Soul Searching

Soul searching

How deep do I have to go

It's hurting

Not being able to know

I seek answers for questions that don't make sense

A treasure that lies in a legend and nowhere else

Something that I had never sought before

Has become an obsession that though I deplore

I have to find to be able to live

A purpose to self that I have to give

The purpose whose abscence was never felt

Cause it was round the corner that I just bent

Not finding it where I thought it would be

A torrent of chaos swirling within me

No direction, no path, that I want to take

A nightmare that persists when i am awake

Empty within

A void I can not fill

No desire to win

My ghosts I can not kill

Am I giving up too soon? Are my battles unfought?

Am I letting go too easy of the happiness that I've got?

Is being hounded by questions reason enough

To lose my smiles and not to laugh

I have earned the place that I have in life

It's not come easy without struggle or strife

And I have to cross this one more hurdle

Not lug it around like a loathsome burden

Make this a journey like any other

Unknown destiny of an adventurer

Relish the possibilities that beckon my heart

And restore my spirit that's broken apart

Traveller alone

Who can hold me back?

Destination unknown

I shall make my own track

Unwarranted Greed

Things you have
That you don't need
But still you seek
To feed your greed
That junk because
Your peers possess
Indispensable
So You obsess
Or just so that
You can rave
Things they don't have
You hunt and crave
Needs driven by
One-upmanship
Momentarily by
What's seen as hep
Your desires drain
Someone out there
Of what's really theirs
But do you care?
A kid who slogs
To make your jeans
For the lack of water
The slums unclean
The uprooted trees
To print your mails
A carbon roof built
Of your car exhales
But you know all this
These cliches you've heard
You deem the doomsayers
An alarmist herd
Not worth listening
So you drive down
To the mall
And the latest brown
Shades you buy
To stay in style
And heighten your sins
Overflowing pile.

Rumour's Song

I fly far and wide on my outstretched wings
Helter and skelter perching on one and all
Like a raunchy wench I have many a fling
As I answer all summons of lovers who call

Benign is the whisper which begins the blames
I poison all targets which lie in my path
Soiling the solidity of established names
Baseless strength of my haphazard wrath

Willing to mutate as you want me to
To maim your opponent in your covert duel
Camouflaging the false with what is true
The harmless lie becomes deliciously cruel

Growing in scale with every tongue I touch
Tipping to unleash a tsunami of venom
Recoiling to fullest before packing a punch
To stagger the blissfully unaware victim

Am a weapon for whoever wants to use
I hunger for pain and sadistic joy
I have no scruples and no sides I choose
Morrow YOU could be trapped by my ploy

I thrive on your thirst for superstition
My vicious waters will have no end
Perpetrated by progenies with blind conviction
A rumour of yore becomes a legend

- Himanshu

Forced Metamorphosis

Born as a caterpillar.
Will I ever become a butterfly?
Am I too lowly for your love?
And too slimy for your eye?

Relentless your resolve
To change what I am.
You say it's for my best.
And I believe in your scam.

Struggling in my cell
My unworthy self I hide.
So that I become
Who you can truly pride.

If I had to die today
And Of me what you have seen.
Will you then have loved
So far what I have been?

Will you miss my yearning
To rid you of your grief?
Or will you rue the fact
Of things I didn't achieve?

Born as a caterpillar.
Will I ever become a butterfly?
Can you not see my beauty
If I crawl
...instead of fly?

- Himanshu

Comfort versus Happiness

Joint at the hip like a pair of twins
Take one and the other will come it seems
But like the lonely child of lovers asunder
I live with one without the other

Without asking myself what I really sought
I hammered away at my life that was fraught
With regrets and greeds of comforts I yearned
And while hunting my goal many things I spurned

Things that I thought were distractions in the way
The love and the happiness which though I craved
These things I thought would be there at my goal
Bundled with riches, or so I was told

But the joys that I thought were only there at the end
Were sprinkled in abundance on the path that I tread
The comforts I desired in a mindless quest
Made me blind to the pleasures that I possessed

The race that I run has no finish
Chasing the outcome I don't have to perish
I no longer seek happiness in the comforts that I want
My comfort pours instead from the happiness that I've got

- Himanshu

Melancholy of an Artist

The journey of thoughts that froth in the mind
That pour through the pen only to find
Words feel so inept to convey what I meant
The essence of thoughts left sinking behind

The journey of emotions with their unquenched thirst
That pour with the colors in a gory burst
But the drawls I drew, Incomplete and untrue
To depict the pain of the entrenched hurt

The journey of defeat that spreads its roots
That pours through the violins, pianos and flutes
But the music I played, floundered and failed
To give me the strength to cope with the truth

The journey of feelings that flow from the heart
My fears and failings they fail to depart
The expanding void, I can't fight or avoid
They gnaw and they gouge till they tear me apart

Surviving the times with pain so rife
I walk the path smeared with strife
Moving ahead, despite the blood that I shed
As I go along on my journey of life

- Himanshu

Contemplations of a Blind Mother

Your thoughts manifest themselves
In the blot of color that swells
On the curtain of my shut eyes
Your soothing tone that belies
The seething anger you store
Too civil to bring to the fore
I don’t see the smoldering scowl
For I see nothing at all
Though you take good care of me
I know the weight I can be
Perhaps it would be for the best
If I cease to be such a pest
Stop being the source of your strife
And not be a part of your life
Then maybe you would get back
Your colors lost in my black
The smiles that I drain away
In the shadowy pits where I stay
If only… If only…
The keys of death I could find
To free you from the ties that bind

