The Moon and You

They say,

That the moon is brilliant tonight.
They point, and exclaim
And gape and claim
That nothing could be prettier than this sight,
Of the queen moon, holding court
In the ballroom of her sky.
Where the stars tremble like young maidens,
And the clouds with their smoky mustaches fly
And flit from one corner to another -
This girl or the other - while
the night lark minstrels the dancers on;
Lonely on the neem tree of my lonely garden lawn; yawns
When the stillness of the night gets to it; not for long:
The drink flows free and spirits are high.
The romance of the night
Creeps underneath the plump dresses of the plump stars, and they sigh
A collective sigh, and why
Not? The Queen Mother is holding court
In the ballroom of the sky.

This drunken poet sees with unseeing eyes,
The revelry of the night sky.
He has beheld his beloved, in the blush of the summer moon. Heard her call to him
In the whispering of the warm, night loo, and
The caresses of her silken hands he has felt
In the brushes of the dark wind
Through his dark hair. Nature's bounty
Makes me pine for you, the more for Her beauty.
How dare they show
Me, your lover, the trembling stars?
Do they not know that I have seen them a million times
In the pools of your liquid eyes, partially hidden by the clouds
Of glassy obscuration,
So necessary for ocular precision,
Yet adding to your loveliness, just like
The clouds add character to the moon?
I, who have found my raison d’être (pardon my French),
In hard-won sighs of love dripping from your clenched
Lips; what do I care
For the singing of the night birds?

I, who have found you: what do I care for the world?

Pancakes

The first eager suffusions of dawn-break ease into the early morning calm, transforming everything into a pale reflection of the pinkish sea-sky. Soon, yolky sunlight shall sprinkle down on upon the sleepy affairs of men. It shall peek through imperfectly-fitting windows and cracks and mischievously tickle curtained dreams, and creep behind drowsy screens of creamy fantasy. People shall arise, and shed the darkness, rub out the sleep-dust from their eyes. The gentle whirr of awakening life fractures the stillness of the morning, inters the dead night. The stars slip away, as silently as they came. The bashful, milk moon cries as the orange-juice sun makes love to it for the last time. The birds chorus in the ravenous joy of being alive. The clouds look on in benign enjoyment. It's a new day.

It's almost time for breakfast.

...

Go away, all you harbingers of Activity. I have stayed awake for too long. Let me sleep for a little while more. Let me dream, a little while more.

...

You come to me in the fissures between sleep and consciousness.

Paint

The canvas of the sky is washed clean. Tomorrow, the daily lives of a million people subsisting in this masala city shall pollute it again, with their circular ambitions and efforts. But for this evening, the sky is virginal. Soft. Alive. After so many days, it has awoken to the sound of whispering pitter-patter on the plastic roof of my father's garage. To the smell of a smoldering moisture; to the mischievous nip in the air, which tickles and teases so.

To the frustrated, liquid longing in the eyes of a fifteen year old girl, who combs her hair repeatedly by the light of a flickering gaslight in order to look beautiful for the benefit of the rain.

To the lonely guitarist, lost in the puffs of his own lung-burning smoke; who in a roll of translucent paper shall fly to another land, shall escape corporeality.
To the sallow, burning boy, who peeks out of the window into his fair neighbour's bedroom.

A thousand dozen insecurities.

But not tonight. Tonight's for gazing up at the milky stars in quiet wonder, and thinking of poetical and philosophical matters. Tonight is for nostalgic melancholy. Tonight is for being and existing. Tonight is for sleeping with our doors open. Tonight is for watery happiness. 
Tonight is for Us.
Under the guiltless canvas of a rain-washed night, You and I shall paint of Love.

...

But the magic's slipping away now. The evening is melting. Soon we shall go back to our fading lives, our silicone, reined-in existences. And the night envelopes its own, and rests. Tomorrow's another day.

...

Everyday always comes too fast.

The Sky

I don't look up at the sky enough, any more. Don't feel the colors enough.

All I notice are the skeleton-sketched borders. The patterned outlines of a dusty, sweaty morning in Delhi. When moisture sweeps in the moment you step out from your morning bath. It sticks to you. It sticks to you like guilt as you go about your day. It exults in your smallest exertion. It licks you, like a grey-brown giant cobweb of inertia and listlessness.

No colors.

Are they dead? Sometimes, I wish they were. I wish they were dead, so I wouldn't have to live with the knowledge that I can't see them. They're angry at me. They refuse to entertain me; refuse to enter my mind and flow through me.

I wish for a lost girl. A girl not from our times. A girl who lives fenced in her head from the corrupting greyness of the without. A girl who wears skirts. A girl who can See. A girl who can flow with me.

