Morning Breeze

I inhale deeply

The freshness of dawn

They say it's pollution

I call it life

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Imperceptible

Apathy

I surrender all

Questions

Violence

And find solace in 

As is

Oscillation

To realign the 

Path

Immediacy

I give up the

What ifs

Deviation

Nonetheless 

A Post Script

I AVOID 

Those butterflies

Churning inside 

I know

The river

Changes course

And sometimes

Fences too

 

                         

                                   

                                                 

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Reverie

 He was a lanky youth

I had just started wearing saree

We took the Chartered Bus from the same stop in the mornings

It was my first job

With a meagre salary

Fresh from College and a sheltered cocoon

I was naïve, shy and saw the world through rose tinted shades

I knew he watched me covertly

Though he sat at the far end of the bus

Where the seasoned men played cards

The ladies sat in front and kept to themselves

I did not know much about him

Sometimes in the evenings 

We again happened to take the same commute home

A few months later I got a seat next to his

By choice

He said he was a year younger to me

I was crestfallen

I had read about "the tall, dark and handsome " 

Who knew how to deal with the world 

 Whom the girls of marriageable age swooned over

"The most eligible bachelor ..."

The mothers crooned to each other

But he knew who to choose

The innocent virgin.....the one who would surrender to his ways 

Without a word of protest

From that day onwards

I ignored him

I did not know about him though

He knew too many things about me

And then he stopped coming in the bus

I wondered why

But that morning...

We bumped into each other one last time

He told me he was being transferred

To another city....?

I too had my plans of shifting base

We did not say good bye

But just crossed the road 

Without a word

I towards the bus stop

He towards home

Oh yes! We were neighbours

A few years later

In the Puja Pandal

Saw him standing at the far end 

I had come over for the vacation

It seemed he still watched me from the corner of his eyes

Greenish brown fringed with curly lashes

We never spoke of course!

It did not make sense

My life had taken a different bend

Away from his 

And I had too many plans which never matured at the end

Still...

Long time after

Again during a vacation

I saw him  walking into the Puja Pandal

Holding the hand of a girl child

A dark woman by his side

His pale skin had a deep tan now

He wore a pair of spectacles

Elderly....serious....responsible....a family man 

Undoubtedly

Yet for a moment he was startled to see me

Still the same perhaps

Quiet, introvert,  too stupidly naïve

 

They say some ties do not have a name

Was this one of those?

I am not so sure

Yet in lonely leisure when I muse over 

Those days...

Once I had got a second hand text book

With beautiful poems written at the back

Was it his?

He had said he had a passion for music

Did he ever sing a song with me in mind

That's stupid.....you know

We had never kissed

Or said "I love you"

That was too cliched

We never got that close

It was just a look, just a smile, just few words

But

I still remember the colour of his eyes

His walk and that quick side way glance

Making wordless poetry on a wet dusk

At the fag end of life

Decades later  

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Paradox

I was born on a long winter night

Mother must have laid cold and cramped

When the umbilical cord was being shorn

Father calculated the planetary position

And my horoscope was born

"She will bring back the lost glory"

Pronounced he and continued harping the Same  till I believed in it

I was just a small child

If by glory he meant the furniture

He had to sell off or the jewelry

My mother wore in her photos

He was somewhat correct

But if it indicated something beyond that 

I am not so sure

But I was tied to his words since the day

I could make some sense of my existence

The paths I took were too narrow, too wide,

Too steep, too crisscrossed

But I persevered

Because I was supposed to be the

Beacon of their life 

Bound by my image I tripped, I fell,

I persevered again so that I could tell

I have won, I have proven

The forecast made

When I had uttered the first cry of life

The destiny that was drawn out

And my journey that was charted 

Even before it began

"Masochist," my sister would say

"Vulnerable", I replied 

I pretended to be brave

When I felt the most shaken

I blazed with anger

When it hurt the most

Scarred when recognition

Came my way all too late

Yet I perpetuated the false hope

In the hope to be the glimmer of hope

In lives flustered by hopelessness

Yet on some moonless nights

Stepping over my own shadow

I wonder what life could have been

If I were not what I was culled out to be

Stronger, braver, lighter and perhaps happier?

Had life let me travel back in time

Would I have had the heart to desist,

"I am not what you make me out to be"

Let me just be the trailing shadow 

And walk in peace

Not the blazing torch you have 

Turned me out to be?

(*) It is customary in our culture to draw the horoscope of a newly born child as per exact time and place of birth. In olden times it entailed long mathematical calculations to derive the planetary position during birth time which would influence the life's journey of a person till death.

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The Glass Ceiling

They said 

You have to taste the food first

I said I am no cat

If I die who will look after my family

That put a stop to the sordid dictum

Which had taken the shape of an ageless  convention

***

He said you should keep it under lock and key

The diary

With pencil entries

Some day you will find them erased

By the miscreants

The diary remained where it was

No miscreants ever touched

***

He said

You ask too many questions

There are some you should never raise

God knows where you will end up

Without a possible return 

I still probe 

Without any hope

Of getting a sane reply

My silence

They have not been able to buy

***

She said

Think over

One day you will be all alone

Without a soul to call your own

I do not till date resent

My decision

To be on my own

I enjoy what others have never done

Walking on broken glass

Barefoot

The boots lost in the storm

Steps bloody yet firm

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The Midas Touch

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Today's Prompt : The Poem should contain          Complete Name of the Poet's Favourite Book

If only I could turn

My life upside down

And yell, "Eureka"

Like Archimedes had done

"Why upside down?"

You may ask 

I'll reply to that

Just give me a while

A simple wish 

With logic of its own

If you care to mull over

You'll understand soon

When you empty your bin 

Or bag or case

Don't you place it upside down

To cleanse off all trace

Of the clutter inside

So do I want to declutter

My life so that I can

Dispose off the slushpile

And start afresh ... dream anew

Even if that never ever comes true

But alas! I am yet to find that one

Sorcerer's Stone

Which can do the trick

Turn the clock back soon

Let life play a jig on its axis 

But if you come upon

The angel who has it

Just whisper my name

To her and in a flash

See the magic wand

Swing in action

Moonwalking may you

Find me "beyond 

                the horizon 

                  beyond"

 Like Michael Jackson

Wanderlust

This week's prompt : 🏙️ City of Dreams 

I had thought at first

I wouldn't opt 

For this prompt 

But then on second thought

"What the heck let's move on..."

I don't have a favourite stop, as ye know

Coz am a reclusive vagabond 

From the days of yore

But my ever increasing lust 

Lingers longer than I want

As I eyed the labyrinthine

Gullies washed in sparkling blue

Again the wandering fever

Took over me

Just as I was going to get lost in the maze

The PC caught hold of me

And screamed, "How dare you haste"

Since then I am ogling over my dream

Of vanishing into the blue

But the screen won't slide apart

And engulf me unto

🤦🤦😋😋😜😜

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