April 15: My Little Date

I might be blundering a little, falling
more than I thought I would. Perhaps
the darkness is throwing me off, pushing
me too hard for me to balance, hang on
to things quite right. Sometimes, I'm
afraid of silence. Of solitude. Last night,
I had a little date

with myself. Quiet, and yet so loud.
No white tablecloth, no roses or candles.
Only a wooden floor facing the bright
windows of the library, only a single
strip of sky and two stars, only a plate
of sandwiches and namkeen. Only a
phone resting on tired knees, playing
soulful strings to myself. Only the wind,
tousling back hair and the leaves of potted
plants in the vicinity, only the strange looks
of passing strangers. Only the smiles I could
give to myself. Only the smiles.

The music grew bigger and leaked out
of its bubble, until it filled the collegescape,
coloured everything a warmer hue, floating
into my badly-lit corner and rising, soaring
past petty worries and little aches, my bent
back and clenched limbs, the weight of the
world in the bags under my eyes - the music
painted everything lighter, named it all brighter,
called me moonshine and firewater, touched me
until I tingled, brown freckled skin over bones
and dreams, as tall as mountains and as deep as
the sea. The music grew so big I couldn't see it
anymore. The music was inside and outside, the
wind grew louder but more silent, and I flew.

The sandwich was divine. The corner was serendipity
in form. The moment, though trivial, was incomprehensibly
large; my little date with myself was a sonnet to solitude.
I had no white tablecloth, no fancy restaurant - I was dressed
baggy, unprepared, on the ground with throat to the stars.
It was all I needed, to tell myself
hey. I love you, man.
I don't need a white tablecloth or a black party dress,
the bright lights are enough, the dark sky more than plenty.
Life itself is all I want to aim for - life itself, my friend.

April 14: It's late.

The poetry called out to me all my life:
sometimes quiet and sometimes loud,
it nudged me as if from a river, water
rushing through my fingers as I tried
to escape - poetry called out to me, yes,
but it never asked me to stay so late,
never told me the clocks would fall
asleep before my eyelids drooped,
never told me that moss would grow
in my bones and I would have to let
it blossom, and hope for wildflowers.

I can say it, say it loud and say it
low, I can hold a hundred mirrors
up to myself and watch the reflection
of golden sun white out any image that
I should see - I can wear a hundred masks
and pretend each one of them is me. All
that you need to know is
I'm trying to
break even
with myself. Perhaps all I will achieve
will be hollow and paper mache. I might
lose the sound of my name. I am taller,
taller than the weeds in my backyard,
taller than the marks on my wall that
measured me once, taller than the lies
I never thought I would tell. The night
goes on, and doesn't end. It's late, and
my flesh is complaining, muscles and
bones aching with the ticking clock
and whirring fan. It's late, and yet I
must be awake. I need myself here,
wrapping the night time like a shroud.
Upon ache and sorrow and misplaced
wanderings.

April 13: Hope

The story of a single walk -

one of many, in the dusty, worn

streets of Dharamsala, amidst monks

and foreigners, trinket-shops and cafes,

constantly surrounded by misty rain and

mountains:

as if in a pop-up card or a picture, the deep

radiant shadow greens, the colour and bustle

of a tourist city, the particular midday smiles

of travellers in transit, resting tired bones here, on

this restless mountainside, searching for sunshine

and salvation on endless roads and reclamations.

Turning left before the monastery, three small figures

swaddled in bright woolens walked up an empty path.

 

The mist gathered before us, and we were okay

with getting lost. The great elsewhere murmured 

from the mountains, and cobbled streets and brick

walls led us to residential buildings, small gates and

open sky filled with smell of pines. A solitary rooftop

under construction - we paused; rubble, grey concrete

and iron rods marring our cityscape and rural views.

We turned our backs to the occasional passersby, and

we were silenced, pine trees and quiet buildings now

opened up the horizon, mountains filled the foreground 

and faded into shadows, the humming city was still, a

river flowed. The sky brimmed over, and a world

unravelled itself graciously

before our simple wanderings.

