Reader Island

 There will always be an island

the island of readers

unbiased

who come to my writing as nymphs and dryads

to the cool of a forest

and the shade of a waterfall

to enjoy the words'

sound

cascading like water

picking and eating them

like berries

that stain their lips red

with their juice

and because of these and the naiads

who quench their thirst at my poems' fountains

because of their refreshment

I breathe

I live

7Nidhi Popli, Lakshmi Venkatachalam and 5 others

Something dark

 I know you read me

and then wish you hadn't

because there is something in there

you just can't place your finger on

something that is nothing like and belied by my appearance

shaggy like a bear and silver-backed like a gorilla

something dark that swallows light

and make you want to be wild, get wet or get angry

Proud to be an anti-national poem

 Looking at the young, feminine faces of 'the enemies of the State'

Narwal, Devangana Kalita, Parul Khakar and Disha Ravi

Their names like a poem

(All Good Hindu Names, or are they not, my friends?)

I feel 'their' State is the devil's flaming brew/tea

and they the flies to wanton boys

who think they are Gods

who 'strip' off their wings

and leave them all in it to float, sink or drown.

Paranoid and bitter? Poem

A Tribute to Nightbirde*

I remember back then

how you used to come

hang on to my every word and every poem

You and you and you

and you and you and you

I was the stars to your moon

My poems the sun to your sunflowers

I was the one you could practice heliotropism on

Then when you thought that you had arrived

Your visits became few and finally none

You said you are not a poet, or your silence did, to me

I am bigger than you now, it said, I know it all

I watched you try to remove the ground beneath my feet

Unable to feel hurt, or anything

The Krishna whom you felt that you could give a bhashan to

The Drona whose thumb and forefinger you wanted to remove

The one who was just an inn on your way to your destiny

Or cut down to size, to step into my shoes

I was busy watching the ants in the anthills

The anthills in the savannahs and not the cities

You did not know of people like Nightbirde

In comparison with whom you would never become anything

As you did not have the same amount of humility

People whom I watched, the tears streaming down my face

The real thing, whether successful or not

Fighting insuperable odds and able to go on

To sing, to dance, to write poems to fight, to live

To hope, to have faith, to love, with the courage to go on alone

I did not know them and they did not know me

But we were kin and wing to wing flew in the unknown, lost

"It's ok, it's ok, it's ok," was our song

"To be among the lost," and soar, vast, "sometimes".

To burn a hundred poems and still be strong

To never look back, and have nothing to look forward to

to break the yellow lights and know it is only you you lied to

"It's ok, it's ok, it's ok", you see

"To be among the lost", and not even soar**, "sometimes."

*Everything in this poem may be wrong. (ref. to Richard Bach's Illusions)

** have a golden buzzer moment

https://www.facebook.com/simoncowell/videos/542849500456737

Prompt poem

 

given by Amita Paul

10stSponsoSrencdh  · 

This is photograph of Karwar Railway Station which Karnataka Tourism claims is the greenest in India.
It looks breathtakingly beautiful in this photo.

I wonder how many poets in TSL would feel inspired to write a poem or two on it?

that green that mist those tracks that train those platforms and the smell of rain is that not where i kissed you once that rain that green those mountains that mist that smell that pain

The night as seducer/seductress - a poem.

 The night as seducer/seductress

the night has its longings

the day does not know,

takes off its furs/dress

no longer trammeled by the light

not afraid to reach out and touch

for warmth

the skin of the one/s it wants to darken

the night has its own restlessness

its feelings/failings

and longs to be found at some hearth

watching the flames licking at the logs

curled up on the carpet

legs stretched out

in its nakedness

having crept in through the window

and the sliver of light

underneath the door

to slide, sidle into bed

and watch over

the breath in sleep,

the soft rise and fall of some fair breast/chest

black now, with the light switched off,

as its own face

in the mirror near, a mere* now

in its sight.

*well

Anti-moon poem

 I would not want a lover like the moon

Far away and probably cold not only in June

Just an eye or peering in through the window

Yellow or silver, pitted black or new

I would not want a lover like the moon

She is only a dream that makes you want to swoon

Never comes down from that distance, up there

To the earth to take off her clothes as an apsara

and dance with me to my poor tune

No, I really would not want, either, to be the moon

And be compared by poets to atrocious similes,

lies, metaphors and lunatic images

The moon is like a paper cup

She is cheese and a crescent of t/horns

Dripping blood, a vagina, a sand dune

A desert, there's a girl in it, no, that's a cosmonaut, you fool!

Must be painful to read all that and not feel like a poltroon

Roses are there and stars and the sun

Golden ladders to the night and sky

Blue of the morn

Be careful what you wish for

Be wary of the moon

I would not want to have her for a lover,

That old, capricious, woman moon.

Rejoinder poem

 Trying my hand at poetry after a long time by my standards

A Poem inspired by one I read of Smitha Mohandas that I have turned around or inside out - thanks for the inspiration, Smitha, by making me read a good poem written by you carefully after a long time

The small, brown puddle

On the wet, muddy side-road

An ocean for two paper boats

After the rain,

Drifting away from each other

So near can yet be so far

His arms lay robotic by his side

To not touch her fingers wet from raindrops

While her thighs trembled for their touch.

So near can yet be miles

A hand's span in a puddle

For paper boats

Oceans wide. The water getting in

Drowning, making the paper a thick, soggy green

Sinking.