Il Concerto

What a huge crowd of admirers!
Beaming with joy I looked down
At the eager eyes looking up at me,
I was the star of the show that night,
No wonder I couldn’t see her in the crowd.

It was such an army, growing with time,
And all of them to watch me in all my glory,
My head was spinning, and wherever I looked
I saw bright eyes, cheering me on,
No wonder I couldn’t see her in all that dazzle.

I was about to start performing, a love song,
Which, of course, had been inspired by her,
And I started, in my baritone, a soulful note,
The song even brought the gods out of their rooms,
To listen to this sweet melody I was singing,

The excitement got to me and I started dancing,
Someone pushed me off the stage to the ground,
A few people were standing around me
The sky was filled with streetlights and a full moon,
And I was at the bottom of the trunk of a tree.

I was still disoriented, unable to take stock of the scene,
Before I could stand straight, my cheek faced the brunt of a slap,
It was my girl, hitting the same spot she had caressed a while ago,
As I rubbed my eyes, she yelled at the top of her voice,
“How many times have I told you not to get drunk and climb trees?”

Waiting For a Sun..

The shadow on the road lengthened,
The eastern giant had woken up,
So he could come out and blaze on,
And burn more bodies like hers,
Taking undue credit for a task,
That awaited another fire.

He was moving steadily, driven,
The shadows watched him, shortening and dying,
Oblivious to the demise of her shadow,
She lay getting a fine tan on her wrinkled skin,
Born again, her shadow grew,
Growing up with a growing pot,

The dizzy pot, drunk and dizzy, drunk some more,
Spilling out the drink, the drunk went crashing,
Dragging her with him, companions, in rags and riches,
As the shadow disappeared, so did the pot,
In new company, as pots always do,
As she lay on the road, waiting for a sun, hers...

All I Have Left

I live looking for lost moments
Moments that slipped through my fingers
Moments that I tried to hold onto
The tighter I held, the quicker they fell,
Like grains of sand on the beach

I search in the brightness of day
I search in the darkness of night
I sieve the waters of the seven seas
And sift the sands of the deserts
All this search tires, not my spirit, just my body...

The minutes we shared as we met,
The hours we spent as we talked
The days we enjoyed flying amongst clouds
The months we lived each other’s lives
I look for all those lost moments, in vain...

I have our love as a beacon to guide me
Though the beacon burns brighter every coming day
My pursuit has led me only to dead ends till today...
But I refuse to tire; I refuse to give up,
For I know that if I do, I’ll lose all that I live for

Yes, this is all that I have left in life
This perpetual search that drives me
To find a life I lost and live it all over
For in that life I knew no sorrow
For in that life I had you with me...

I want to find the vessel of sorrow,
For I'm sure it is completely empty
Having poured its fill into my life,
It is now dry and parched
I want to find it and pay back what I received

But to find it, I have to find you,
Only you can empty my mind of sorrow
And fill it with happiness
Only you can bring me back from the dead
And breathe life into my body

And so I keep looking for you
I keep looking for you, in those moments
Moments I have lost to Time
And I know that I will find them
Or at least will die trying....

Between Train Tracks

I am a weary traveler, worn out by the winds,
Walking in the narrow gap between steel lines,
Holding dear to them as if to a lifeline,
And maybe for once in his life, I was right.

The train of my past had pushed me out,
The train of my future had departed before I could board
And I stood, a lonely traveler, between tracks,
Trying to bring myself to the present, this eludes me.

So with nothing to do and nowhere to go,
I look around at the world which has made a choice,
To turn the tables, every time I get lucky,
To frown if life gets kind to me, which she rarely did.

The world did seemed beautiful, though ironically,
For it was not my world, and mine was in turmoil,
The contrast was glaring, so glaring that I looked down,
At the train tracks where I had been standing for a while.

Looking down on these tracks either way,
They meet in the distance, on both sides,
Though where I stood, they looked otherwise,
They ran parallel, which geometrically would never meet.

Maybe life was telling me something,
Maybe what I felt was separation, isn’t really so,
Maybe it was just a parallel journey we had to take,
Maybe to be together in the distant future... like those tracks.

So with my long list of optimistic maybes,
I have started walking into the east,
To find a life, that lies beyond those mountains,
Those mountains behind which the sun rises everyday...

Walk on the Beach

As I place my feet forward and take every step
The sharp sand particles feel like pins
Those hurt my feet and make me bleed....
I go back to the times when these same sands
Pillowed and cushioned my feet.

Maybe because in those days, the sands ignored me,
Being intoxicated by your touch upon them,
For then, whenever I looked back, I saw
Two pairs of feet on them, leaving marks on the sand,
And now, just one lonely pair.

