Sheermal!

Sheermal, a dish 

I was first offered as a gift
From someone which I back then

had not known

Sheermaal, a type of bread
which involves elite and luxurious ingredients 

like saffron and cream
and comfort elements like egg and milk

Sheermaal, a reddish brown bread
which is first heated in a tandoor
and then buttered with warmth

Sheermaal, that thing which fills me
with love, warmth and comfort
in this harsh winter.

Sheermaal, a ray of hope
I hold on to for sweetness
After the most mundane days

Or just 2020!

On Sunday evenings!

On Sunday evenings,
I feel like a child locked in
the bathroom.

The bathroom,
which is both dark and
full of cockroaches and lizards.

Lizards,
the reptile that I don’t like,
after snake and so I sweat.

Sweat,
my only constant from Sunday evening
to a wretched Monday morning.

Monday morning,
a portrait of my fears and
a fake fearless face that I’ll put up.

I’ll put up,

with the mood swings of those I love 

and in return, I’ll be ignored.

Ignored,
is my new favourite state
after being deeply loved.

Loved, 

the Sunday, the day, I mean 

but then this Monday.

Monday......

In my dreamland!

In my dreamland
I see myself sleeping in your lap
as you brush my hair

In my dreamland
my nightmares don’t exist
they’re perhaps on Jupiter

In my dreamland
cobras and pythons aren’t ripping apart each other
in fact, unicorns and dragons
are chilling together 

In my dreamland
my screams are only for
reaching out to my favourite ice cream
not of fear making me dread another dream

In my dreamland
there are no wretched days
of overthinking and anxieties
it’s all about rainbow smiles and starry skies

It’s all in the dreamland,
unreal, unrealistic, unimportant.

Promise me my love!

promise me my love,
you will never mistake
a prayer for a miracle

promise me my love,
you will choose to
remain what you're, despite

promise me my love
in no life will you mistake
attention for care

promise me my love,
to never love anyone
more than your own self

All things life prepared me for!

All things life prepared me for, included wars, but not failures
As if men and women only failed on Mars
And on Earth they were only meant and programmed to win.

All things life prepared me for, had me drool over dreams that they saw,
As if my imagination was incapable of imagining sun make love to water and turn the entire ocean into gold
But, you see on Earth, dreams are made of concrete, desires are components of unwanted ties and emotions are always considered as fatal as cyanide.

All things life prepared me for, were not meant for me,
I just wanted to be,
in a home not house
in Delhi not Noida
in ecstasy not cage
in bandages not heavy drapes
in trans not senses
in college not school
in ocean not balconies
in being not body
in atoms not chemicals
in rhyme not whine
in life not trap.

All things life prepared me, was for a house
Made up of four walls and a ceiling only,
While I was meant for home,
a place which would possibly be
A cross between passions and unfinished novels.

Home!

Home, is not where the heart is
It’s possibly somewhere,
where the soul is in sync with being and belonging.

Home, where the coffee is not a perfect brew
and has some extra sugar too
But tastes like an ocean in a desert.

Home, where I can smell ageing paper
and not be reminded of the books,

I need to read and the presentations I must make.

Home, where sleep comes naturally,
and does not wake me up, 

with nightmares leaving me smelly sweaty.

Home, where in my unkempt hair
and Un-ironed T-shirt

I feel my breath pass like breeze.

Home, not four walls and a mere ceiling.

The court of?

But my lord,
When you write the judgement
After listening to the versions
Of what you’ve heard and understood
Remember to note, what you felt.

My lord,
I recall requesting you
To make a footnote of my attempts
At trying to convince you
That each day I tried.

My lord,
There must be a record
Of my trying, my unbecoming
My abandoned belongings.
Somewhere in your fancy words
My trivial anxieties should be noted.

My lord,
It should be documented,
How each day I tried to combat
Those what must have
Felt like trivial anxieties and insecurities
As world wars.

My lord,
There should be an evidence
Of my trying, failing, falling.
There should be a proof
That on the days I managed
To conquer the soul
I lost to my heart.

My lord,
Whether in life or in death
There should be a part
Which reeks of me
And is as strong
As some hundred dragons strength
As magical as unicorn fart
And as gorgeous as a blooming flower.