We were silenced.

Sharing conversations and a smoke, we watched

the world anew. Snowpeaks hid behind mist, and

smiled. Sunlight was gold and white, and darkness

of exhaled smoke rose up and vanished. We were

born again, resting on the horizon like three baby

sunsets. Intoxicated on mountain air and stillness,

we walked those winding roads, through cobbled

streets and alleyways, jutting pipes and steep steps,

climbing and jumping, shuffling and stumbling, I

held on to the parts of the city that offered itself to

us that afternoon, complex corners and wildflowers,

prayer flags emerging from every mountain peak

in that blessed little town. We found our way out

of our beautiful little maze, 

onto an empty, wide, cobbled street. To my mind,

the people smiled and were still, as if in a photograph.

The shops were bright and cozy, incense wafted through

the air and conversations were warmer. As we turned to

leave the little paradise we had discovered, I chanced upon

a sign on a fragmented little wall. Somebody had spray-painted

an arrow in the direction from which we had come - bold letters

in blue stood out against moss and rock. The sign said one word,

hope

April 12: Rituals

Evening on the football field
is purple and gold, clouds settling
around goalposts and hills, the orb
of sun resting precariously on horizon.
Me, in the business of finding joy,

standing amidst high socks and studs,
even grass and kicks, hair desperately
pulled back and held with bands and clips.
Oversized t-shirt and oversized shorts, oversized
heart and smile in minute body of skin and bones.
Me, in the business of desperately holding on to
joy instead of sorrow, finding meaningless rituals
to anchor myself against so I don't float away.
Breakfast every day, and class on time - 6 pm
on the field, convinced to run, clench teeth and
fists, hear heartbeat thudding in it's fragile cage.

Sometimes
I regret that I can hold on to meaning
only through these rituals. Perhaps I should
throw my computer, have conversations only
when they are truly meaningful, and eat when
I'm hungry, not when I'm supposed to. Rituals
are a desperation instead of a reclamation. I did
belong to effortless truth all my life - I'm not yet
used to working for joy. To discipline and dates.

Sometimes
the evening surprises me, and standing on a field
surrounded by skies of purple and gold, truth comes
effortlessly, in a continual gust of wind that pulls my
hair out of its tangle and my heart out of its cages, it
seems to be calling my name, a single vowel of longing
etched across the clouds - running and passing, I notice
myself smiling. The shadow of the wind tousles my hair
even when the gust is past. The shadow of a smile stays.
I will have dinner after a bath, and then I will work. I will
sleep before it's too late, and embrace the ferris wheel of
everlasting days.

April 11: Weekend Preludes

It began with a singular catastrophe -
a hilariously awkward coincidence, a
quietness that sat in my heart like a
melancholy familiarity, a silent loss.

Determined to make music
of my weekends, I resolutely
walked on, dust and crowds
gathering on my sorrow like
vultures - I called the sun my
friend and sweated with a smile.
If happiness wants to play catch,

I will run after it with
all I've got. I promised myself
this, I owe myself far too much.
Travelling alone in the streets of
Delhi - mysterious, narrow-eyed
and wide-laned, callous and kind,
pulsating, pulsating with life - I fly,
soar above my trembles and tears.

I plan with a vengeance, phone calls
and messages, a grid and a map in my
mind, until I am prepared. Looking out
various windows, wind tousling back
hair, I can see that I need this. I needed
the soft music and wine in coffee mugs,
the darkness of night sitting on me like
a shroud; I needed the silence.

Now, I need noise. The metro whizzes
past, and there's always someplace to be -
old friends and new, the crackle of beer cans
swaddled in a checked shirt, glugging down
in turns, between giggles and conversation.
The sun beats down on Connaught Place
despite curtain of clouds, and sets my skin
on fire. Laughing and walking, intoxication
and reclamation. A strange mix. The streets are
nearly empty, and so are the cans. Beer and sun
wrote hope on my arms, and winding walks down
darkened Delhi that night settled gentle joy like
dust in my hair. Street lights and April showers,
every word said in jest and yet, every word carrying
the weight of days of darkness and stagnation. Hope,
gathered in pools of lights on rainy flyovers, folded
into the warm blankets and hot showers of a home,
offered in fragmented smiling exchanges over tea.

