The Celestial Dance

There’s a branch knocking knocking

On my window pane

A storm is brewing

The wind is blowing blowing

Over the hills, over the trees,

Through the brick walls

Of my domain

Where I huddle

And watch peering

Into the gathering grey

Birds have stopped calling

Leaves are rustling

The trees straining against

Their tethered moorings

Clothes flapping are

Hurriedly gathered

Doors and windows

Are hastily shut

And the branch is

Knocking knocking

As if beating the very

Rhythm of time


And my eyes fly

Like sparks from

Kindled coal fire

Reach towards

The murky horizon

Where I meet life growing

From the booming voice

Of universal death –



What is this force

That draws me out

From within myself

To want to join in –

In that great celestial dance

Compressed breath

So. The celestial bodies are misaligned. The birds have flown. Abandoned the branches where they had grown. The wind has fallen silent, perhaps has migrated to a different sky. Unable to hold on to you, clasp you against my heaving ribs. I let go. Without a whimper. Yet your ghost lingers. Stubbornly. Compressed within my breaths.

my caged soul

my eyes like abandoned boats – adrift

in windless waters

crave to strip you off that

smooth skin that enshrouds you

and lay you open

like a butchered beast

and set myself free from

my caged soul --

from your solemn silences

that touch me with the pinched lips

of a miser hoarding his

hidden emotions

Let's pretend

Let's pretend, both of us, we're having fun
Red wine in a glass, it's bouquet tickles my nose
Hey, let's have a party
We'll wear pretty clothes and heady perfume
Listen to golden oldies with fond memories
We'll tell each other stories and jokes
Yes, that will be such great fun, won't it?
Hey, how about a movie tonight
Yeah, let's go to the multiplex
And catch that evening show
And do dinner in the restaurant
On the top floor..won't that be fun?
I am really having such fun
Can't you see me smilin' and joking and
Talking politics and all?
Oh, come on, it's such fun to pretend
We're having such fun, isn't it :D

of Solitude

there is this theme again – of Solitude

silences fluttering within

like flightless birds

caged in an exposed landscape --

your words never conveyed quite as much

as your silences crawling

like a snake shedding its skin


benumbed – my frostbitten tongue struggles

to prise open that cage

for a desperate furious taste

and your tender face turns

rugged like a stone cliff

Waiting..waiting

The gulf of a silence
Unfathomable unspeakable
The koel's shrill voice
Screaming longing longing
Is throttled

She sits in darkness
Mute and still
Her parched throat
Dry and dusty
Waiting waiting
For the joyous cloud
Bringing the song
Of rain

the travesty

life spins its ironies like a menacing cloud of buzzing bees

around her maggot filled brain. whispers poison words. she halts

midstream, hides her corrugated tongue, and carries on.

as if all was hunky-dory.



the bitch is cold dead: you wouldn’t have thought her cunning

eyes once fluttered with fresh washed curtains. rose petal patterned.

now they hang, lifeless, faded, dirt stained. hidden behind

them she crushes flower buds.



in a show of self-denial. secretly she hates their fresh colour,

their tender skin. she tears. she rips into them with her hooked talons.

flower buds will not be allowed to bloom. each torn petal strewn around

her gnarled feet, an insipid slaughter. she strikes an injured pose



in ragged finery. the crone moves her toothless jowls to work on

the curses that escape in frothy spittle through her blue lips. her

face contorted in tear-filled rage, collapses,



disappears in the mass of quivering drool. her skin like crumpled

hide left out too long in the brittle sun. her face cracks open in a gaping grin. she

rejoices in the travesty. called life.