For the likes of us!

For the likes of us,
whose hearts continue to ache
as if they were meant to always hurt and bleed
What good will your painkiller do to us?

For the likes of us,
Who can overwhelm ourselves,
Just by the sight of a falling flower
A peaceful sea, dying dream
Our unholy being
What will your highly scientific drug do to us?

For the likes of us,
Who swear by Ghalib, in pain
Rush to Rumi, in disdain
Reach out for Tagore, on unbearable days
What will your prescription of pills do to us?

For the likes of us,
Who choke almost to death,
In our cubicles where air is sucked out
Of our lungs and souls
Hit the bed wanting to sleep
Wishing to not be ‘me’
What will your combination of anti this and pro that, do to us?

I must always!

I must always close my eyes and go to sleep
even if it shows me
what I wish no one ever sees.

I must always hide my wounds
And mask my scars
before they call it a rotten farce.

I must always pick & hold myself
like a suitcase
on a crowded conveyers belt.

I must always smile
for healing and being
are ornaments of loners in hell.

I must always bow down to you
even after you’ve chosen to
uncrown me.

I must always feel complete
like a metro city, oozing of parties
unlike the bandaged holy Kashmir, reeking of pain and poetry.

I must always sin
how else will the Gods ever win?
I must always.

Calcutta!

There is only this much
That you can bear,
And only that much,
You can hold,
But this city,
Calcutta,
is a feeling untold.

You wonder and ponder,
Feel trapped and free,
Crave and drool,
All of this simultaneously.

I don’t know how this
City holds it all,
Is it even real,
Do we even deserve it,
Is this a miracle,
They said never existed?

Oh Calcutta,
Ah Calcutta,
Never Kolkata.

Who are the braves?

Who are the braves?
How do they look?
Do they understand maths?
Can they solve problems of
Simple and compound interest?

Are they scared of snakes?
Do the snakes paralyse
The braves too?
Do they shiver,
In fear?
Does anxiety defeat them?

Can the nightmares
Rattle them too?
Have the ever
Woken up sweat drenched?

Does an assassination of dream
Make them claustrophobic too?
Have they ever been in a
Gas chamber?

Are they scared of wars too?
Do they ditch and duck a few battles?
Are the braves God loving
Or God fearing?

Who are braves?
How are braves?
Does a hug make them feel safe?

Kashmir!

On my normal, ordinary days,
I feel for Kashmir,
But on my not so normal days,
The bad, overpowering days
I feel like Kashmir,
Caged, curbed, captivated,
With forces standing around me,
Apparently for my own good,
Random people, claiming to be
The ones who’d never want my bad
Taking decisions which,
In future will be known as my decisions
Even though I know no bit
Of the decision that they,
The ones who I’ve never seen
Have taken for me.

Kashmir, as they say continues
To be a paradise for at least
The ones who’s insides,
Continue to ache,
Even as they brave all the storms
Without knowing it was,
But a bad destructive storm.

To you Kashmir,
May you have the strength,
To stand up, rise, smile.

You carry my photo in your wallet!

You carry my photo in your wallet,
The brown colour leather wallet
That I gave you on your birthday,
The birthday which we celebrated,
Remember?

We had got three cakes
Because you and I couldn’t choose one
Red Velvet, Rainbow and chocolate,
All big cakes were bought,
You cut them all,
I ate almost all,
That birthday,
When I gave you the wallet
Which I wanted for you.

You, hate brown leather,
I love it like none other,
In that wallet,
We had put our picture,
The picture we took
In Ireland,
Your favourite country.

Years later, today
When I touched your wallet
It was as soft,
Our picture was not their
You had put mine,
It was as if you and I
Weren’t together,
But you still kept a
part of me,
Maybe I’m not your past,
Probably, we exist
In our present as good people
But that is all.

We are just people,
Hopefully good.

I have to tell you something!

I have to tell you something,
But how do I?
Do I wear a nice dress,
To seek all your attention?
Do I pour in some wine
In the goblet you bought
Last month?
What do I do?

No,
My words aren’t enough,
They have never been,
With all the courage,
I muster and all the air I breathe
To be able to utter
What I must,
You, just hear,
Never listen.

