Haiku

1.


'carry me'
cottonwood seeds
drift



2.

autumn again...
the wheeling shadows
of a carousel



3.

your words
soap bubbles rising
in a fair ground



4.

leaves fall
the mating season
for butterflies?



5.

autumn leaves--
how can my poems end
without protest

Homage

Haiku

sitar thrums

why  some tunes  dry up

with autumn

Alaap (Tanka)

fog

clearing up

at dawn

melody of birds

startles the friar

[ A tribute to Pandit Ravi Shankar ]

Autumn

Do I see you today
as if I've not seen you before

The air of a vagrant around you
a voice barely audible
a pair of eyes staring out
at nothing

You keep smoking
your wrinkles pronounce
the curves of a sand dune

Embers travel deep into your cigar
one miserable cat seeks refuge
in a memory lane

I know you're the maker of a mist
that which embalms the emptiness
of willows

I recall myself running amok to hide
into your hollowness

You are such a miser
piling up everyone's desires
a child that cackles while it explores
its treasure trove

I question myself
how else could I perceive
your presence

a fiery butterfly
flutters in the middle of
deliberations

Pearl

I had one

It appeared that the oyster
couldn't do much to hide its sheen

When I showed it to you
your lips parted and I saw
pearls all around

Then on a dull summer day
you said its pretty useless to read
the same story over again

Your shrug of shoulders did much
to cover a growing stress

Until you finally said the pearl has lost
its midas touch

And that days are more yellowy in autumn
than being gold

So the mist rose
covering the bridge the lake the cottage
of my dream

I had one simple choice to make

I threw the pearl back to where
it came from

Double Tanka

he did not say yes 
or no, but left with 
the quiet breeze 
she’s pleading with the rain 
to get a reply 


fungi clustered 
at the base of a tree trunk 
could there be 
a tinge of poison 
rooted in her words 

Still the Greenhorn

You know it bleeds
to brood upon my own verses

How many times can a man suffer
from such fanatic spells of creativity

How can he possibly pass on
the products of his
all possible word-scrambling sessions
and merrily go on teasing the hapless reader

you in this case

Yet it bleeds
And it grieves me to ask you a favour
to place your arms around me
for a journey

One weeny beggar towing his wishes
to the bow of his violin

If we cannot find him
we might bump into the den
of a sycophant
a parasite living on its yesterdays

We may even chance to meet
a sweating Santa in summer

Or we may travel anywhere
with the puff of a weed

It is still bleeding my friend
and I do not know
whether my writing possesses
the fibrinogen to clog the flow

So yet again it is this hackneyed plead
of a self-obsessed narcissus
who needs you badly
in the hour of his crisis

in his empty mirror

Haiku

the bent tree
in a storm
my grandpa


her cold look--
my first sip of
ice tea

When I lose all my rhymes...

On a day when clouds stream in
from the east
on a kind of a day when your face resembles
a sober chameleon
A working day in the countryside
with millipedes out to feed
hungry mouths

When an ordered line of ducks
cross the road nhurriedly
A thousand minds oblivious of a civilisation
parading with a dutiful resolve
to a built-in tempo

past the headstones
of a cemetery
Past the buried victims of a lonely war
won or lost by none
I pause to wonder
where I'm heading

Haiku

1.


protest march--
shorter shadows follow
the tall one

2.

cottonwood seeds drift--

the birth anniversary

of my late father

Rural Haiku

the road
winding into fog
cattle sounds


sun above
grass tips; a rooster
cocking its head


tribal dance—
the scent of earth
after a shower


holding blossoms
close to her heart
her coy smile


playground
the glint in the eye
of a squirrel


distant flute
a sudden breeze
ruffles in


a plop
off the wooden bridge
ripples


a swan takes off
the slow run
of the evening train

Starry Night

Inspired by Vincent Van Gogh’s “Starry Night”


#1.
starlight
the cathedral of
a sleeping village
---a lone cypress
---prays with me


#2.

the tumult
in the night sky
haunts me
wind carries the scent
from another world

Haiku

rain

filling up potholes

the ghost town

glittering dew--
the frog prince
croaks loud

a rainbow
outside the window
our song

Haiku

the yarn
she weaves...
moon halo

Tanka

she stands here
arms akimbo watching
leaves fall
the little red rooster
calls it a day

Melancholy rain

in melancholy rain
i think of you

the trees, in their sullen
subordination, make me recall

my stooping low to your
whirlwind whims

the patter on my roof
fades the words you had gifted

i hear vehemence in the voice
of a trapped bluejay

i dwell in my doldrums

as the drizzle fizzles out
and a cloud-gate tempts me
to escape this tangle of yours
I saunter along a path with wafts of wind
that brings the scent
of nascent earth

until the day frees itself
like enlivened birds

Tanka

she explains
the plus side of doing
business
at the picnic --
her husband eying egrets