I never knew I would find hope in dusty Delhi streets,
in weekend preludes lightly brushed with alcohol and
independence, in emptying my mind of the foliage
that grew there for days. Salvation comes sometimes
in cities - I smile, and I can make music again.

April 10: The Memory Pot

"Memory is not a keeping

but a forgiving, the thresh and burn

of what we cannot salvage" - Leah Silvieus 

Today, working and reworking

moments as if on a potters wheel -

changing my mind and putting both hands

forward, gently lifting this massive mound of clay,

the whirring wheel, the squelch of splatter

earthy on my arms, smelling like rain.

I cannot wash the remnants off,

they dry on my skin

and crack.

Perhaps this is memory -

everything I could not fashion

into a piece of art. Perhaps this is me,

how I hold memory, paint over peeling

clay, painful to the touch, and call it

beautiful;

perhaps the memory of tonight
can only ever be of remnants: your scent,
the tender smiles, the mahogany moon -
everything about your arms that I could not
salvage
while I was there, holding on too tight.
Perhaps I will save the scars as well as the
shadows of stars, pack them into brown letters,
and write left-over words in black pen.
"Once", I will write. "If only". 

April 9: As You Will

"I wish you were as I would have you be" - Shakespeare

O Will, old man, don't we all?
I know your will is mighty strong
but do you really always know
what you want?

'You are what you eat'
and I contend,
you are what you read,
what you watch,
as well as what you pretend.

Every morning, wearing
mask upon shattered mask,
layers of shadows and light
upon flesh and sinew until
all that remains inside is
remnants;

hollows through which
wind whistles through
and whispers echo loud.
My name is not my name.

April 8: Poem of Sadness

The whirring fan, the listless legs,

the exhaustion that creeps up on you

like a shadow. One never expects to

have to constantly fight, be ready for

battle, fists clenched and jaw tightened;

but that's where you are - every time

you pause, take a breath too deep, a silence

too long, the sadness comes swiftly, diving

in arcs around you, rising up your arms just

like smoke - and all you want to do is leave

and there's nowhere to go.

Time moves in leaps and crawls, fragmented,

and you lose all sense of it before long. Work

piles up and slips off the table, conversations

grow trivial and you start to forget what you're

supposed to do with your hands when you stand.

Fiddle, twitch, bite your finger, twiddle thumbs,

adjust the side of your glasses or wipe your phone.

There's no reason - no reason - and that's what 

really gets you at the end of the day. It's a war

you're fighting, alone in your head, an endless

ocean you're swimming through and each breath

you takes robs your lungs of something important -

and you're getting nowhere, nowhere. People scare

you. They scare me too. Buildings look bigger, the

sky caves in. It's a constant struggle to smile wider

do better work harder run faster read more cry less.

Maybe this is what being an adult is like. I thought

the sadness lasts less when you're older, and along with

knowledge and wisdom and vocabulary, you gain strength.

All I'm gaining is perspective, and that doesn't help, really.

Sadness is fine in small doses - like medicine - as long as

the rest of the time you feel new, like a baby leaf, and know

to watch sunsets and make good choices, as long as five nights

a week you can go to bed with a smile on your face, and as long

as hope outweighs outlasts outlives outshines outscreams despair.

But don't worry just yet.

Don't worry yet. Hope is here, 

just quieter, slower, older and wiser,

less ambitious than despair, less insidious.

When it comes, it'll come with all the force of

a thunderstorm, a falling ocean, a vowel of longing

written into the taut skin of the sky. Keep faith, my friend.