- Himanshu

Universal Speed

Thoughts of time when time began
Celestial matter spread with a bang
Fusing under gravity and heat
The upshot of its nuclear feat
The stars and planets and their moons
Revolve in galaxial cocoons
Billions and billions of years
Over which these heavenly peers
Were born and grew and took their path
In their orbits as they were cast

Pacing along the passage of time
Gradually increased their shine
The stars, like our sun, then nurtured
Planets which in turn mothered
Life on them which itself evolves
And no, with time it doesn't crawl
It gathers speed and shoots ahead
Faster it goes faster it gets
Time that ends up getting squeezed
And Decades pass in just a week

The universe from which we all hail
So patiently creates the veil
Which covers all and nourishes
Environ in which life flourishes
Gaining perfection over time
But patience for us is such a crime
We get caught in the endless rush
When "how" is supplanted by "how much"
The time we have we spill and spend
And hurl towards the hurried end

- Himanshu

Bridal Hunt

Surrounded by unattractive people all around,
I hunt for beauty so rare and prized.
The women I admire, the famed and renowned,
Would be off limits, I woefully surmised.

The Movie Actresses, and the celebrity chicks;
So sensuous with their clothes so bare.
But too out of my league to try my tricks.
So I look out for opportunities else where.

My army spread over a thousand miles
To seek a girl that I will wed.
Astrologically filtered profiles
To pick and choose I duly get.

I further sift and sort through girls:
A shade too dark or inch too tall;
Or her hair too tangled with its curls;
Reasons plenty to reject them all.

A shortlist of dames I draw
To meet in person and examine.
To weed out any glaring flaw
New rounds of rejections begin.

The patient search paid out well.
The best was at the last it seems.
She was the girl who'd always dwelt
Incognito in my dreams.

The fantasies flickered to life,
Of romancing this maiden so coy.
Oh I had to have her as my wife.
(An obedient and a lifelong toy)

I did not notice her scornful glance
As I assumed she was all mine.
I woke up from my blissful trance...
"From this marriage I decline."

Her "regrets" conveyed loud and clear;
Now confused about what I had do.
Coupled with a tinge of fear
At being refused to be married to.

The reason she cited for refusal,
My hair line that was receding fast.
Shallowness now seemed so cruel,
When I met someone who matched my class.

- Himanshu

The Last Story

Boys and Girls today will be the last story I tell.
No. No. Now don't be so worked up. Do not cry and yell.
The story telling classes will continue to be.
A new teacher you will get just as good as me.
Now don't be so rowdy. You better make me proud.
And behave like good children with the new teacher around.
Yes Nathan,
You know my place. You can visit me whenever you want.
From the school, my home's just a tiny little jaunt.
Ohh-kay. I will tell you stories when you come to meet.
Yes... and you will all get cookies and cakes to eat.
There are no benches to sit at my home you know.
You will all have to bundle up and squat on the floor.
Oh children! I will always remember all your names.
Little Betty, Robert, Wilson and James.
And each of you, You have all been such brats!
(Do not giggle now)
And such a part of my life, to just forget like that.
No the new teacher is not a tyrant, you'll see.
She's very pretty and sweet, and younger than me.
I am going because I am too old to teach.
Oh how sweet Tanya!
Thanks for saying I look ripe as a peach.
But no, there are rules, and I have to go.
Yes, I wish the rules were made by you, Joe.
Then I could have told you stories forever and ever.
But then the new teacher so young and clever,
Would never get a chance to teach beautiful children like you.
And even though, I would love to continue
It wouldn't be fair to not give her a chance
And if times are not allowed to advance
We will all be always stuck in the past.
So. I will go now. Give me a hug class.
Oh. Don't rush like that. I can not breathe.
You stampeding herd. Now get back to your seat.
Children I am leaving the school and not you.
And while the school might forget me, I hope you won't too.
Bye! Love you all!
(Flying Kisses all around)

- Himanshu

Party of Escape

It breaks into waves in wares of silver
It flows down the gullet like a raging river
I take lustful whiffs; the aromas titillate
It parches the throat with its acidic taste
The fires it lights cause delirious delights
As all my senses mingle and mate

The reasons I concede to this pleasure
To escape the burden of my lost treasure
The past now a blur much like the present
The hurt disappearing like the flagging crescent
We revel for no reason in this mirthless season
Shedding the pain made so easy and pleasant

The manly me tries to make it a joke
But the liquors consumed emotions evoke
And I laugh and cry in the very same instant
I confide even though there is no one to listen
In the party each punk lying wasted and drunk
And unshackled spirits break open their prison

- Himanshu

Broken Trust

Broken trust...
The shards
Scattered on the ground

The doubts that were brushed away
Thought to be unfound
The doubts that never stood a chance
Against the towering trust I’d built
Not for a second did I ever pause
To let those doubts breed and grow
They eventually dealt a telling blow

The broken pieces of my trust
Sparkled with an eerie glow
Smeared with drops of my blood
I felt the memories gushing out
From the wrist that I had slit
As I watched the dark red stain
Like a blooming flower spreading out

Amidst the pain and doubts so strong
I meditated in silence for long
Brutally betrayed and alone
I held myself though I felt so torn
I prayed to God...
I had to pray
And trust for things to be right again
For the sake of someone who broke my trust
I can not let trust never grow again
I need to give trust another chance
Sometime, somewhere, for Someone else

- Himanshu

Instant Results

Miles of mirror adorn the wall.
Midgets and fatsoes and giants, all
Huff and hoe and grunt and pant
As stacks of weights they heave and haul.

