Gadfly

When I struggled
Out of the wreckage of my nightmare
On the wall was spread out
The sun
Deliciously golden, warm and edible
The crow happily cawed
As if it had found something to eat
The leaves wet with rain
Shivered with delight
At the touch of the breeze
One was just happy to be awake and alive
Quite at home with the clutter
Of a house lived in
It was almost like heaven
Before the gadfly came in

Talking to myself

Everytime, inside the bus
Full of strangers
I keep looking for
Known faces
Someone I could
Lighten the journey with
Trading inanities
On life's Sisyphean grind
Or trumpeting new acquisitions
Aware of sounding like the serpent
Selling the forbidden fruit
Even while saying it
All the time both
Hiding the pain in lies
Pretending to be swimming
When being swept away
Living the same servile lives
Yet assuming sovereign airs
As the bus lurches, sways and surges
And I trade old words
With him, I often feel
I'm talking to myself
In a dream I've already had.
(Published in Kavya Bharati)

Down to earth

At the public tap
The mother does not see
The moons floating in the pots
Full and waiting to be fetched home
The child thinks they have fallen in
And whispers conspiratorially
She will rescue them
When no one is looking.
To grow up
Is not to see the moon in the pot
When you heft it to your hip

Inviting

The sodium vapour lamps
Come on early like the night
Despite the illumination
My glasses look like they need changing
The air in my lungs
Whistles as it comes out
I think I should wear my woollens
Next time I dare to stir out
When I see girls go laughing along the road
Savouring cone ice creams
Mocking the nip in the air
Even death seems seductive
(Published in Kavya Bharati)

Interpreting English films

If relatives hounded you for being an English literature student with quizzes on "what does this word mean" friends insisted on taking you to English films without sub-titles to serve as interpreter. Action films like Five Man Army or Sudden Impact are self-explanatory but how do you explain a film like The Philadelphia Experiment, which talks about the Fourth Dimension. I really cut a sorry figure trying to interpret that film and was dubbed by those who sponsored the outing as an impostor. After that experience I used to pick and choose the films to interpret. Soon I found that going to films was becoming a chore. My clients kept interrupting me during interesting sequences. In a very emotional scene in a western as Clint Eastwood tells the murderous sheriff: Deserving has nothing to do with it -- the client on my right shouts into my ear: "what's he saying?" You wish you could do to him what Eastwood does to the sheriff. I had my revenge when I took a few of them knowing Hindi to a Dharmendra starrer and harassed them throughout. It was at such times one wished the world had a lingua franca. Now, ofcourse even James Bond speaks in Tamil and Jackie Chan swears at his enemies in Madras Tamil dialect. Interpreters can watch their films in peace.

The Buddha laughs

When the lights blow out

The children forced to study

Cheer as if darkness were godsend

Candles which do not want to die

Disappear but when found

Bring the walls alive -----

We are all children again 

Marvelling at the shadows

We can turn into deer or hound ----

The air hums with unheard sounds

The empty chairs glow with life

The streets flow with chatter and laughter

The Buddha in the showcase stretches

And laughs at how time can come to a halt.

Cooum

Near the cinema
Stripping women of their souls
The river quietly breathes
Stoic like a saint
Though dying of the city's sins
On the bridge
The harlot
Too weary to walk the streets
Stands staring at the waters
Mourning the river
She had lost
In her hamlet green
Where it skipped like a girl
Without a care
Frothing, foaming, giggling
Unlike the river here
Dying of the city' s sins
(Published in Kavya Bharati)