To My Nymphalis Antiopa

I stepped out of my room one winter morning
So early that even the sun was yawning
All the dew-covered trees and leaf
Had tear drops though none was in grief

With dew, they had cleaned their eyes of earth
And filled their faces with mirth
Seeing it made me wonder
What had got their attention to surrender?

Then I noticed the source of this attention
The reason for all this happiness and commotion
It was a small, dull cocoon
But hey, it was glowing like the moon

So that was the reason behind this mirth
It was a gathering to witness this new birth
A life was breaking out of the cocoon
To see the world, oh so soon...!

Out slowly the girl sneaked
At her new world, she peeked
Then she stepped out, in all her glory
Out to see and learn the world’s story

She began her journey onward
She placed her soft feet forward
Maybe she was not sure if the earth would stand
The weight of all her six hands

It was then that I was reminded of you
Of your soft beauty and gentle demeanour
Allow me to say this, would you?
Without you this world would be a big bore....

Those plants and trees were like me
From a distance they were there to see,
A life moving out to fly
Just like I watched you walking by...

And then the girl opened her wings
Those big black captivating wings
Reminded me of your beautiful eyes and the day we met
Though I’m not sure if you remember me telling you that

We spoke only for a few minutes
Heaven knows how I managed to do that
I saw your eyes and that very minute
That very minute, I was tongue-tied

I blurted out what came to my mind
Please forget what I just said
Because, to be honest, I had lost my mind
And was walking while you led...
Maybe that day you had to go somewhere
You stretched your wings out and flew
With my heart down there wanting to pursue
But holding back so as not to pester you

You left the town one day
Not telling me when you would be back
I don’t even know if we would ever again talk
But still I hope that we would....someday...


If you happen to read this somehow
I hope with all my heart you do
Know that I live for you
And with you alone will my life be true....

A Talk to Remember.............. and Relish

I felt a desperate need to breathe
The air was getting thinner
And yet a fragrance touched my nostrils
A fragrance right out of Mother Nature’s bouquet

I had walked more than my share of meters
And that too on an almost vertical road
That’s right; I was taking a trek,
But definitely not for the benefits it offered

This mountaintop had a different purpose to serve
It had, for an evening, taken on a new mantle
It was a rendezvous point for two hearts...
That had, of all places, chosen this spot to meet

To meet, to talk, to share and to care
These two hearts were in love
These two hearts had met and mingled
And wanted to, for a long time, become one...

And once I managed to get to the spot,
I looked around me to see what was special,
And why she had chosen this spot....
There had to some reason behind this trek...

And I got it within a minute...
It definitely was the right and the best spot to talk,
It was a place that had, not just nature’s essence
It, rather, had her presence as well....

And there stood my angel,
In all her elegance and glory
Surrounded by fresh grass and aged trees
That reminded me of her...

She was a mixture too,
Of the old and the new,
The old her was like those trees,
Strong, resolute and protective

And nothing other than the fresh grass
Could have symbolised the new her
She was the epitome of the tenderness, the care and the love
That the grass bestows on every feet that kisses it

And there she stood, the angel of my heart,
And here I was, all tired sweaty and out of breath
As if she read my mind, she handed me a bottle of water
That I immediately took to my lips to sip, or rather gulp!

Man, if the gods ever created an elixir,
It was this. Water handed over by your girl,
That when drunk through your lips
Feels almost like a kiss from her lips...

So after having my dose of the elixir,
And getting back whatever life I’d lost
I turned towards my girl and saw her eyes
The eyes I had lost and was losing myself in...

We spent a while looking at each other’s eyes
Sharing stories of each other’s treks up the hill
Speaking in the language that only lovers know
And the language only they can speak and understand...

Then we felt it was time to talk,
In a language the world understands,
And we spoke, reminiscing about the day we had met
About the way we had met....

Of all the strange things that happen under the sun,
This had been one of the sweetest.
Two apparent strangers, meeting within the confines
Of an object that ranks among the least romantic...

Ya, it was a bus....a dirty steel frame with a loud engine
That spewed smoke and dirt, pestering the trees it crossed.
And out of that rudimentary place had emerged something
A thing of such beauty that only Nature could create such...

We went on to talk about all the fun moments we had shared together
All the happiness that had intertwined our lives so much
So much that death had failed to do us apart
Death himself was powerless to stop us from getting together

He had taken her away from me, thinking he had been successful
But pity his ignorance; he failed to know the power of love
And here we were, talking and laughing and living life.
For my girl had been granted a fresh lease of life

A life she wanted to spend only with me
A concession she had been granted,
By the powers that be, to meet me...
Not when we wanted to, for that would’ve been “always”

But only once in a while, though not so long
It still felt like eternity to us, this was the first
The first of one such moment, to be blessed by the gods
For we were together, after spending lifetimes in purgatory

And we were not planning to let this day get wasted.
Our eyes met and stayed glued to each other
We had a lot to share with the other
And yet when we tried to talk, no words came out

We managed to form coherent words from our mouths
And talked about how much we missed each other
And how much we wanted to live together
Back in the garden of bliss that she now hailed from

The day we had in our hands was quickly running out
And yet, we still had stories that would fill books
As always, we wondered at the unfair nature of Time
That flies by when we are at our happiest...

We kissed each other, knowing that this time,
There, literally, was no tomorrow.
We had no idea when we could meet again
But had to depart with mere hopes...

My girl was turning paler and was fading away
And I looked down the hill I had climbed,
Despite the fact that the journey downhill was easier
The fear of going back to the world haunted me...

My world was here with her, not down there
And I wanted to live whatever time I had left, with her
But that wasn’t how things had been destined
And I woke up myself to the reality of a void life...

I shall go down this hill today, thinking, or rather dreaming,
About when and where we would meet the next time,
And how many “next times” had to be there
Before my time was over and I joined her...

The days till the next happy day of my life will be full of dreams,
And hopes. Hope that would give me a reason to breathe and smile,
Hope that would give me a reason to live these days
Hope that would make me meet her again....