In front of mirrors they exercise
And try to alter their shape-n-size.
Gain some muscle or lose some flab;
A super-bod the desired prize.

One set of crunches; a light bench press;
No sign of sweat to show the stress.
But implore the mirror to magnify
The cut and bulge of biceps they flex.

A sense of failure and dejection haunts
When ungranted go their stupid wants.
They fault the treadmill and the bars
As at the paunch the mirror taunts.

Slow and Steady that won the race:
A wasted point in this fast-food age.
Want the world, and want it NOW.
Instant results are the rage.

Six-pack you want without burning fat.
Salsa expert in fourteen days flat.
Getting laid on the first date with her.
A palatial house without savings squat.

Dash of patience and hard work combine
To bestow on you treasures you pine.
But if you want the quick way out
Liposuction works just as fine.

- Himanshu

Traffic Tangle

Lined up in a queue on wheels
Few more inches each vehicle steals
In this jigsaw on the road
That carries ten times the load
Of shanty trucks and luxury cars
Which honk together a numbing jazz.
Some more buses and the party swells
As I inhale suffocating smells
No room to budge in this traffic jam
And people they all try to cram
In every nook that they can fit
Vroom a little, move bit by bit
To escape the deadly traffic's tangle
All they do is tighten the strangle.

Who cares if someone else gets stuck
As long as you wriggle out of this muck.
So you get ahead while you can
And while you think it's a brilliant plan
The chaos that the individual builds
Causes a jam which smoothly kills
Hope of a solution to start the flow
Of vehicles stuck within this show.
Selfishness that does no good
Even for self as you thought it would.
Slowed down by unneeded haste
Others paths as you invade
But relenting so order may prevail
Against the animal instincts we hail.

When we gain some civility and some tact
And think of the big picture when we act
When we lose our pride to let other's past
When we choose "patience" over "fast"
Is when a better world we will create
And there won't be a jam when I have a date.

- Himanshu

Song of a Sadist

The sadist smiles that I ooze
At the torments in your life
Tears from your endless strife
Nourishment for my poison shoots.
I pray to devils to slash and maim
Trade my joys for your pain
You burn and char in your hell
You scream and wail... and I revel.
A twisted want for happiness
Adds on to my bitterness
The gloom I wish upon the world
Sucks my soul into its swirl
The reason why I live and breathe
Futile and empty... I concede.

- Himanshu

Advertise Yourself

Fattening and flowery
(It's good to be good)
But excessively buttery
The praises you pour
Stop... You should
You're just beginning to bore

A blushing boss
At flattery fake
Gathering moss
While the dud is duped
For promotions sake
How low you stooped!!

Lips tightly sealed
As I believe
My work to yield
My just rewards
And while you grieve
The crowd applauds

How naive was I
To think this true
Deeds deafened by
Your dishonest shout
Smiles you accrue
I am seen with doubt

My work unheard
Because I didn't talk
Known to the world
Your empty brags
Letdown, with shock
My shoulder sags

Hard work unseen
Despite the sweat
Lies they scream
Awards they get

Advertise aloud the things you did
The game's about publicity
If you're honest work a bit
And pep up your visibility
- Himanshu

Distances

Distances...
That I didn't even fathom
Have emerged from their lairs
Like unwelcome nightmares.
Every meter composed
Is a few meters deposed
Away from my home
From the ones that I care for
From the ones that I love.

Distances...
With all the cell phones and air planes
And internet and emails
Are still so real.

Distances…
Nostalgia so cruel
And memories so frail
To battle my ail
But memories are all
That I have of them
And they have of me.

Distances...
I am told
Will strengthen the hold
Of hearts asunder
But love gets plundered
When distances persist
For a time too long
After which you return
To the place you belong
Expecting a welcome
With hugs and kisses
And smiles and tears
But find instead
A bolted door
Shut for the stranger
Heard about
In a languishing lore.

Distances...
Don't take me so far
That tears of my heart
Go unheard
As they drip on my soul.

- Himanshu

I am no Robert Frost

Mr. Frost, a brave man was he
To take the road less traveled by.
Unread, however, his poetry
By the people who poke and pry
And push me on the roads I take
And desirous detours barricade.

Map of my life all charted out;
The journey made with a dotted line.
To remove even the slightest doubt
Or distractions of what I really pine,
Lest I indulge and incur a loss,
The major events marked by a cross.

The obedient kid that I was
Took the path that I was shown.
Pettifoggeries didn't want to cause
Just tumbled down where I was thrown.
Engineering followed by MBA;
Like thousands others I took this way.

The tiny spark seething within;
A chance I might just jump the fence.
Look at the world with a devilish grin,
"This is what I want, really, no offence".
What a delight that would be!
A chance to be what I want to be!

But oh the risks that hound my heart;
Now so much more I have to lose.
So scared I am to tear apart.
Is it now, too late to choose?
I don't have what it takes I guess
To take the road that's traveled less.

