Shiva's dance

Shiva's dance
the approaching storm
on a summer day

Haiku

goodbye kiss
unsteady moon
in my glass



she savours
his agony with a smile--
shellfish curry


sickle-moon ...
carving demons and gods
out of stones


why 
the raspy crow
perched on a Y

Loneliness - Double Tanka

for a better view
he moves through the throng
of devotees--
the beggar keeps on singing
to get noticed



fog descends
along the slope
of a tea garden...
just the lone song
of a bulbul

Two haiku and a tanka

a new year
the koala yawns
from sleep


Paternoster--
dawn breaking through
a cloud wall


by the river
an elderly tree
standing alone
i'm no longer aware
when you come and go

Haiku - Tribute to Tagore

“Jibono Moroner Simana Chharaye Bondhu Je amar…”
(Beyond the realm of mortality, you reside…)


1.

starlight
how could I see you
without the dark

2.

tuberoses
the scent of your poems
lingering      

--------------------------------

‘Aaji Joto Taara tabo akaashe…’
( The constellation that manifests itself within me…)


3.

opening up
my windows to your light
the prayer hall


----------------------------------

‘Aamar hiyar maajhe lukiye chhile…’
( You remained  unnoticed, unknown, deep-seated in me….)

4.

beside my garden
a wildflower blooms
late autumn

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‘Amare tumi osesh korechho, emoni leela tabo….”
( Incessantly, you have filled me with verve, with vigour…)

5.

waterfall…
how would I script all your words
in my lifetime

-----------------------------------

‘Amar sesh paraaner kodi songe nilem, gaan kantha nilem…”
( In my travels to the unknown, I bank on the melody within …)


6.

homebound bird…
a  sailor’s song  floating
into the night

---------------------------------

‘Fhagun haoway haoway …’
( I lost my heart to the spring breeze…)


7.

Flame of the Forest--
a breeze carries off
the grounded

---------------------------------

‘Badol Baul bajay re ektara…’
(The wandering monsoon keeps playing its harp…)


8.

aimless breeze
the nonstop patter
of a minstrel

Haiku in the Christmas week

1.
Christmas Tree
losing colours to the fog
my childhood days

2.

first bite
on the plum cake
her apple cheeks

3.

yellow sky
in Jesus’s eyes the halo
of candles

4.
bright star
why should I mind the absence
of moon

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