The snake plant in our living room,
stands haughtily near the window.
Unlike the poor potted plants
sweating it out in the balcony,
this one has her green card.
She remains unruffled in the face of
the plagiarism law suits filed by the
Snakes' Right Commission.
But if there's an anaconda movie
playing on the screen, you'll find
her drooling like a groupie.
This snake wannabe of mine likes
showing off her green stripes in the
flashlights of the flickering tubelight.
And when the wind plays snake charmer,
she sways and rustles in trance.
When I come back from work
and water the plant with what is
left in my Tupperware bottle,
she slurps it up like it's
milk poured by a devotee.
Then, she slithers and
stretches her limbs in
all her photosynthetic glory,
waiting to be worshipped.-
This morning when I stepped out,
I found a poem lying dead at my doorstep.
Taking hold of the couplet hands,
I dragged the body into my bedroom unseen.
Now that I finally had the opportunity of
a lifetime, I stripped off his clothes
and took a good look at the body.
Mmm...quite sexy.
The imagery was a sight to behold!
Abdominal muscles rippled in rhythm and rhyme.
They were perfect alliterated squares
and the package below was definitely not a haiku.
He had his hair combed in artful
sonnets with the standard stanza gel.
I took a poke at the bulging biceps which
bounced back like a limerick with the
fists curled into perfect punchlines.
[ Caption]
-
ODE TO THE ONION
after Pablo Neruda
One of the things I've come to hate since
I've started cooking was sautéing onions.
Waiting for the onions to tan themselves in the pool of oil
with the blue sun blazing underneath is pure toil.
Generations have lived and died while the onions laze
and sunbathe in their makeshift Maldives.
We, the staff of the great Indian kitchen
have a bonded labour contract with onions.
Not a day goes by without sautéing onions
There are exceptions ofcourse,
not all things are done by force.
But, everyday I enter the kitchen,
these purple balls of yarn wait
for me to paw and scratch at them,
while the ginger and garlic bait
and catcall me, next in line for my attention.-
You see, that's the thing about readers.
We munch on paper like it's a mulberry leaf.
Spinning a cocoon of stories and paper characters.
And when it's time to break free, we fly out.
Aloft on the wings of printed magic and
a little homesick for the world we left behind.-
When we read the books of dead poets and writers,
do their ghosts hover behind our shoulders,
wringing their hands, wondering if we like their books?
When we see the dedication page, do
their eyes mist a little for their loved ones?
When we read a certain line and smile,
do their phantom hearts soar a little?
Do they warm themselves up within the dust jackets of their books
and soak up all the emotions pouring out of us?
And when we finally turn the last page of the book,
do they stroll back to their cemeteries with a happy smile,
stretch out in their graves and tell the inquiring flowers,
"Yes, I had a good working day,
pour me a sip of that delicious nectar.
Let's have a toast."
-
Summertime, the sun
likes to play holi, spraying
us in shades of bronze.-
One night, when the moon
whipped the stars with a comet,
a few of them fell into the
soil pots in our balcony.
The next morning, there were
jasemine flowers blooming in them.-
It was way past midnight when we
came back from work yesterday.
The moon was kind enough to
drop us home from the hospital.
We were colleagues of the moon, you see
and we liked uber sharing together after work.
— % &But the gates were closed when
we reached our apartment,
the heavy lock holding it in its place like a
metal anchor mooring its ship in the harbor.
The sleepy watchman plodded towards us
like a pirate with his half-opened eyes.
He checked us out, confirming that we were
the goods he had sent out that morning and let us in.
We got into the lift and pressed for our floor,
the engine whirred and the cables twanged.
The building creaked and croaked as it pulled us up
like an old woman drawing water from the well
for the two thirsty travelers who had showed
up at her door in the middle of the night.
When we finally stumbled into our home,
home did seem like water.
Fulfilling a longing in our parched and
exhausted bones like only a home can— % &-
Some people have sorrys living under
their skin, breeding like a swarm of honeybees.
They think that's how the logic of apologies work.
That if they spill out enough sorrys then maybe
just maybe, they wouldn't feel the sting of unhappiness.-
Every once in a while, the wind comes to participate in the
audition hall of the wind chimes in our balcony.
They'd tinkle and chime and rehearse their songs hoping
for a chance to star in the SAREGAMAPA - Nature Edition.
But the pigeons perched on the railing and acting
as the judges would coo and critique their raga,
shaking their heads in disappointment.
If it's particularly bad, they would leave a
diarrhoea of poop and fly away.
Since my flatmates had assigned this month's
cleaning duties to me, I would be left with
cleaning all that delightful, gooey mess.
Which brings me back to my main question
"How do you flip the bird at a bird?"
-