In all these years,
Months, days and hours,
How have my words not convinced,
Your soul to listen to my voice
Which part of me will resonate,
With you?
Is there a part? Can you pick?
Till when will the shards of my dreams
Stitch your commands?
Till when will my wounds bleed?
Will my voice ever reach?

Fear!

I love this thing,
About fear,
Not anxiety or panic,
Just raw fear.

The fear of not,
Winning or losing,
But just the fear
Of being able to breathe
In this captivity.

Yes, the fear of,
Continued breaths,
In confinements,
The confinements,
From where I can
Smell freedom
Lust and drool over it
But, can’t get it.

The fear of being captivated,
In my own cage
Starting from a complex rib cage
To a simple trap of
Four walls and a ceiling.

I know I belong to
The skies and the seas,
But, I should be,
Amidst of bunch of
Beings and machines,
For that is a part of
My unholy responsibility.

The fear of continuing,
To breathe in captivity,
Just that,
Raw fear,
Of getting accustomed to captivity
Is poetry
Destined to glorify
This slavery of fear.

What is a story?

What is a story?
A truth you’ve suffered?
A tomorrow that you crave?
An attempt to archive
What you’ve felt?

What is a story?
An agony aunt?
A crystal ball?
State of mind at 420?

What is a story?
Your companion is disguise?
Your soulmate at 4am?
Your pawn?

None,
A story is versions of you,
Good, bad and ugly
Real, unreal and surreal
It lives through you
Even after your death
Till eternity.

A story.

When I say that!

When I say that, 

I am choking in this open air
You will believe me.

I am not asking you,
I’m telling you,
You see
And very similarly
When I say that
I will breathe through
This gas chamber
You will watch me
And not question me.

I am a believer,
And so I don’t
Question your science
It’s not my business,
I stay out of it,
But, you, the one who
Claims to know it all
Denies what I choose
To be real at all.

You, the ones who have
Got their science, maths and logic
Absolutely-perfectly-right,
Say, that this magic and all
Is oh so naive.

You, the ones who build
But never create
Tell me, aggressively
That, This and that,
Make it,
Without knowing
What ‘it’ is,
What it holds and beholds.

You, the ones who see
The rising sun
And the fading moon
As just a differentiator
Between the morning and night,
How will you define the evenings
And the days that are spent
Without mind and sight?

Yes, there are days,
When the mind sleeps
Soul meditates
And heart beats,
Just like that,
On the days the
Science is tired
Art comes to it
Pats it,
Puts it to sleep.

But, oh of course,
How would you believe.
It’s all in an imaginative head’s
Rotten mind.

Come to me past
Your night
And before morning
I will show you
What miracle and storm
Feel like, alike.

Courage!

Now that I’ve gathered sufficient courage to expose my scars and skills to the world, 

I would like to thank, you, 

for making me feel insecure and unsure of who I am. 

For had it not been you, 

how would I ever know that I could lift parts and pieces of me to re-build myself,

expose it to the sun, and the skies and let my inner self be. 

Yes, vulnerable at times but beautiful despite!

Flowing water!

Flowing water is a state,
Of mind, heart or soul
That I don’t know,
But, it is a state.

When the water flows
Gently, gracefully
The chaos within seems to
Settle down gradually
Mild breeze kisses
Parts of you
Peace makes love to you
Bliss grows within.

Flowing water, is a state,
The one in which
I wish you and I
Could forever be in.

They!

They,
Must always know what’s in your head
Irrespective of their inability to consider
What you want
And more unfortunately,
Accept what you don’t want.

They,
Who would choke you
Every now and then
As if it’s the new normal
In your life and be alright.

They,
Would want you to believe
The oxygen you inhale
Is existent because of their mercy
Your art of breathing is your sin,
Your being obviously is forbidden.

They,
You see would call you
A coward, a loser
Oh! And the most disgraceful
Living being ever,
But they would lose it
As they see you break shackles
And destroy those cages.

They,
You see our scared
That one day
You might just wake up
Brush your teeth,
Comb your hair
Put on your clothes and shoes
And leave
To never care,
And be back
EVER.