Just. Stop.

Every morning I wake
To a world of ignorance
And hate.

I wish I were ignorant
Of the existence of that other ignorance.
I wish I could just stop
This hatred. This stupidity. This.

All the remnants
Of my peaceful sleep
Rub away
To a gloom so deep.

Yama, I know only so many.
And they bring me all this pain.
You, who know the whole world and beyond -
Do you also think we live in vain?

Yama and his alter-ego

(written on July 25, 2011)

“Starlit skies
Stretching up beyond sight…”
“Myopic vision,
Thanks to city pollution.”
“Twinkle, twinkle little star,
How I wonder what you are?!”
“My stars are city lights you know
Twinkling and flashing in fog and snow.”
“Peace and deep breaths
I can lie here forever, cover me with wreaths.”
“Restlessness keeps scanning my skies.
Shall I espy a real star ever and rest these eyes?”

Too much, too early

You have heard of "too little, too late."
How about "too much, too early?"
Overwhelmed senses can only take so much.
Too much? Too early?
Good is great, as long as it lasts,
Bad is good too, in the lessons it imparts.
But too much of either or or?
The beginning of the end is here, when it starts.
Or that's how it feels,
When life is on fast-forward button,
Hurtling down roller-coaster like tracks;
Only, it isn't anyone you know controlling the button.
If Yama or one of His avatars were a Friend,
Maybe there could be some leeway.
But Gods and mortals have a different kind of relation,
It's not so easy always, to find a way.

Desperation

Someone, anyone, anything at all.
To help me.
He raised his head.
You mean Me?
Yes, Even You.
Yes, yes, You, if not anyone else.

A prayer

Restlessness grips me everywhere I turn these days. It is not as if I want to go back. It is more as if I want to go on, beyond the present time and space, away from the realities of the unreal world, towards the one true certainty there is. Time goes on. I wonder how much time have I left. What all am I supposed to achieve in the time there is? Who do I listen to?

I do not and cannot say, that I am not, in a sense, enjoying the fleetingness of now. I laugh, I cry, I contemplate, and I grow up. But the more intensely I experience the now, the more attached I become to it. And the more the attachment, the exponentially more the pain, and the suffering. What is the lesson? I am sure there is something profound here, that I need to know - before the time is up.

Today on Poila Boishakh, let me know what you already know Yama.

Peace out

The best I can give You
Is to take myself away,
However hard it is for You and me,
However illogical a decision it may seem.

The decision, although obvious to me,
Is so difficult to keep.
To suffer, to go away from You,
To stop wanting to coming back too.

You don't really help, You know
With eyes as beseeching as those.
Your words, always pragmatic, always right
Always showing me the better light.

You urge me to follow greatness
You appreciate my thinking beyond my years
All those words You spoke to dispel my fears
Now ring false to my ears.

Giving in is so easy then
To sit quietly in a group and observe You be,
To return whenever it is just too much,
To find excuses, reasons and as such.

But the best I can do for You or for me
Is to take myself away with a hope
That I will be strong enough to resist and bury
Whatever it is between You and me.

Tug of War

When Yama calls,
Everything human has to fail.
I stole some time from my time.
I have to get out now on borrowed bail.
When you do one thing
But your heart and soul lies elsewhere,
It's proper to be both proper or not,
And choose one over the other.
But what if it's a tug of war?
Heart and soul on opposite sides of the coin.
Times hold you back,
But time itself must go on.

Where are you.

In that time,
When it's not morning
And not even night,
When I am not asleep
And not quite awake,
I need to Know.
What if there are no signs,
No marks to show sign of life.
How does it matter.
To whom does it matter.
A question or a disaster.
There's no one to answer.
So I wander
Trying to find someone, something
That can solve the one question without a mark.
Why.

Sleep

The dark of the night
Mocks the emptiness of light.
I'd rather be in the dark
Than in the eyes of sight.
Pick me up, O Sleep,
Engulf me in dark.
Do I hear a sob?
Do I see a mark?
Turn off, turn off the light,
Lighting up a desolation so white.
It hurts my eyes to see
What could have been or could be.

