someone you never cared about.

Unread letters

I found this Polaroid of me and Nani
Sitting with a huge tub of ice cream
Probably from one of my birthdays,
Mom took it with the first camera that daddy bought,
Back then cameras had reels
That had to be developed into positives and negatives.
.
.
My birthday was in the summer month of July
Ice cream was an inevitable part of the birthday party menu,
Hence, daddy would bring a generous amount of ice cream
Mango and strawberry flavors for the guests
And for a chocolate fanatic like me, hazelnut and chocolate chips.
.
.
In the photograph I sat on our sofa with a chocolate smeared face, my royal ice cream tub half empty
Nani sat alongside, smiling as she held a spoonful
Me gazing at the tub, she staring into the camera
I wonder if she ate that scoop for the Nani from older days that I recall had sensitivity and would eat ice cream only after it melted.

Along with that Polaroid I found an album full of pictures
On my birthday, Nani would make a point to visit us, twice on that day
With her arthralgia joints and aching back she would walk up to the first floor
In the morning to wish me “Haphy Birthday”
(you read it right, that is how she would pronounce,
and the fact that I found amusement in her pronunciation
was another form of joy for her)
And to offer Puja. In the evening to join the family dinner.
There were pictures of all of those captured moments,
Her offering the Aarti, feeding me a slice of cake.
.
.
Those albums were like hidden treasures and
those memories like unread letters, waiting to be found
At the right moment.
.
.
We never thought of them, for years until today,
Now that Nani is no more, it is only these memories that I can reply,
There is hardly a month left for my birthday, this year, a lonesome affair it will be,
But I guess I’ll open a few of those unread letters.

Madness

We are the perfectly weird couple,
The magical reality of my teenage dreams,
Dancing in the rain, eating cotton candies on Ferris wheel,
Kissing each other in the middle of a fight,
Laughing like idiots on our wedding night,
In all of these madness, we’re partners in crime,
In all of these madness, our love comes alive.

Soul

My soul won’t rest
Until all of her scars heal
As she teaches herself to forgive
Of the flaws she ever had.
My soul won’t rest
Until she learns to love
Herself like the way
You never did.

Things that buy me happiness

Death by chocolate ice cream
Mac and cheese with extra cheese
Cup of cocoa with marshmallows
Pakore with pudine ki chutney on rainy days.
Sleeping on mumma’s lap
Long drives with dad
Grandma’s milk tea served with stories
Late night girl talk with sis.
Hugs from behind
Star gazing under the moonlight
Little love notes stuck on the fridge
Candlelight dinners in our balcony.
Rerunning Big Bang Theory at day
And Friends at night,
Laughter over his jokes, so silly
No projects or assignments in sight for a week.
Sunsets by the beach
Candyfloss and teddies
Songs by Beatles on repeat
Reading books and poetry to my pet.
A month without the surprise of pimples
The body con red dress that fits me perfect
Varied colors of nail paints
That moment in front of the mirror,
When everything in life seems perfect.
All of these
Can buy me happiness,
Not for the entire life
But for a while. .

Bucket list of a dying man

PC: Instagram

1.) To pen down his autobiography
And tell all of the people
The story of his life,
To read all of Shakespeare’s masterpieces
To work in a Broadway
Learn all of the languages
he could only learn half
The guitar he could never learn to play.
2.) To go on a trip
All by himself
The Seven Wonders, The Northern Lights
The floral wave of Cherry Blossoms
To hear his voice echo in the Grand Canyon
The Galapagos Islands he only heard of
Walk through the ruins of Pompeii
All of which he wanted to see.
3.) To be together with his wife
To shower her with all of his love
And to his family
give all of his time.
He longed to see his mother
And talk to his brother
Of the house he could never build.
4.) He was reminded of all the times
With his father, he had answered back
And never said sorry.
Of all the apologies
he thought of
But never made,
Of all his love
He never proclaimed.
5.) He craved his mother’s
bitter gourd sabji
The one which he never ate,
Even thought his mom would say “beta it’s good for health “
And for once at last
He wished to get high
With no worries.
6.) Meet up with at least
one of his friends
And  talk to the one
He had never talked with
since his farewell.
He wished to make amends
And die a man people remembered,
A man who had died
But wasn’t dead.
7.) To love himself
For being the man he was
And be happy with the life he lived
Of the times he stumbled
But didn’t let him fall.
8.) As his clock started off
In reverse circles
Fifty years of
His life fell short,
He wanted more of his life
He wanted more of his time
He wanted not to die. .