Tanka

Tanka

#1)

a room scented 

with Christmas dinner--

hard to find

any trace of contempt

in your smile

#2)

the diver

continues to hunt

the  wrecked ship

---a swarm of silver fishes

---follow his trail 

#3)

puffy clouds

crowning blue mountains

makes me recall

the yogurt on your nose

the day it rained wild

#4)

the lady

in her red kimono

eyes his path—

rugged steps leading to

a stone built monastery

#5)

sixteen bearers

carrying a bride

in a palanquin--

red sorghum grasses

waving in gentle wind

#6)

two cottages

in the moonlight

one empty with ruin

the other full

of your memories

#7)

she stands here

arms akimbo  watching

leaves fall—

the little red rooster

calls it a day

Haiku

1.

had I been...

wind swirls in a field

of growing crops

2.

between

the drifting shadows

a chameleon

3.

your voice

a song sparrow

in the morning

4.

autumn again

a  mockingbird

on windowsill

It is May

it is May
the hungry eyes of a ragamuffin
inspects an afternoon

cobblestones gets dappled
with loosened red petals

sky empty as the paleness
of your lips in the photo
tainted with a hue of forgiveness

looking out the window
perhaps at the tree losing florets
your hair disheveled
by the warm hand of summer

i saunter along a path
in the iciness of
a bygone winter

Haiku

wave
after wave
.... filling my footsteps


not even a whisper...
an owl and I watching
the star plunge


the bird
becoming smaller . . .
twilight


your letter
pleading innocence--
slanted rain


a ripple
on the lap of a ripple
loosened leaf

the wheels tanka

the wheels 
of a cart rattling 
at dawn 
---a village boy and girl 
---slip into the fog 

2 tanka

#1) 

writing verses 
in the shelter 
of her memory... 
shadows lengthen 
behind rosemary bushes 

#2) 

my recent verse 
dimmed by your shadow 
mocks at me— 
i rummage through 
the word history of 'eclipse' 

thunder flashes

thunder flashes-- 
ghost of Caesar 
beside my bed

If you cannot win today

still no sign of clouds

at exactly fifteen past nine
a speck of sun filters its way through
an unclear pane
glorifying a minute portion
of the opposite wall

the umbra 
third eye of an unseen goddess
stays so for fifteen minutes more 
making the clown in the clock face smile
sardonic

then my door knob rattles
as a goods train passes by 

one naked lizard
the sole spectator of each episode
returns to its hunt 

finally the clown sermonizes
you cannot win your prize today

another day drops between
summer and monsoon

to paint you

to paint you 
a small house 
fringed by gardenias... 
to paint you 
alone in an autumn mist 

deep in sleep

deep in sleep 
a gray-haired vagabond 
at my doorstep 
---how many rooms 
---have I passed through 

hidden faces

pictures of me 
occupied with nested dolls 
how often 
do I open and close 
the hidden faces 

wild June

to think 
of a wild June 
to think 
of sneaking our way 
through tall grasses

3 haiku

thickening mist... 
your crafted promises 
still intact 


your touch-- 
on the rabbit-shaped lake 
a cat's paw breeze 


she offers me 
a morsel of her life 
autumn whisper

my hellish affairs

i recall bumping into an odd man
who posed as an astrologer 

my planets had all gone awry
and may a miracle by some occultist

put me on course

my dinghy had tasted salty waters
been ravaged by storms
as i set myself forth in mission 
after mission

hopping from islets to islets

what he missed out
was that in each harbor
I've perceived
the echoes of your laughter

the slit in my door

I hit upon
a slit in the wooden door
through which my secrets 
must have diffused out 
into the thin air to be breathed 
by sage owls in their nocturnal bench

you can place your eyes against it
and get a glimpse of a portion of a bed 
beside the window
where I passed my jaundice days
in isolation

if you notice it from inside the room
you'll get one half of a stair
and a bit of an iron railing
that stands erect from the world war days

How did all the years percolate
without my noticing

three feeble men
who point to my window while speaking
quietly among themselves

the wet glint

the wet glint 
in her eye 
quicksand

The man who left without saying much

She would always notice
the sad look of his attire

Weighed with thoughts 
his eyes
although elegant 
were fixed to the bright fake flowers 
on the mantle

He was a man imbibed by a gloomy rain

Words scarcely flowed from his thin lips
a hefty cloud has to lighten its load at times

His gray hair had the semblance 
of a ruffled sparrow unable to conquer
a headstrong wind

Mature lines were drawn over his face
a tilled land parched without a monsoon

Fingers jittery with excitement
a red-tail deer watching moonrise

He was more like the stump of a beheaded
banyan

She'd total the age rings
and each time come up with diverse counts

He'd sit there 
a frail man
nonplussed for hours

Till the evening guides him to its embrace