- deftly drawn pictures

in austere words, brood

over their empty plates and empty bowls

that appall their shacks.

Trapped in a rancorous quagmire, ‘deep’

screech like a quiescent quadruped.

Mere silhouette of children, turgid tummy bearing,visible

scurvy, rickets, malnutrition-

purloin their innocent faces

and make them corpses nude.

Dry breasts of mothers utterly prostrated

the emotion no one can comprehend.

From the sky-scrapers came down, no head

to offer them a ‘frugal lunch’

but something serious they discussed

- the next Miss Universe contest!

Like a child who count his toys

the surveyors counted the dead bodies

fiendish politicians who masqueraded as ‘saviours’

made promises bizarre-

electricity, health drinks and even

a seat in the next elections!

to which melted, their doll like passiveness

and said: ” We want nothing

but a frugal lunch to save

our dear children from the hands

of the great tyrant, death”

To which the ‘saviours’ suddenly  became dumb and deaf.

While the hungry fire like prancing horses,

falling and rising and swaying

danced wildly in the air, unbridled;

surged forward, gorged on the emaciated corpses

satisfying its hunger with the ‘frugal lunch.’

winding ceaseless:

memories one or two crushed here and there

hue-less dry leaves in mind,

wind kissed blossoms

never in full bloom!

an abyss in the dark-

broken words, emotions

pain unexpressed

intermittent subdued cries;

a birth here and a death there..

interplay of souls!

I’m pregnant with fragmented reverie:

my senses fail to comprehend sense and time,

put me into the realm of silence

let me lie there dormant, dormant,

my eyes wide open with slumberless dreams…

Scattered around the vagrant languid moon,

I behold his lovers, the fervent stars-

Whose bewitching charm doth appeal

The forlorn night with ecstasy.

The alluring night feign as a demure maiden

And the shrieking owl does molest her serenity.

A nightingale flits through her heaving bosom,

And I hearken its sweet enchanting nocturnal song,

Pouring upon the night and me, alighting on a bough.

To this exotic song do the trees darkling respond

Nodding their leaves in rapt delight

And make the sluggish night, agile.

Beside me a ramshackle hut in mud

Over-grown with wild creepers to the top,

Illuminated with innumerable glow-worms,

Challenges the starry vaulted sky, above.

I can hear the smooth sound of falling water,

But I do not know where the cascade is.

The humming sound of the cascade,

mixed with the nightingale’s song,

Tend to awake the reposing men and

The beast with its seductive magical power.

How jocund do the dashing beetles around me,

Hop and dance as if to claim-

Their right over the cloudless night,

And I find my sloth slowly fading away.

A gentle wind hurled from the lurid heaven,

Came to me through the depth of darkness

Gently kissed my untied hair leaving it

Dancing to the melodious music around

And puts me and the clammy night into a sweet trance.

Then I suddenly remembered him-

Beside my windowsill, once I’ve

Seen you riding a horse

I was then a princess and you, a knight;

When I was a shepherdess, you were a gypsy,

You’re an epic and I, a meaningless verse.

In my days of dead hopes, you gave me solace.

Let me repeat the question which-

I’ve often asked myself,

“Who are you to me?”

I think this night of rapture

Has blessed me with the answer-

You’re just an illusion, a mirage in me!