Old bus routes...some familiar numerals - once relevant, now obscure... those that led homewards some twenty years back. You take that road once again...and you spot a younger self, hurrying down a bus to queue up for an auto... tired, uncertain and yet resolute to get somewhere.

To the right, the busy road takes a sharp turn... a turn you took quite often some twenty years back...the road that led you to an old lady, frail yet firm. She was a window to your childhood...her wrinkled hands once held you with all the love in the world when you were yet to make sense of anything at all... you now feel her presence in your roots... her story resonating in your being each day. The form now faded, she stays afloat in those uncountable waves that rhythmically make their way to the sea..

Ah, you crossed that river too...the precarious ferry ghat, the fragile jetty that took you to tiny vessels painted in bright shades, mocking the greyness of the tireless river. You sat on the edge, and looked to your left, and then to your right, in that fine drizzle which played light notes of probabilities, unsettling the harmonious dance of the waves...they said as you believed, the shore across would lead homewards.

The mirror accumulates a fine layer of dust...you see your younger self - a distant figure...now a form, now a shadow...a play of light and darkness... You turn away, avoiding eye contact... you don't seek embarrassing conversations...you don't want questions, for you have no answers...whose life did you live...what home did you seek...which routes did you take...you wonder no more...

The sun silently sets in the distance - colours of the twilight like sharp highlighter pens, interrogating the validity of options and choices...

 

 

She...

...evades confinement

And each time

I put her back in place

She returns

Out of nowhere

Hope in her eyes

Faith in her being

She returns

Unsettling tidy spaces

At perfectly poised practical moments

With the same questions

Across an abyss

Of infinite silence

Those were the days when time used to be spaced out into rectangular boxes of equal length - each a subject to be learnt, a skill to be acquired - as a tiny being clothed in crisp bright colours of institutional recommendation marched between school and home in determined little ballerina shoes. The streets never mattered, the footsteps did.

The orange pot of molten promises spread across the sky like a treasure as she pranced towards her music classes, twice a week, firmly holding her mother's hand, through the confusing little streets of the neighbourhood. 

There, the music teacher - a lady in her early thirties, would sit on a small cot, surrounded by her pupils - all shapes and sizes. She went and joined the group as her mother waited outside with the other guardians. The music teacher would sing and lead them through a journey up and down the notes, accompanied by the harmonium. She would follow the notes with the others (many of whom were way older than this three year old), join in a melodious rendering of sargam  and repeat the bol of the chhota khayals taught to them, as they were introduced to the Hindustani Classical gharana.  

There was no compulsion to make sense. Of anything. The melody lingered on. Long after the classes were over. As she walked back home with her mother, she kept repeating the lines to herself - sometimes even singing aloud, blissfully oblivious of the passers by - who were sure amused by this chance entertainment, and at times, even stepped forward to express their feelings.

She felt no embarrassment. None at all. Her mind was engrossed in the web of these entangled notes which had joined together to give her a melody - a tune she could hum, a song she could sing. The dark streets - punctuated by occasional street lights - she knew, would lead her home.

And she knew things she didn't really know back then. Etched on the little mind, in silence, forever.

She knew that ups and downs create tunes you could hum. She knew meanings are meaningless. She knew she could sing her song, irrespective of people around. And she knew that dark streets too, can lead homewards. 

So, there's this Santa Claus. Around ten feet tall. Installed each year just before Christmas, beside a busy road. He is, customarily, dressed in a bright red suit with glistening white borders. And, of course, there is this cheerful smile to inspire hope and festivity.

The optimism in the air is enough to make you cry. 

Blue skies. Winter mornings. Bright sunshine. Warm pockets. 

It's almost everything beautiful that you can think of putting together in one frame. 

But then, that's how stories begin. Mostly.

Days go by. 

And then there are pigeons and crows. Indiscriminately distributing an equal share of poop to the smiling old man who has no option except endurance. 

Tropical weather adds to the drama.

By the end of two months, there's no cap left. You see a balding old man with an amused expression - almost reciprocating your own, at the trials and tribulations of earthly existence. 

And if there is a storm, the poor man is subjected to the atrocities of imitating the action sequences in The Matrix - laid out horizontally at a perpendicular stretch across the ground, though his feet remain fixed to the initially intended vertical alignment.

At this stage, you identify...for, you are friends now. 

Absurd drama needs no stage. Santa understands. So do you. 

 

 

There's this cemetery inside.

Ask not for names

Nor details of burials.

I plant flowers

Hedges appear

And fade away

In an eerie silence 

Punctuated by breath.

The cemetery grows. Unguarded.

A handful of soil 

To each living soul.

Hear those footsteps? 

They come and go oft

Like dried leaves. Countless.

 She...stands like a reflection in still waters. 

Distant. Solemn. 

Medusa's hair, floating like carefree wavelets, 

Engulfs all yesterdays and tomorrows

She...stares, who knows where

Those empty sockets bereft of dreams

Absorb sun rays of infant delight like

Frivolous promises of unshaken faith

She... speaks not a word

For, what is speech 

But random spewing of unnecessary sounds

Sans meaning, sans occasion

She...stands there quietly

Looking on and on, 

Till the rough grey stones - all melt away

To merge with a fluorescent ball on a dusty footpath

Haiku Chain

I

They cast huge shadows

engulfing little mirrors

 - monumental beings.

II

The seed I planted

came snaking out of the ground - 

Venomous. Silent.

III

And I thought I crossed

that bridge beyond forever

twice before with you

IV

Tiny white florets

hypnotize a starry sky

with fables of faith