A REVELATION

Sweeping aside His dark cloudy side,

He revealed eyes clear as azure.

Momentary transition it was for the lucky,

Who saw it, did, who didn't were left unsure.

Unsure of His colors, His persona,

His intent, His nature, His motive,

His beliefs, His truths, His lies,

His meditation, His pleasure, His grief.

But He let me witness His revelation

And I stood awestruck as He swept aside the mask.

And lo! Shone a sun brighter than molten liquid gold

And for few seconds, in the truth, He let me bask.

LIVING THROUGH NIGHTMARES

One evening I was walking across a huge ground and watching the stars that were especially bright. I tried discerning shapes in the constellations and was amazed on an instance to find one that resembled a human face. A man bumped into me at that moment and asked me to help him find a cab. I hailed a few but all cab-drivers did not seem to notice me. My new acquaintance laughed sinisterly every time another cab went past and I did not understand why.

In some time the bright night got a little darker and I lost the man somewhere. Instead I had this very tired feeling in my bones. I kept looking at the stars and had a feeling that they were not as bright as some time back. I also had a very strange feeling that the ground I was strolling on had fewer people than before.

In some time something very strange happened. The stars got visibly brighter and I espied the face in the constellations just as before. I looked around with an uneasy feeling and sure enough, again there were more people on the ground, all looking edgy, some running towards the street and some idly and dejectedly sitting on the ground. I had a tremendous urge to run but I did not know where to. A kind looking man stopped by and said gently, “Sister you are accursed. Run and try to catch the 12am train if u can. It is the only possible deliverance.” I thought that he was madman talking about curses and deliverance. He shook his head sadly and walked away.

Then I discovered something stranger. There were two sets of people on the ground. One set had dejected eyes, glazed all over and grim set mouths, almost looking doped and the other set looked like regular people hanging out on a weekend night. Furthermore I found out that the regular people were not noticing the weird ones at all. I almost bumped into one of them in my preoccupation and stopped to apologize. They did not even see me! With dread I started to believe that maybe I really was part of some accursed group and with this realization, started madly running towards the station where I now saw many of the others were headed. I was not in time of course and had a stitch in my side going quite fully out of my mind with crazy fear. Again the stars dimmed and I lost my sort, seeing only regular people strolling by. Again and again this cycle repeated with me trying to reach the station before the stars dimmed but missing every time. I kept getting back at the same ground I began from and as the night progressed, the crowd of weird guys kept getting larger too.

Finally, close to a quarter to twelve, on the appearance of the starry face, I really scrunched my nose in determination and ran as fast as my weary legs could carry me. I reached the station just as the clock was striking twelve and could see a sinister black train approaching. I knew if I did not board this train I will have to live through it all again and again and again till the next new moon in my accursed life and hope to get another chance at this method of deliverance. In desperation right before the clock struck twelve and the stars dimmed again I jumped from the platform right in the way of the train and let it run over me.

The stars never dimmed this time. I was running like the wind with the train without even feeling it. I felt less fearful than before but still not quite sure of what was going on. Whose was the starry face? Yama’s? Was this deliverance? Or was I in for another cycle of penance, purging my sins and checking off my karma of many lives?

"BRILLIANT!"

“Brilliant,” smiled He.

Thought she, “This is how it should be.

At least I am visible finally

Not perpetually walked over

Like transparent thin air.”

She had worked very hard

To come across His gaze

She’d tried by wit and looks to amaze

Again and again crisscrossing through his maze.

He is the lord though

He looks when He pleases

He doesn’t have to look away to tell you that He isn’t looking

But when He does that, all life ceases.

So when He actually acknowledged her

With a single blinding word, “Brilliant”,

Thunders flashed across barren deserts

And rain came pouring down everywhere.

RESOLUTIONS AND DISSOLUTIONS

Now that resolve is impossible, she’s starting to dissolve.

How could she be so confident and naïve as to believe that resolve was ever possible?

