Scattered pearls,
rolling die,
wet-tyre tracks.
Racing,
to different finish lines.

Would you like the rain,
if it asked before pouring?

If it was mindful,
not to dive into clothes,
drooping over the line.
Brutish blotting.
They had just about dried.

If it did not startle,
those shy fragrances,
and make them dash out,
from their earthy retreat.

If it sprayed evenly,
careful not to dig up puddles.
Or make raging seas,
for paper boats.

Would you like it
if it tip-toed past the window pane,
politely, not disturbing.
Not making drippy faces,
urging you out.

Silent curl,
of burning paper.

Ember glow,
writing in air,
with crumbling black.

Visits

I have been to a place twice. Once in bustling daylight and the other, later, in imagination. When sleep sings in slow breath and time smudges night, I go there again. The charred souls of dying lamps, brim over to meet the dark. Their wicks lie limp, swollen with oil and hope - pale glistening yellow, like stained teeth. The winds sweep their burnt slippery scents through the hollow pathways. A few flecks even reach where the stone gods rest amongst fragrant bribes.

Grown-ups

I'm fine,
how have you been?
The usual flurry, I said.
We then spoke in courtesies
and pauses.

I cut the call
realising,
that she has learnt
to mouth,
unconvincing lies,
in the fidelity of the night
and betrayal of sleep.

Evenings

Streetlamps glower on at the darting birds. I always skip the time they are turned on. They droopily watch the turn of events, gazing at their feet lost in whizzing traffic. Evenings slowly dim around them like a deep inky sigh.

Green

Syrupy eucalyptus oil. It sat sulking in a tiny glass bottle marked by a label with Mandarin script. It had traveled all the way from China to the wooden table in the old house, thronged by other ointments, phone books and Quality Street tins with sewing tools. It was a stark green. Like the mouth-watering thought of raw mangoes.The potion found it's release every night when it was rubbed onto grandmother's aching knees. After she dozes off, it would drift out and wander around brutishly. So pungently stubborn, as if to say that this is how green smells like.
She had forgotten to cork it once. The gluey oil had silently left till it was nothing but a thin green scented line. The scent was now tainted with other things that had drifted in and taken refuge. There were choking fumes of the mosquito coil, the smell of the sweetmeats she stealthily ate, the odour of the musty wooden beams, the scent of voices which reached late and the thoughts which were shooed away among many others. When I found it and sniffed what remained, it stung and watered my eyes.

Catnap

You sleep, unfettered by the frail evening shadows that slowly settle on you. The shapes of leaves, the indecisive light of passing clouds. Lazily moving along with the rise and fall of your breath. Be still. Sleep calm. Lest they wake up and scamper away when you stir.

Kattan chaaya *

She would go about on a locking spree at twilight. The gate was clanged shut first. She swung it in with both hands like tethering a sluggish monster, waking up from sleep with a dull metallic growl after the day long inertia. The afternoon rain had been abrupt and brief, and like half finished sentences, misted the air - never completely leaving. When it blended with the waning light of dusk, it softened all edges and gave the front yard a feeling of being looked at through a fuzzy cobweb.
She "tch-tch"-es past muddy puddles to the front door and with an affirming sweep, bolts it. Her skin glistening and dark, as if the night had smudged onto her.
At night, rain pelted down impatiently. She settles down near the rickety dining table, under the new asbestos roof which amplifies the sound of the downpour.
"What are you drinking?" , I prod.
"Kattanchaaya"
I grin profusely. She nonchalantly takes a swig. Her mouth, flaccid and frilled by age, would never be able to hold it all in. It would brim and gloss her lips as she gulped it down. It would leave a moist imprint when she kisses my forehead. "Sleep now" , she demands as I clamber onto the bed, which smells like hiding rain and old bibles. She leaves silently, even before the wet remnant of her kiss evaporates.

*Black tea

Buffering

It was a child, frail in his disinterest, trying to the play the piano when he would rather disassemble it. He was more interested in what he would find inside, what intricate mind-boggling mechanism he would discover. This wood, which retorts with music, cannot be dead. But if it is alive, how is it a slave to his touch ? How does it wait, to wail melodiously ? He wishes the teacher would not edge him on with encouragement. Why not just chide him, so he can take offence and storm out. His playing would stop and start again erratically as he fumbles with the keys. Beethoven when he plays, a hapless child when he stops