The sea waters are no longer sweet as they used to be,
Increasing my thirst every time I bend down to taste them,
I cannot have enough of them to quench my thirst,
Reminding your presence by my side, in my life,
I could never have enough and begged time to stop.

Time has stopped alright, though a lot later
Than what I might have hoped or prayed for,
I stand frozen in time, frozen quite literally too,
The breeze has become a blizzard, a cold cruel one,
An overwhelming chill passes through my spine.

The wind that blows by, brings goose bumps,
Knives of ice pierce my bones, in hundreds
The cold chill makes me shiver and sweat,
Cold knives on sweaty palms, I yell in pain,
And yet, my call remains unanswered.

The sunlit waters of the sea appear warm
And inviting. I step closer, hopeful
That your warmth may have passed over to them,
And my hopes are washed away by the waves,
With water colder than the heart of Fate.

But I still stand in these waters, and observe,
As wave after wave brings water and takes it back,
Just like it takes water and brings it back,
I live with the hope, that it will bring back what it took.
I live to see it bringing you back to me....

A Promise Unfulfilled...

Walking along the waterline, he waited for her,
She had told him that she’d be there,
And he had only to believe in her,
And wait for her, which he did.

He knew, not hoped, that she would keep her word,
She had always done in the past, without an exception,
Even if she was half way around the world,
She had been by his side, when he needed her.

And he had always wanted her, by his side.
In joy and sorrow, he had wanted her company,
For she was not merely his better half,
She was his breath, she was indeed him.

And now, she wasn’t there, he was all alone,
He believed she could get to him, no matter where she was,
More than anything else, she had promised she would,
And she had never gone back on her words, never before.

And now she wasn’t there, leaving him alone,
She had abandoned him forever,
But he lay in wait, believing that she would come
To fulfil the promise she had made to him.

Summers and winters have passed over and over,
The tide has ebbed and flowed over the sandy shores,
Waves might have eroded his footsteps; time may have withered him,
But her promise to him stays alive in his heart forever...

Walking Along Cornfields

Holding hands together, we walked in the corn fields,
Fresh ears of corn eavesdropping on us,
Laughing at our jokes, or so it seemed
As the wind tickled them while gliding past us.

Holding hands together, we walked in the corn fields,
Just me and her, walking amidst rows of corn,
Her plaited hair rose in the wind, embracing me,
Rows and rows of brunette corn on my face.

She knew I loved the smell of fresh corn,
And I knew that day, that there was more to life
Than just fresh corn. There was a heart to care
And to be cared for. There was a life to share, with her.

We danced in the fields, round and round we went,
And made tread marks on the soil,
Marks that were claimed to be trademark crop circles,
By conspiracy theorists, the day and week after.

Corn fields have mazes these days,
People tend to get lost in them,
We were friends of Theseus and danced
Our way into the maze of love.

Tired and delighted, we sat down to relax,
Resting my weary head on her soft lips,
I did not know if it was a minute or an eternity,
Lost in the bliss, me and the monster of Time were.

Ecstasy knows no bounds, and I could see it in her eyes,
When I finally did get up. I could see it in my eyes,
Reflected in hers. We were in each other’s arms,
The world had itself shrunk to the small space between us.

I lay in her lap, resting my eyes, in her radiant beauty,
Her fingers in my hair ruffling, what the wind failed to do,
I was going back in time, lying on my mom’s lap,
Her affection flowing free into the crevices of my lip.

The ears of corn leaned in, to sneak a peek,
But pulled back when I looked at them,
Were these games played by the wind?
Or were these played by my mind?

I wish I had my mind switched on,
It always goes into slumber,
The minute I think of her. Into hibernation, it was
Now that I was this close to her.

Words are too limited to appreciate the beauty
Of her voice, which could put anxiety to rest,
Drive exhaustion into extinction, and turn
Despondency to dreams.

I need no dreams, to live my life
For I got her, better than any dream
The best, man could ever dream of,
Was cradling me in her lap, the bed of paradise.

Day was dying into dusk, the sun getting lost
Into the mountains, to rise again tomorrow
I was getting lost in her, not knowing
If I could find myself ever again...

Not that I was worried about it,
For I was the citizen of this land of God
Where she was Queen, with all her warmth,
Crowning her beauty and benevolence.

We found our way out of the maze of maize,
Through the end of it, we walked out,
Two sets of feet marking the way to guide,
Lovers of posterity who enter and leave.

Lovers who don’t have to get lost in corn fields
But would rather get lost in each other,
Just like we have and others will have,
Holding hands together, walking out of the corn fields.