In the face of a God-sized man, what chance do sinned and weak mortals stand?

Resolve was never possible. She was a fool to think she could be held up.

It’s not due to lack of trying.

If only the inner strength they all talk about materializes in her shell.

But no Sir, all she is reduced to at each four in the morning is a dissolving heap of sobs and insecure longing.

Pathetic really, but hopeless, helpless and inconsolable…

How can she keep up the brave front for long now? How can she put her act up again?

All she wants is to become one with nature, per se – to dissolve so homogenously with the sea or the space or the forest as to be forever lost, and forever found.

ADDICTED

I’m addicted.

I’m addicted to sights, smells and joys that have nothing whatsoever to do with you.

My mind feels numb and my soul feels alive when I espy that one aroma somewhere around.

I need not think.

This is right. This is how the world should smell.

My eyes come back from the dead when they dive into an immeasurably deep pool of clear, honest water. Eyes…

Why do I need to be rescued from that pool?

It feels like home.

Let me, oh please, let me be.

My consciousness seems doubly, even triply, alive when I feel you close – which is all the time.

An unreal fantasy seems realer than reality.

The proverbial evening breeze seems to be delivering lingering caresses from an unknown lover.

Or is he known?

Secrets that I keep of the world and from the world are safe in my heart.

But is my heart my own?

I feel angry if someone or something hurts me for once.

It means there is no good in me or that someone, something.

But everything around has you and only you.

Every aroma reminds me of you, every pair of eyes seems to have you behind. Every person seems to be made of you and every detail of the world – real and in my mind – has got to have inevitable connections to you.

I feel I’ll become you one day myself and that thought brings me a heady feeling of weightless transparence.

I love you.

And I’m totally addicted to you.

RAINING FROM MY EYES

It was so obvious that it will rain today.

“The Lord hath told me.”

To have, yet have it not – that sums up what having Yama in your life means.

I knew it right from the time He announced that He will leave today.

I knew weeping wasn’t an option, especially not in front of Him.

So obviously someone else had to do it for me… pent up emotions have to come out after all.

I knew, like everytime, the elements will help me.

So I knew, oh I knew it for sure, that the rains will arrive in the city this day, pour down my anguish straight from the heavens, yet bring me peace… pure and simple.

“He went -

Time and energy well spent.

The bird flew…

Which way, who knew?”

POISON

Poison in His veins.

Blue murder in His eyes.

I dream up a beautiful world for Him.

For Him though Hell is what is nice.

Poison in His veins.

Wrongs that can never be right.

He chooses to punish the wrong one though -

Wrong the wrong one, what a sight!

Poison in His veins.

I feel sorry for this behavior.

I can never come back.

I am parting ways forever.

AN ACHE FOR AN ACHE

(IN MEMORY OF PUNE-BOMB BLAST)

He called me up, my friend from the land of dead.

My loved one was scarred, he said.

My loved one has lost forever many of its dears

And left a city of ghosts, fleeing its fears.

“Not again”, I said,

” ’cause I love every inch of this earth

And beyond too, if I knew,

What it is that colors the blue.”

“Whatever. But the news is true.

I’m telling you because I know you through and through.

You’ll feel the pain of a dozen families

And weep for the sins of half a dozen enemies.”

And so it was that a night before the test,

I was at my mournful best.

A mocking laugh sounded as the unrestful were laid to rest

And Yama held a billion’s pain to His heaving breast.

THE RE-RETURN OF PAIN

A dozen red lamps lit up the midnight blue skies,

Even as a hundred hands held His wrists.

“Don’t go. Stay,” they said.

Claimed His possession and times and even His head.

Even in the light of those dozen blazing lights,

Even tearing apart the pressures of a hundred hands,

His head and heart and soul tears tears apart.

The return of pain really comes at the very start.

A GRANTED WISH

He came, he saw, he conquered.

She went blind, she conceded defeat.

He came with the black clouds,

Unexpectedly in pleasant spring.

She looked up at the skies,

Contemplating eyes wondering.

