Kala Ghoda

Not by the absence of the dark horse

Nor by its history that overlays your fortified stones;

You are known: by your antiquity that treats you like wine

And by your magnetic connection with the mundane;

By your musical and multilingual corners,

Your libraries and lawns, and streets that trifle with them;

By lanes turned towards sandwiches and sev-puris,

And by your compassion wet with cold sugar-cane juice.

You paint self-portraits

On walls of daily chaos and nocturnal silences

Inspecting the anatomy of Bombay

Through the city’s inverted lenses.

(First published in Pyrta Journal: December 2012)

An Urban Evening

The hour is stretched across the letters

That slide along the restaurant board,

And reduce the titles to mild jitters

Bombarding against the giant door.

Packets smuggled into the outskirts

Of the evening and its formations,

Its quiet iterations, cryptic translations,

Miniscule divisions and infinite revisions

Packets emptied and frisked

By long nail-painted fingers,

Rolled into a stick. Licked. Lit,

Circulated in a gang of mingers.

From the languid parade of time

The youth stages fantastic escapes

The night quickens under its long feet

Trampling the evening’s countless mistakes

At a distance of eight drunken steps,

Across a couple of quarrelling couples,

Beyond a gathering of ex-teammates,

Reached by a pair of Indian chappals,

Among the waiters and waitresses,

Lime slices and fruit juices,

The gossip lingers.

Manchurian’s cooked with a tinge of violin

Tied to the present with its flaccid string

In braceleted hands the evening flashes

And the wind shaves the cigarette ashes.

I am an observer of this urban evening

Like the fluttering of these blackened leaves,

The muttering of a million mes. 

The air is embroidered with tar

Forming the boundaries of this bar

And the slowed wheels of the cars

Have cascaded my circumstances

With

Thinking and its aimless branches

Pushing the world into parallel trances

O the uninvited,

O the unwanted,

O my loved one!

I want to sink you

In the mouth of this hour

Or spit you out like a long-chewed gum

But life without you is a thankless habit

Like smoking weed into an empty drum.


(First published in Muse India: Sep-Oct 2013)

Two Sunsets

All that you owe me
is a couple of sunsets.
Not a ray more, not a ray less
all that you owe me
is a couple of sunsets.

Two incoherent stories
wrapped around a coffee mug
a kingdom of two rooms
expanded to a hug.

A cake cut into
pieces of time,
savoured over
a private rhyme.

All that you owe me
is a couple of sunsets.
Maybe a ray more, maybe a ray less
all that you owe me
is a couple of sunsets.

(First published in Brown Critique: July 2013)

A Sonnet for the Causeway

What dazzles me is its mundanity: two pairs of legs,

hopeful and unruly, treading down the road as if

– so effortlessly - creating a Geometry of freewill,

stopping by hawkers, biting into burgers, their

selves shadowed occasionally under the roof

of an Irani cafe – enticing a middle-class hunger 

through Keema Pav, Bun Maska and cheese omelets.

The way the causeway emulates the unbridled walk

of life with its veiled climax, recurring bifurcations

And tempestuously planted surprises is as

fearlessly artistic as the two who have ventured

into the vastness of this luminous, brazen afternoon,

stamping a tiny yet indelible, almost perennial,

mark on the timeline with their faint footprints.

Ham Sandwich

I have a ham sandwich in my fridge.

Deep-fried ham. Wheat Bread.

But that won’t suffice, will it?

I can get you some sauce.

Would that do?

How about some sausages as well?

And I’ll spread some butter over the bread.

Would that be good enough?

Hey, listen! Or do you want something completely else?

I could get you Poha or Parathas from the next lane

I am just wondering what, what the fuck,

will make you have breakfast with me again.

(First published in Muse India: Sep-Oct 2013)