- Himanshu

Birth of Art

The voices within I strain to hark
An attempt to mend my hurting soul
But demons gathered in a shoal
Deafen me the way they bark
Their proclivity to keep it dark
Peace of mind my perceived goal
But hurt and pain those devils dole
In this misery there is no lark
The only gate out of my hell
The bleeding streams to try and thwart
Is what the monsters want as well
Born from blackest nooks of my heart
(My devils within glut and swell)
The child of my horror! My escape! My art!

- Himanshu

Dance of Life

Smooth like a wave she begins...
With breathless highs and lows.
In a twirling eddy she spins;
With the grace of a river she flows.

She careens like a feather
Cradled by the flowing breeze.
She dances untethered;
With winds nestled in her knees.

Scores of sparks together spawn
A burst of flare with a blinding glare.
Her flaming body dances on...
The enthralling sight, the seers stare.

Time itself ceases to be,
As she gyrates like the earth.
Celestial bodies stop by to see
Her fiery and unbridled mirth.

Dance itself her only goal;
She builds her own reality.
Glow of her heart illumes her soul.
She dances for the Gods to see.

Vexing worries no longer hound;
She dances all her ails away.
Like her dance her joy unbound,
As the music makes her sway.

Crashing from heavens above;
Jolted back to the cruel world.
Torn apart from her only love;
The music no longer to be heard.

Stolen of her movements deft,
As the music ceased to flow.
The dainty maiden felt bereft
When the present had to go.

The world was blinded to her strife,
As on the past she cast a glance.
She wished to dance a dance of life.
And while alive to live to dance.

- Himanshu

A Flight I took

As we mingle with a fluttering and a happy cloud;
What’s up with that kid? Why is he crying so loud?
The innards of this flight not luxurious enough?
‘Cause the exec up ahead sure is finding it tough;
He is fighting with the crew in his elite "first-class"
Seems the curve of the cushion doesn't suit his ass.
Or does the child share his problem with the guy next to me
Who has got his "Bombay Times" with a missing page-3?
Some guy who demands a more spacious loo.
And that lady thinks her sandwich is too cold to chew.
Or maybe the kid wants the same thing as me.
That curvaceous stewardess... oh the anatomy!

Problems aplenty that could pique the child.
But utterly clueless on what's got him so riled.
Oh-oh. His mum just figured it out.
A diaper change delayed due to flight take-off.
A dry bottom and the kid was at his goo-goo again.
But us grown-ups, we still weren't relieved of our pain.
Complaining is our right, though we have all we need
And no matter what they give, we refuse to be pleased!
The child has long been quiet, blowing bubbles with his spit.
Someone’s got a new complaint; the cabin isn't well lit...
(Hey, someone tell her, we are landing and the lights need to be
Turned off...)

- Himanshu

Pursuite of HappYness

Pursuit of happYness with a "Y".
Philosophy loaded in the replaced "I".
Because happiness that "I" pursue
Is not for me, but for "Y"ou.
You my son, my mother, my bride;
Your smiling lips are what I pride.
And it is for that I take on this chase.
And I shall hunt with fervent pace.
I care not how much I bleed;
How much I injure in what I seek.
Contentment in every sense,
Be bestowed on to you.
And I shall find my happiness,
Which is what you desire too?

- Himanshu

Choices Confuse

Two doors that open
Into different worlds.
No telling how
The future unfolds.
Not clear of what
You really want.
What door to choose
To start your jaunt??

Which dress to wear
In the upcoming bash.
For TV shows,
Siblings clash.
Imprisoned by
Freedom to choose.
The gains so little
For what we lose

All factors weighed
On a micro scale.
And statistical models
That never fail
Analyzed threadbare
To heart's content.
So come tomorrow
You don’t resent

Opinions from every
Passer-by;
Qualified or not;
They all try
To share their wisdom
And help you out.
All piling on
Your towering doubt

Logic loses
All control.
Varied responses
From audience poll.
A dash of superstition
To spice it up.
And your brain reduced
To paper pulp.

When the death bell sounds,
You make a choice.
Listening to
The booming voice
Of your guts
That point the way.
No rhyme, no reason,
You still obey.

You choose the life
That you blame
Rue and regret,
Crib and complain
Staying true
To the human core
You wish you'd gone
Through the second door...

- Himanshu

Death of a Child

I flip pages full of careful scribbles:
A school days memoir I treasure to date.
Images so vivid... Nostalgia tickles...
Changes so blatant since second grade.

Little delights that boundlessly thrilled;
Pleasures so trivial that aroused a smile.
Infinite desires now remain unfulfilled;
Smiles suppressed by problems that pile.

The heart didn't know of class and caste.
Impetuous ire never grew to revenge.
But all those things so far in the past,
When worldly values were not entrenched.

Harmless pranks on fellow mates;
Fickle fights that didn't last an hour.
Now flimsy politics for accolades.
A word can turn a friendship sour.

No problem too great for mom to solve;
The heart brimming with hope to battle all odds.
Minor setbacks now break my resolve;
Searching for strength in fraudulent Gods.

Trapped, ensnared, in the heart I tiled
Joys that lit the childhood days.
While growing up I killed the child
While futile wants I blindly chase.

- Himanshu

"Whatever" Words

Adages you grow up by,
Labeled as clichés today.
Looked at with a scornful eye;
Too preachy in the modern day.

