For him

1


His nectared name
will colour my lips,
till another mouth
will hold it
between her rubied lips.

2

There, we were,
without any need
for exaggeration of held hands,
just aloof in love without promises.

There, when he offered me
to explicate
the delicate matter of the heart,
amidst the cutlery
and blunt knife
and bored diners,
My ‘No’ stuck in my throat
unable to tumble and collide
with his expectant eyes.

How terrible were partings then,
when we kept meeting
after we bade our ‘goodbyes’.


3

Shards of glasses
broken long ago
in a corner
untouched by the tapering wisp
of the aged broom
suddenly pricked my fingertips today
Untouched
not even
the moist edge of the mop
could cajole it out
And now it was
beneath my skin –
A glittering of pain
A slight warm blood


http://soibamharipriya.blogspot.com ©

Asti*

Beyond the courtyard
moss grown
where the cement had lost
to the repeated lashings of annual rains
I picked her bone
with the last withering steel-gray of ash
Around my neck
I offered it to her
delicately
wrapped in hues of saffron
She, given to fluffy pillows
and softness of downy bedcovers
Now a wooden clasp for pillows
Bedcovers she had none
Just a parasol of palm leaves
to tide over the dark world of mud, water and stars



asti- A Vaishnav Hindu funeral ceremony observed usually on the 6th day

Release

The night
awashed
with phairen’s sudden showers
clears up
Outshined by the moon
freckles of stars
remained obscured
in its usual pattern
The freshly cleansed breeze
Brought news
of his release
from a once dreamt dream
But like me
he was caged
His heart beneath his ribs
mine beneath my bosom
Yet from within
his prison of bones
one day
he will summon
love’s tender weakness
I will dream
of charting out
in the abject vastness of the sky
with a stars studded map
I will embrace
the season of nuptials
with fear of exile
with hope of a genesis
with another heart
clasped
in another chest
one rib less
than mine

http://soibamharipriya.blogspot.com ©

absence

It was an absence chalked out,
like the cold circular rim of gold,
a clasp of an ornament
where a glittering stone once adorned
Absence was
the presence of a rim;
a clasp;
a remnant




http://soibamharipriya.blogspot.com ©

absence

Would a God undo the lurking lack?
Would a companion do the same?
There is no antidote to absence.
We were borne of it,
in hopes of a completion
We are to carry it to our graves


http://soibamharipriya.blogspot.com ©

Fleeing Dove

They have arrived
after the bullet has been shot
after the bomb
has spewed its shrapnel
to take stock
of the situation
When the streets
bleeds with splinters
and undressed torso
and limbs
They'll arrive
-the patriots
in white
Condemn
the cowardice
and assure
"The culprit will be booked
and tried under law"
Ex-gratia/s
announced
Of course
the Government
is pained
and so will numb
Another blast
with another ex-gratia
And we plot
to kill
the shrapnel
with flowers
and a fleeing dove?

http://soibamharipriya.blogspot.com ©

No bonafide address

I have lived
a decade
without an address
in this city
I have lived
without a paper
to declare my existence
A concrete mesh
housed me
yet scared to contain me
trembles when asked
my whereabouts
and deserts me
When I offered
to be chained
hand to hand
One by one
they'd link
the ridges of my fingertips
All ten of them
My eyes -the iris and pupil
the tears and anger
They will now
give me a number
Armed with this
I am told
I'll get
my bona-fide address

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