When it clapped thunders

She read his arrival in the wind.

She knelt and prayed for the worse.

With a cool mind, she prepared for the accepted curse.

And then she was granted her wish –

A permanent stint in His kingdom.

This meant some more time for games

And a delayed flight to freedom.

"YAMA, COME."

“I know you love me so much.

Why don’t you come for me?

Now, when it’s a cosy autumn evening,

When no one cares where anyone else be.

“When you’ve loved me from when I was very young.

When you’ve been courting me for this long.

When an answer to “Age? Name? Identity?” is “To Nothing I belong”.

When a peaceful memory is just a song.

“Why don’t you come to take me?

Take my hand and set me free!

Unshackle my roots, on my pride lay a wreath.

Embrace me, embrace me, O Dark Death.

“Why did the serene evening of everyday

Blaze at me today with a fiery orange sun?

Why our job on earth, O Yama,

Is all but done?”

YAMA IN LOVE

Since he couldn’t cry in the day,

He wept his grief in his dream.

Enough of the tough facade -

Silent tears spent unseen.

Not all is great.

Not all is right.

When there’s everyone around

Yet no one really in sight.

“I have a job

To kill my love and joy.

Can’t do it and can’t not do it either -

Why such a punishment - Why?”

CHATTING WITH YAMA

"Why?”

“Because.”

“How?”

“Thus.”

“Mourning?”

“Nay.”

“Pensive?”

“Yea.”

“Tears.”

“Why?”

“Heavy heart?”

“Now say goodbye.”

“Have said so.”

“So what’s the deal?”

“Why you walk away

Remorselessly with the kill?”

“Feeling is not part of my job

But I’ll say I am sorry for you.

Not for her – she’s happy.

You’re sad and so little you know.”

“Go.”

“Where?”

“To hell.”

There! That glare!

“O ignorant fool.”

“Explain. I’ve to know.”

“Patience.

You reap what you sow.”

YAMA FIGHTS

He’s dark and strong -

He’s so full of might.

They call Him – Yama,

The lord of the night.

Day after day,

He deals in plight -

Chopping off some wings,

Giving some others, flight.

In the blink of an eye,

He takes and gives sight;

Deciding for Himself,

What’s wrong, what’s right.

Just and cold,

His mask’s a fright.

What He goes through, He knows

Alone – the dark knight.

Numb and alone -

night after night,

He lies on His bed -

Tired of the fight.

THE ESCAPE

I met Him again today

When He was preening amongst His peers,

Laughing the laugh that puts terror in our hearts

And hold close to our chest, our dears.

When He spoke it blew icy winds,

Numbing all senss with that tone.

As some scampered for their mackinaws and mittens,

Others drew back in dark corners, left to moan.

I stood there stunned like stone,

Looking up at Him with awe.

His majesic demeanour and flashing eyes

Struck my insignificant self, raw.

But He meant well, this time, He said -

His laugh, for once, had nothing ill to bode.

He smiled His grand forgiving smile once more -

And patted me down the road

THE GLUM AND THE THRILLED

Two guys met me on my way back home yesterday..

Yama has slapped them both they claimed.

Yet one looked glum and the other thrilled.

Yama slapped one on the back and the other on the face…

The glum one counted his days till the end,

And bemoaned the undone things in his life…

The thrilled guy skipped a mile a step

And forgot all about any impending possible strife!

The glum one hugged his family last night

And prayed hard all night long…

Asking forgiveness for all the sins he committed

He repented in the dark night’s song…

The thrilled one bragged about his friendship to the lord

And roughly shoved people in his way;

Smiling at his knowledge of power,

He knew nothing wrong could happen to his day.

Yet the glum one learned to live right and good

And a long life blessed the ground on which he stood…

And suddenly a thunder clapped overhead -

Lo! The thrilled lay on the ground – struck dead.

And then I understood why -

The dark lord’s actions are like a sailor’s bet.

You don’t know his reasons until you see the cards,

And what you see ain’t what you get.