An ever ready rebuke in place;
"Whatever" to say all you mean.
Wisdom dodged with elegant grace,
(Pretentious but) "hep" you seem

But "oh my god", what will happen when
"Whatever" itself goes out of style?
What(ever) will you reply with then,
Without your tri-syllabic guile?

A "cool" new word will be coined.
Same vacuity it will convey;
When "whatever" gets over-toiled
And is classified as a cliché.

The Ugly Manikin

Tall, slender, full of grace,
She stood for the world to see.
A hint of smile played on her face,
Her wares displayed invitingly.

Flocks and flocks who spotted her
Moved to catch a closer glance.
With bated breath curses utter
On seeing her countenance.

Protruding lips that hid her fangs;
In a snarl her lips were curled.
Hair to rival Medusa's ranks;
Spite and anger her visage hurled.

Though garments pretty she had donned,
Failed to lure the people in.
The sight that left them feeling conned:
The unruly, ugly manikin.

Ugliness of the model blots
The lovely clothes that she wore.
In the shop each garment rots,
As unvisited remained the store

Judgments by what seems to be;
No effort made to probe within.
No second glance to really see;
The worthiness of the manikin.

Shopping Spree

Thousands of them
Like discordant downpour.
The resonant footsteps
Walk in by the score.
Helter-skelter
In the glass enclave.
Driven by unending
Want and crave.
Flimsy garments;
Artefacts brittle;
Fattening foods;
Warranted little.
Abundant, yet
All so expensive.
Unneeded, yet
Desire compulsive.
Buy and consume;
Drain all resources.
A job it creates.
A planet it kills.

A River Flows

An unknown journey, an unseen path
The river flows, questions unasked
Led by gravity
To its destiny
Along the bed that time has cast.

Over the cliff, crashed and tore
Its excitement heard in accompanying roar
Living now
And how!
Unbothered about places to soar

Tomorrow too distant to trouble today
The current of life will lead the way
Let worries go
And freely flow
Savour and soak the time in play

Let Go of Rhymes

Shackles imposed by life on me,
Reflected blatantly
In my words; My poetry.

The rigor of rhyming
Without negating
Poetic pulchritude:
Excuse of a stubborn,
Asinine attitude.

Now that I think
Why am I so compulsive
About rhyming and I
Discover the roots
It's the way that I live.
And the beliefs that I built,
Infesting
Themselves in my words.
Exposing
My innermost worlds.

Calling out, pleading for change.
Break all bonds
That hold and hinder.
And explore...
Wander...
See...
Seek...
Unbound beauty.
Not just a change in the way
I pen my poetry
I liberate my life...
I let go of rhymes...

Teachings of a Toddler

The past midnight moon that I sleep off to...
The slothful sun that I wake up to...
Cartoon Network my loyal aide...
'Neath scarring sun Cricket played.

The beautiful days too good to last;
A weekend from now they will be past.
And as I trudge on my way to school
Holiday-memories make me drool.

The school awaits with open gates.
Joyous reunion of school mates.
The merriment of friends who meet.
Set up our castle on our seat.

The classroom caper and the playground games;
The backbench banter and the paper planes;
Delight of a different kind,
Vacations vanish from the mind.

The good times past we tend to rue.
We still enjoy the things we do.
Though complaints never cease to flow,
Mirth of mundane never fails to grow.

Though life will play its puckish ploys.
Battle them with those little joys
That help us through those gloomy lanes
And make it worth living... despite the pains.

Let go the grip on yesterday.
Make everlasting memories of today.
Nostalgia of departed days
On the present cast a haze.
Live for now… and the days to come…
The lessons learnt from the toddler ways.

First Times

The first kiss you kiss…
The first cheque you earn…
The first cigarette tip
That you burn...

The memories we might berate.
Or with nostalgia celebrate.
With affection or with frothing anger
First things of life we commemorate.

The harbinger of
Hundreds to come.
The first remembered more
Than the hundreds' sum.
The direction set
With that first time.
So before the leap
Just think awhile.
For better or
Should it be for worse.
Whether you cherish
Or you curse;
Whether you smile
Or you frown
On the scheme of things
A decade down,
Depends on the dream
That you dream tonight.
So ‘fore the journey set
The rudder right
Make the first of life
A memorable day.
Relish the step forever
Taken today.

Music Sings

Bruised, battered, from battles that never cede.
A lone warrior in his alcove with verve deplete.
I embrace him in my arms, my melody surrounds;
Unravels in my bosom humming heavenly sounds.

A rambunctious youth; An Alexandrian conquest.
An unstoppable march, victorious, shall he rest.
My beat ups his tempo, propels him ahead.
A symphony for success that crowns his head.

Aged in body; with youth replete.
My tune of the yore keeps him upbeat.
Relives his days with the songs of the past.
Yesterdays roll ‘fore his eyes shut fast.

Enemies engaged in a brutal battue.
I palliate ill wills that 'tween them accrue.
Bridging divides with harmonious ties,
From percussion and strings oneness arise.

Anger and happiness, Love and hatred,
Some emotions I heighten, some end up abated.
A therapist, a companion, to heal your heart.
No boundaries to hinder what I impart.

I am all around. I am everywhere.
Sounds of the nature conveyed by the air.
Or from tubes or membranes, or metal, or strings,
A mellifluous melody incessantly sings.