April 7: Magic

I'm searching for MAGIC:
hiding and smiling, moving and grieving
the songs and the sea - I'm walking, learning,
falling and crawling, marking out stars on the
blackboard of sky until I touch them all - touch
them all, their fiery eyes and flaming tails, distant
conversations and categorizations, I need you to know:

Magic comes easier when you're a child -
if you want it, it wants you right back, embraces your
footsteps and your shadows, nudges your elbows when
you tremble, and lights up your windows with shafts of
sunlight and love. Books were my magic - I read hundreds,
and filled the shelves of my mind with the kind of hope
that's hard to find as you grow older and

books grow sadder.

I'm searching for magic - people wish they could go back
to being children, but really, I'm okay - I'm searching for magic
and bloody hell, I'm going to find it, I've learnt a hundred new words
and a hundred ways of thinking, I'm taller and stronger and less afraid
of strangers, my eyes look less silly behind this pair of glasses, and
I'm sure I can do it, I'm sure I can. Isn't this what we work towards,
a goal and an aim, ambition and creation, most of all reason?
When I say MAGIC I want no sparks, I want no dragons and
no wands - all I need is reasons, unbelievably starry nights and
heart wrenching poems, winding conversations that tell me,
HEY
life, life really is, really is
worth living. This moment
really is, really is precious.

I always thought
this kind of magic
would be easier to
find as I
grew
up.

SO WHAT IF IT ISN'T
the struggle is real but so is the flaming,
fierce, ferocious fire that rages in my belly.
I will fight the ravines that will one day
stretch my skin, I will hold a hundred happy
moments in my calloused hands, and when
age hits me like a tornado, I will hug it.
I will have lived well enough.

April 6: Countries of the Body

"There's a place that poets seek
as real and fearsome as the body."
- Tishani Doshi

Tishani - may I call you that? - I need you to know,
I'm in constant conversation with your words, how
you delicately string them together with silk, hang
them to dry under red sunsets and mist of memory.
How your words wrench me from myself, future and past,
here and now, space and time. How your words transcend.
Your every line captivates me, but nothing so much
as when you called the first collection of poetry,
Countries of the Body - oh, how to explain to you
the shivers in the various continents, the swaying forests,
the revolutions, the silhouettes of truth, the trembling restlessness
that arose in the cities of my belly - how could you
coin a phrase so beautiful, and then put it out in the world
so it would reach me, wrench out my regret and lay it
to dry under the stars, touch me in places I didn't even know
existed - how could you?

I've been wondering for years now - what is art? - and
I understand that it must transcend representation alone.
And yet, with a pen in my hand, all I want to translate from
the shadowy world of images is the body - the poetry of it,
the misty mystery of it, the shadow smoke and concrete curves
of it. How the universe could really exist in a single mind, and
how a mind exists in this separate, almost self-sustaining universe
of a body - how it escapes definition, preservation, categorization.

I want to paint a hundred bodies, have people hold still
while I let my lines caress their corporeality, their mortality.
Flesh, muscle, bone and sinew - the creation of metaphors
began in the body, the realization of metaphors too.
What is as beautiful as skin, skin, stretched tight over
a form you perfected of yourself in so many years,
your errors and misjudgements, your petty joys,
your stories and your rainy days, your memory -
wrapped up so tight, tucked up inside, giftwrapped
with golden-brown, slightly freckled, even toned.
How gorgeous are curves - not only breasts and hips,
but the curves of sensuous arms as they rest against
a wall, catching a single shaft of sunlight against
shadow complexion. Calves and ankles, muscled
with strength and resolve, stray hairs lit up in noon
sunlight, shadow and light entwining until this thing
of beauty is formed in my eyes - who can say all bodies
are not beautiful - close your eyes for a moment and
when you open them, notice only fragments:

the strand of dark hair pushed aside with long fingers,
motionless mouth with contours and crevices, full lips
open against sky. fluttering lids of star-speckled eyes.
undulating plains of thighs. ashy mountains of knees.
twitching ankles. wrinkled hands. mysterious ears.
All bodies are beautiful. All bodies are singular worlds.

One day I want to fall in love with somebody
and name every country of their body. I want to
soak afternoon sun in the ocean and dissolve my
unyielding flesh to the seas. I want to outlive my
corporeal frame. I want to live only as long as it
lasts.