12:43.
The world keeps shifting. You think the earth is just rotating, but new plants, ideas, events are continually erupting. Guns and roses collide somewhere, fire erupts elsewhere, maybe in your heart, maybe everyone's, everywhere? The world keeps shifting.
"To divide or not to divide?" becomes a decisive question.
"To empath, or engage only with the vicinity of the self?" a pertinent problem.
Amidst all these, a butterfly flaps its wings somewhere: guns are out, hearts sealed, people tip-toe around topics, and the earth, still, keeps rotating...
New plants, ideas, events are continually erupting, and yet, maybe the world is not shifting....

-

This little tree
on my terrace faced
the harshest of winters,
so decided, to shed
all its leaves.
Sometimes losing means
surviving, isn't it?
But then,
as spring came,
the tree could not wait,
for new leaves to come back.
It just grew, a whole bunch
of fresh flowers
on its exposed branch.
As if to say, "hey, I am not done
mourning yet, but
look at the extent
of my resilience!"
Sometimes strength is nothing else,
just a bunch of soft flowers,
on a naked branch.
Maybe softness is the strongest form of defiance.

-

I could not watch the match today, you know how life sometimes gets in the way? And yet, when the headline flashed on my screen, "MS Dhoni's lightning quick hands whip the bails off in a flash.." I could not help but let my mind have its little dose of happy flashbacks.
To find your passion is a thing, but to do something and make it look so passionate, another. You do not have to do this. Yet, at 43, Dhoni, you still teach. You make cricket look like life. And life is just what you do, with grit and resilience, practice and grace; life is what you do when you do not really have to.
They say if you really look, you can find your lessons anywhere. I could not watch the match today, but with a tiny headline, Dhoni got me my message: "whatever you do, please do not forget to give it some life, some lightning flash, some fun, some grace. And if nothing works out, just quickly whip off the bails!"

-

It amazes me how the sunset
and the sunrise
have the same hue of red;
just that the sun looks
a little more tired
than when it started.
The rest, is all the same:
scattered fragments
of light, trying
to reach your eyes,
birds across the horizon
forming a determined line.
If it's all the same,
tell me then,
which red of the sun
would you have?
The freshly brewed hope
of a lively sunrise,
or the resilient red
of a graceful sunset?

-

So you go round and round
and round and round
in circles around
your own mind;
why this, why that,
why not, oh please!
You keep circling, creating
your own eclipse.
Then one day, you skip,
just peep out
of your own mind-hole.
You weep, a little,
sleep some more,
and when all that goes,
as you open,
there it is, the sun,
just within your mind's reach.
Sometimes circles are nothing,
but pathways that eventually lead
you out of your mind.
Are you then, out of your mind, yet?!
Sometimes, as you see,
"out" means sunlight on your face.

-

They say, make life large; build, build, build, create your own huge universe.
I thought that was the way, why else would they all say!
Until, you came.
One small universe, compact, with little stripes, you said, "hey, it takes one life to build a world, a whole little universe under an unending sky."

I did not plan you; you just came and sat on my lap. How could I not stare into those eyes, and watch a whole universe emerge into the light?
However my day went, it was always a delight, to come home and see you waiting, your deep green eyes shining bright.

They say, let it go, animals, like people, just come and go. I oblige.
But in the streets when I hear a "meow", I find my whole world stop for a while.

It's been almost a month; maybe you are just hiding behind a familiar tree, a bush; learning how to eat what I never let you eat, how to be wild, how to breathe in the free wind.

But here, a whole little world waits for your being. A world you created just by jumping onto a lap, and purring.
Dear Ginger, wherever you are, I hope you know, that a whole world stops beating, when I say you are missed.
Oh, how I wish I taught you how to read!

-

Kisson ki dher mein kaho toh
ek kissa aur jod doon kya,
Kaho na, iss kisse ko bhi
yun hi main jaane doon kya?
Mujhe raaste samajhna
aur samjhana, behad mushkil
lagta tha;
apne haath khole aaj toh
lakeeron ki jagah,
raaste nazar aane lage.
Shayad lakeerein kismat nahi batati,
bas raahein chun lene ko kehti rehti!
Inn galiyon ko phir lakeeron mein
kaho yun kho jaane doon kya,
kaho na, ek aur kissa
kisson ki dher mein jod doon kya?
Main haath mutthi baandh
chal toh lungi zindagi mein,
kaho kabhi kisi lakeer ko phir bhi,
haathon se phisal jaane doon kya?
Kisson ki dher mein kaho toh,
ek kissa aur jod doon kya?

-

By and by, you learn that
in all things, all events,
there's only one prayer
that ever was needed:
"Universe, in this moment,
give me the discernment,
so I may understand,
what demands my resilience
and what may I lay to rest."
For in the end, it is always
a battle between
what to fight that one more time
and what to surrender, with flowers,
to universe's welcoming lap.

-

You visit at exactly 7, I wait on my terrace. Sometimes whole, sometimes dwindling, you are still always ready for an evening of solace. You tell me about light, how you think you are nothing, just a dark, botch in the sky. "Whatever I am, is stolen," you say, "this face, my light." I nod, "we are all the same. Our ideas, traits, whatever we are, is stolen from somewhere. Every cell exists from a pre-existing cell. And yet, we all manage, to add on a little of our unique essence."
You smile.
Isn't it alright, if this being, our theft, brightens someone's night?
Every evening, at 7, the moon and I
meet on my terrace, to share our stolen light.

-

When you find wings,
if you do, where
would you fly to?
Would you then,
want to rest? Where?
Which tree? Which roof?
The sky calls, and allures;
but when wings tire,
an old tree, that never flew,
yet always grew-
when wings tire, an old tree
awaits, just for you.
If wings tire, but trees do not,
why do we teach birds,
to fly, not grow roots?
For the sky allures, and
the tree only awaits.

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