Am a genie you can, evoke any time.
At your disposal my rhythm and rhyme.
Submit to me, concede your concerns.
With the balm of my ballad heal your burns.

Will make every trouble little easy to bear.
Shed tears with you; or maybe hum a prayer.
I live with you in your every breath.
A part of your life from birth until death.

Mundanity

The twister sucks incessantly.
I dodge and dribble helplessly.
My rebellious spirit tugged away,
In the vortex of mundanity.

In endless cycles days are cast.
Quotidian years pass so fast.
Before the realization dawns,
My bacchic days well in my past.

Time I lost I can not gain.
Though my past I lost in vain,
Will satiate with zest and zeal,
The days in life that remain.

Will escape the bonds of common place.
Will grant my heart all that it craves.
A gleaming life to light up the world;
And fulfilled, to death it slowly fades.

Shades of Life

Black and White - too defined;
Shades of Grey lure my mind.
Bourns between the black and white,
Shackle me. Blinker my Sight.
Greys appeal to the roving eye;
Proffer horizons infinite.
Fettered by binary bonds;
Seek escape in boundless fawns.
Black and white don't lay the rules.
Adventure fraught in varied hues.
Flout the don'ts and the do's.
Let shades galore in life suffuse.
Walk on the path that you pave.
Live your life the way you crave.

The Quest for Beauty

Torrents of time,
Biased, unkind.
As I weakened,
Immortal, it shined.
Jibes my age,
Cruelly reflecting,
Disease of eld
Slowly infecting.
No trace of beauty
Left within,
Wrinkles suffuse,
Ruckle my skin.
Crippled by time,
My body it taunts.
Its deathlessness,
It wickedly flaunts.
Reflects my frame
And humiliates.
The sight of self,
Infuriates.
Propelled by fury,
I obliterate
The mirror of truth,
I decimate.
Countless mirrors
Adorn the floor.
Sum of the parts,
Hurt even more.
A million shards
Now laugh at me.
Magnify
My agony.
My ugliness
Now multiplied,
Each piece of mirror,
With glee reviled.
Driven insane,
Let out a scream;
At sixty I crave,
Beauty of teen.
I long for something,
Well in my past.
Mourned the beauty,
That did not last.
It’s not my skin
That the mirror mocks.
The object of jest,
My shallow thoughts.
Bewitched by blasé
Depravity;
Perished in self-
Vanity.
A withered corpse;
In death I rest.
A wasted life;
In beauty's quest.

The Flow of Time

An eternal foe;
It races ahead.
I hopelessly chase,
But the chasms
Remain unbridged...

I have an end.
Bourns I cannot exceed.
But it races on,
Outpacing my kin;
My posterity.

Washed in the flow,
My body and my soul;
I defend its blows.
But it leaves me scarred,
Wasted,
Weak.

It drains my body,
Steals the gloss from my skin.
Skin as fragile
As butterfly's wings,
But devoid of their beauty.

The feet that held me upright,
The head that held high,
Looking the world in the eye,
Now droops like a flower,
Too heavy for its stem.

Sounds circumvent.
Engulfed in emptiness;
Haunted by silence;
But the steps of the one I chase,
Ring clearly in my head,
Getting feeble,
As I fall behind in the race.

An eternal fog palisades,
Clouding my vision.
The sunrise and the sunset
Blurred to a meaningless glow.
No different from a bulb,
That listlessly shines
In the attic

The greatest debilitator,
Also the greatest healer.
As it renders the panacea.
Frees me of all my woes,
My miseries, my pains.

It gives me
My anodyne.
It gives me
My death.

Fly On...

Eggs that lay in a cozy nest,
Bore fledglings tiny full of zest.
Filled with exuberance unbound;
Awed by every sight and sound;
Trifle scared
Of the distant ground.

Food that flew right to their beak;
Pillowed on feathers, snuggled to sleep.
The little birds now growing fast.
Their brethren flew, whizzing past.
The nest so small,
With the sky so vast.

Desire to fly filled them all.
The bravest one answered the call.
Gingerly, on the edge it stepped.
Took a leap and vigorously flapped.
Mid-air the entrant
Grimly trapped...

The wind gods rushed to help it fly,
Buoyed the bird to kiss the sky.
The siblings gazed with delight
Their brother's smooth, graceful flight.
Defying gravity;
Gaining height.

Far, a gun intently traced;
Followed the bird as it paced.
A gunshot cut the silent sky.
Panicked birds pell-mell fly.
The pilot screamed
An unheard cry.

The bullet soared, its target found.
Plummeted to the dreaded ground.
The first time flier flew its last.
Froze with terror, scared, aghast;
The birds that saw,
A brother grassed.

Fear instilled by the gory sight,
No one dared to take the flight.
All cowered in their mother's wings,
Till courage the morning sunlight brings;
The tragic past
No longer stings.

One more bird leaps from the edge,
Following the nature's pledge.
Plethora of dangers cloud the sky.
Though destiny the perils deny.
Did not deter
The bird to fly.

Disasters come and strike us all.
It matters not how far we fall.
Life goes on despite our loss.
We move on too after a pause.
The past begins
To gather moss.

Fear and sorrow do not last.
Future heals traumatic past.
So spread your wings and soar away.
Don’t let the wounds of yesterday
Hinder the joys
That come your way.