A girl who can love me for my colors and my music.

A girl who can love my Art, for my Art is the greatest expression of me as a living, breathing, beating human being.

But I'm losing my colors in a cesspool of mottled-grey guilt. And I'm losing You.

Solipsism

I am but a pinpoint of light

In a tapestry of
Being-ness.

As am I.

We could fade away tomorrow.
And with that, our love.
We don't matter.

Except to each other.

And how does that matter?

...

I love you.

I know.

By the act of loving you, I make

You the most beautiful soul
In the entire universe.

Only to yourself.

Precisely.

... What?

Who else matters?

We see the world through our own eyes, and it is but our interpretation of it.

It exists for us.
It defines us, as we define it.

So people don't matter?

They do. But only in relation to us.

Your love makes me beautiful...

... In my world. I don't care for anyone else's.

And neither should you.

...

I love you.

I love you.

Melancholy

I loved the book. I loved it. It was something I could've written. That's probably why I loved it; we can only ever love what we understand. People keep asking me how my day's been. I don't get it. Ever. How can a day be singularly 'good' or 'bad'? I've never had a day like that in years. Maybe I've never had one. I don't remember. It doesn't matter, either way. I sleep a lot these days. I'm sleepy all the time. It's a nuisance. I could go to sleep right now, and it's noon. I feel so utterly useless. I wish the inertia would go away. I saw a cat lying on the grass yesterday, while going to class. He was rolling about in the sun. I scratched his belly. And then he went away. I had a thought lying in bed last night. It was a terribly important thought, and it cheered me up immensely, having thought a thought like that. But when I woke up in the morning today, I couldn't for the life of me remember what it was. I wonder whether it'll come back to me, and whether I'll know when it has. I wish it hadn't gone away. I had a dream last night. In the dream, I was a caterpillar and you were a butterfly. And you were beautiful. I remember the glassy patterns on your wings, as you unfurled them in a burst of free motion.

You flew away.

I had breakfast today. Toast, egg, milk, cereal. I have this every day. Every morning. My breakfast and I are comfortable together. I didn't feel like getting up from the breakfast table.
So I missed the bus. It honked for a while, and then it drove away. I went and saw my mother in the kitchen today. She was cooking lunch for me. Some vegetables, a pot of meat, and soup. And I went and stood beside her, while she cooked. The hurr of the spinning exhaust, and the smoldering stuffiness of cooking plants overcrowded my mind. And she wiped sweat from her brow, and smiled at me. The yellowness was too much for me. I went away.

Maybe

Ice cream clouds

Music that fills you
And leaves you gasping.

Your hair. The colour of old mahogany. Of the sun-sprinkled trees outside your verandah. Your hair smelled of cigarettes and wood smoke.
Your eyes. The twinkling of your shadowed eyes when your spectacles caught the odd, maverick ray of omniscient sunlight.
I've known you in so many ways. You're my answer to everything.

Fruits

We're all Indian. There's something profoundly desi inside all of us. Something that craves the earth. That craves the turmeric-kitsch of Bollywood - that innocent rebellion against the senses, and against reality. That sips wine in fine company, but splashes into the hues of a pelvic-thrusting nautch at the provocation of happiness. That revels in the smell of a thousand spices; yellow, green and red. That blushes in the colorful flirtation of Holi.

...

I want to dress you in bangles of moonshine,
And in warm colors ground from turmeric and saffron
I shall paint your name across the crystal night sky,
Embellish your forehead with the stars
Of our forefathers.

Soon,
You and I
Shall be buried in the milky graveyard of the suns
For an eternity.
Next to each other.
And we shall cry for the world, together.

Come Back

Balloons of happiness,

Ephemeral.
Slowness of emotion and action
Twinkling thoughts
Of sacrilegious disorder.

The queen moon.
The clouds.
The birds.

The birds are envious,
The birds are envious of the
Clouds.

The stars are humid tonight.

We're all going to fall
Into depths
Of guilty pools.
Come here, why don't you.
Come here.
Come here.
Tired of cliches.
Come here.
Silences.
Overempty.
Sweet.
Streams.
Blood.
Prone to excitement.
Who's my friend.
Who is it.
Somethings.
Something.
In the way.
She loves.
Have fun.
Ooh ooh ooh.
Streams of consciousness.
White.
Black.
Differences breed hatred.
It also breeds love.
Love.
I'm perfect.
Come back.

O.
I wish I could come to life.
I wish I could exist forever in this state of intoxication.
Nothing is real.
I can see.
I can perceive.
Don't take this away.
Make this my reality.
Come back.

I'm sorry.
For being here.
For doing this.
I'm sorry.
Maybe I'm not.
But if it'll make you come back,
Come back.