The See Saw Ride

The see saw sways, back and forth
Seeking my soul to betroth
The good awaits with open arms
The evil lays hypnotic charms
The good of good,
The good narrates
The good of evil,
Evil orates
Goodness the good
Permeates
Overbearing evil
Manipulates
Undecided, I
Equivocate
To convert me, both
Altercate
Gains the good advocates
Seem too trivial to the mind
The offer that the evil makes
“Don’t let them go”, the heart opined.
Wealth, sex, power, fame
Rewards driving me insane
The lure of devil
Just too strong
The wrongs just didn't
Seem too wrong
The mind that hears,
The louder voice
Takes up the wrong,
But lucrative choice
The good hangs its head in shame
The evil victorious at this game
The see-saw tips to the evil's side
It’s every craving I abide
Millions ride their see-saw this way
To the devil's side they sway
Immersed in our self pity...
Convenience wins over gallantry...
More than our own felicity,
Is important other's misery...
The roots of greed penetrate...
Love replaced with crimson hate...
Selfish desires rule the mind...
Power renders people blind...
The evil deep in our hide
Outweighs the good, convincingly
Firmly pinned on the devil's side
A game, the seesaw cedes to be

Sleep Denied

Dancing wild…
Music loud…
Graceful moves…
Swooning crowd…

Sleepless nights…
Raining cash…
A drunken bar…
A drunken bash…

Some money earned…
A Family fed…
Thought of as base,
Yet all reveled.

A ban imposed
For sanctity.
Victim of your
Hypocrisy…

No food to feed…
All time to sleep…
At Stars I stare…
As I weep…

No blaring beats…
No leching eyes…
All holy but,
The body dies.

A struggle ensued…
Of work deprived…
Empty Nights…
Yet sleep denied…

A Farmer's Demise

The sweetly burning sun
The smoothly flowing sweat
Blithe blisters in my hands
From untiring ferment.

The bosom of the earth
Fed with foreign seed.
My heart that awaits
A crop of bettered breed.

Seducing the land
The beat of the rain
Like a debutant father
I wait for the grain.

But the soil bears no fruit.
I have no crop to hay.
Hopes buried with the lies
And traps that they lay.

It wasn't the scented soil
And thorough was my toil
The seeds' prevarication
Mothered destitution.

My family foundered
Perishing in poverty.
Victims of seed-sellers'
Greed and Apathy.

The price of poverty too high
For honest work to suffice.
The deceit of the rich
Celebrated my demise.

- Himanshu

Autobiography of a Knife

Snuggled in a sack all packed and dark.
My metal gleamed white and sharp.
Illuming innards for us friends to mingle,
As we joined our master on his junket to jungle.

As the troop halted and camped for the night,
I was summoned on the scene for my might.
Skinned shallot and spinach and snake gourds too.
Played my part in feeding the crew.

Inscribed initials on a barren bark,
Leaving signs of sojourn to this park.
Heading back home all marched along.
A detour decision proved to be wrong.

Miserably mislaid. Environ hostile;
With me they flayed, vermin vile;
Shrews and snakes on the poisonous path,
All smitten by my valorous wrath

Famished for food were the unfed.
As the hapless horde moved ahead.
Energy exhausted, my master weakened.
His uncaring companions felt brutally burdened.

A fellow friend took me from my master,
Pretext of preventing any damning disaster.
Separated from skipper and a second later,
Possessed by a poseur I turned a traitor.

A devilish design the scoundrels schemed.
Versus my will took me in their team.
Stabbed in the stomach my skipper I slay.
Others fed on the flesh of my commander's clay.

Was I a villain in a saviour's disguise?
Or a traitor who caused his master's demise?
Served with a purpose all life long;
Cast as a sinner for someone else's wrong.

Unkind, unfair, the world we live in;
Though pure at heart yet we sin.
Enslaved by circumstances beyond you and me;
I am not the devil I am made out to be.
.
.
.
I beg of you.
Please do not judge me

- Himanshu

The Painting and The Shoelace

The twirl of brush,
The swirl of a lace,
Furrows of concentration,
Dug deep on their face.

An artist at work,
On his greatest creation.
A toddler tying his shoelace,
With utmost frustration.

The battle between
The virtuoso's skill,
Pitted against
The neophytes will.

Colours burning alive,
In the outline's shackle.
The lace neatly bound,
In an orderly tangle.

To be hung on a wall,
The painting sold.
Earning the artist some money
And a dent in his soul.

No witness for the child,
His achievement unknown;
But strutting proudly,
A notch he had grown.

An acknowledged greatness;
Happiness denied.
From a victory unnoticed,
Pleasure derived.

- Himanshu

The Unreachable God

A desperate devotee seeking solace,
A minute with God was all he yearned.
To escape the worldly profanity,
To the divine his soul had turned

The burning sands, the cruel sun,
Charred his skin. His feet were torn.
He marched along, to meet his God,
The only one he could call his own.

Erupted, from the flat horizon,
The temple top, rising high.
Tornado of glee in his heart;
He could sense his God was nigh.

Stepping through the temple gates,
Faced by an un-thought of sight.
Throngs of hapless encumbered ones
Come to shed off their plight.

Withheld in crowded chambers
Impatiently the poor lay.
Rich ones shelled out their lucre,
Bought exclusive right to pray.

The mendicant robbed people;
As well as did the priest.
The rich "bought" ambrosia.
On leftovers, poor feast.

A long and crowded queue ahead,
Claustrophobic our devotee felt.
But the thought of reaching God,
His spirits high the pilgrim upheld.

People pushed, shoved, cursed, abused;
The serpentine queue inched along;
Assuming their quest for God
Justified all that was wrong.

The struggle and penance fructified;
His God, the pilgrim had barely seen;
The guardian of God broke his prayer,
"Move along," he let out a scream.

A minute with God was all he'd asked.
An eye-blink was all he got.
Depressed, angry the pilgrim felt,
Convinced, his impure soul would rot.

Then far, to nowhere, the pilgrim went,
Where no human defiled the air.
Cried silently for the want of God,
Thinking almighty did not care.

"I live in ones who know to love.
Can’t help the ones who fabricate
Evil schemes to rob the world
Their lives, themselves, dilapidate.”

The serene voice awoke his soul;
Struck with realization divine:
His God was with him all along.
An elaborate hoax, was the shrine.

People outdistanced themselves
On paths of evil when they trod.
They wandered out of His reach,
And they call Him 'the unreachable God'?

The God-men and the holy pyres
To the divine, do not lead.
The only way to reach your God
Is to live him in your every deed.

- Himanshu

Hate

A confinement, a bondage,
A self made prison.
A blinding emotion
Obscuring all vision.

The reasons so trivial
On which it breeds.
Needs no nourishment
On itself it feeds.

A feeling that outlives
Life itself.
After your death
In progenies it dwells.

Destroying all
That lie in its path.
Replacing love
With merciless wrath.

Vengeance and anger
Reek from your gaze.
As blood it desires.
Death it craves.

Don't succumb to it.
I beg. I plead.
In your grave it will cause
Your soul to bleed.

- Himanshu

The Eagle's Plight

I want to fly, fly unbound,
Over the clouds at the speed of sound.

Endless space surrounding me.
My unhindered spirit, roaming free

Abruptly I notice the void around,
With nostalgia I recall the ground.

The school of hens, the gaggle of geese,
Sparrows together playing on trees.

Birds below of a same feather,
Migrating home flocked together.

I and my brethren fly alone.
Wind whizzing by in a drone.

You are the king perched at the top.
You glance below and miss your lot.
The fun, the love and the care;
The togetherness that was there;
You earn all treasures that you wished.
A Laugh with friends is what you miss.

Airborne high loneliness found.
Do I really want to fly unbound?

- Himanshu

Thank You

An unlikely setting,
To cause introspection;
A bus that I boarded
For commutation.
As I bought a ticket,
For an extra second I lingered,
Thanked the conductor
For the service he rendered.
He gave me stare
Of utter disbelief.
As if I had chanted a curse
To cause endless grief.
Coming to terms
With what I had said.
A widening smile
With a scratch on the head,
“No one ever says that”
Aloud he exclaimed.
“Thanks for your thanks
My day is made.”
As I alighted,
A teacher I remembered;
Mrs. Chaturvedi
And a lecture she delivered.
Asking us
To thank all we should.
Cause the world was lacking
In deserving gratitude.

I think of my teacher,
And the teachings she lent.
Today I know,
What she had meant.
“Thank you teacher,”
I silently say.
“For it was you who made
The bus conductor’s day."

- Himanshu

Why Do I Have To Go

Why do I have to go, and leave the people I love?
It just seems like today that these people I met.
I was getting to know who they really are.
With an unstoppable tide I am about to be swept
To far away where only memories I'll have.
Which I fear forgetting and being forgotten I dread.
I want to be close to the people I love.
I want to be missed; a tear could be shed
To just tell me I am wanted; to tell me I am loved.
And it hurts them as much, my absence will be felt.
Hope my memories will make up for me when I am gone.Everyone shall stay in my heart where they've always dwelt.

Fuck Myself Again

Though I love to joke and laugh,
Sometimes I want to turn them off.
And then I let in the clouds of doom,
Spreading in my head, I let them loom.

All the pain I inflict upon myself,
And then I cry out aloud for help.
Unknowingly, the pain that I have fed,
Nothing real, it’s all inside my head.

Thinking of things that aren't there,
Blinded to the beauty everywhere,
As the pain mounts inside my brain,
I choke as I fuck myself again.

The evils of the world stare at me,
I try to battle hopelessly.
A tunnel engulfed in dark,
At my misery the world seems to gawk.

Finally I try to sleep it out,
Try to clear up the clouds of doubt.
I wake up, completely sane,
I joke and laugh... till I fuck myself again.

Me, By Myself

Deafening silence,
In my ears.
Friends I seek
Among my peers.
Their only care
Compete and race;
Be the best,
And the winning face.
They cut, they stab,
And move ahead.
Not a glance behind,
Not a tear shed,
For the ones they hurt;
For the friends they lost.
No room for love.
No place for trust.
Judging people
By their usefulness,
Other virtues lost
In nothingness.

They don’t care.
Neither do I.
So let’s not bitch.
Let’s not sigh.
No need to cringe
With helplessness.
No need to harbor
Bitterness.
Just be wary,
And move along.
Be merry.
Sing a song.
Don’t need no friends,
Now I see.
I have myself
For company.
No deafening silence
In my ears.
Smile on my face
Mocking my peers.