Glossary

1) For the poem 'Oh, Kolkata! My Kolkata'

Kolkata (Calcutta) is a city in India.

Gulab jamun - (Hindi) (gool-aab jaa-mun) or gulab jamun is a popular Indian, Nepali,
Pakistani, and Bangladeshi sweet dish.
Gulab jamun (gul-aab jaa-mun) is a popular northern Indian dessert, made of a dough
consisting mainly of milk solids, (often including double cream and a little flour) in a
sugar syrup flavored with cardamom seeds and rosewater or saffron.

Sandesh (Bengali) - is a sweet that is made in West Bengal state of India and in Bangladesh.
It is somewhat comparable to a Peda. It is created with coconut and sugar. Some recipes
of Sandesh call for the use of chhana (curdled milk) or paneer instead of coconut.

2) For the poem "Zubeida"

Mehndi body art - a tradition of India and other Middle Eastern nations, it has gained popularity
worldwide. Resembling intricate tattoos, mehndi body art is applied to the surface of the skin
using a paint-like henna paste. The paste stays on the skin for several hours. When it is
removed, it leaves behind a stain that darkens over 24 hours.Mehndi body art can last one
to two weeks or longer.

3) For the poem "Death of a Neem tree"

Bauls – minstrels from Bengal. Bauls constitute both a syncretic religious sect and a musical
tradition used as a vehicle to express Baul thought.

Ektara – One stringed instrument played mainly by the Bauls.

4) For the poem "Krishna"

Anahata sounds - are the mystic sounds heard by the Yogin during his meditation. It is said that
once your heart chakra (Anahata) activates and your consciousness rests at the heart center,
you may hear overpowering sounds that penetrate your whole being and that these sounds are most
pleasant to the ear and they resonate within every particle of your universe. There are loud as well
as subtle sounds.

Kans grass - Kans grass (Saccharum spontaneum) is a grass native to south Asia. It is a perennial grass,
growing up to three meters in height, with spreading rhizomatous roots.]

'Oh, Kolkata! My Kolkata'

Rain beads glitter
in the halo of streetlamps,
i watch you in a candle flame
within the makeshift dwelling
of a street urchin

A local train sheepishly dissects
the morning fog
your sulky face by the window

i read symptoms
of your newest disease in newspapers;
two sparrows twitter inside your ribcage
dreaming of a winterhome

Oh Kolkata, my Kolkata,
i discover you as an abandoned child
wailing beside the trash dump

i open a casket full of decaying
tube-colours, and search for a lost one;
nagging flies keep tasting
a pile of sweets in a shop

Hours before Sunset

she tiptoes
into my mind
slips to the farthest corner

**

cirrus waves
inform a Gulmohar
of an alien

**

fog monster
engulfs the hill --
I search phrase book

**

hummingbird
flirts around
reddened marigold

(Gulmohar – Royal Poinciana tree)

Sevenling Inertia

Morning’s roving fingers
probe uncertainties
hidden behind a mist’s curtain

Somnolent night owl
perched upon a bare bough
of a winter-crippled oak

tries to shield his stupor

   





   

Sevenling – Night

In the deep dark corner:
a plastic clock face,
and jerking seconds.

Arms in silken embrace
feel the hours slithering by;
soft sighs of the shadows

...rest beside dozing stars.

Revisit

(Haibun)

I had shared many a baked summer mid-noon with a quiet path.
We would curse weather bulletins, and believe our curses could hasten the rain clouds. We would contemplate the likelihood of a hailstorm pelting us with frozen bullets. Three sprightly sparrows would twitter, “We have found it!” and exchange places. Near a cross-road, an antique furniture store with a heady smell of turpentine and an octogenarian store-keeper with his ever-smiling face would stare at us. Today, I watch its age-worn signboard hanging loose. The awning in ruins. Walls morbid and covered with moss. The path says, “I leave you here”.

bougainvillea vines
grown over a decade--
farewell flowers

Guitar

One late afternoon
rain poured quietly.
Your face was crimsoned,
eyes had a strange gleam.
Something was odd
about my sheepish smile, too.

My voice nestled inside,
purred like a drenched kitten,
as we exchanged silence.

Today, the water-drops
have found a lonesome melody.

cloud laden Kolkata

Black & white day
under an archaic umbrella.
Grayish demon flexes its muscles
over skyscrapers . A rickshaw-puller’s
raincoat is glued to his skin. An abandoned
leaf journeys on flood waters. The Magpie Robin,
merrily drenched, calls somebody.
Drops narrate anecdotes
on a bus window.

Neither today, nor tomorrow... yet someday

I’ll wake you up
and throw open the gateway
to my irrational imaginings. You’ll find
a path leading to a flight of stairs,
taking you inside a door hinged with
my ventricles. You might wonder
how could butterflies flutter within
my morbid veins, why a cuckoo calls
amidst a stale fog inside the cranium,
why a carpet of deceased autumns
do not rustle under weighty loneliness.

I don’t intend to disrupt
the brilliant view of a diamond ring
in your sky. I just want to show you
a glimpse of an eclipsed world.

My first Sevenling

You have shed your old skin,
sprinkled remorse-ridden sunlight
over a poison ivy.

My soliloquy has grown
like unkempt grasses; overgrown weeds
have imprisoned your lost wings.

I used to love gardening, ages ago.

The rain, and after
(Two Sevenlings)

She’d sky-dive with succulent drops,
frolic upon leaves of a rare foliage
and plop into a puddle.

She yearns to flirt with a young Nimbus,
get drifted by a stubborn wind
to unoccupied isles.

She’d compose a symphony for the dripping moments.

******************************

When the curtain lifts, the haze clears,
she watches her dream-globules evanesce
like rain-dots on warm sands.

One green tree frog warbles,
a wasp spider limps out of its secrecy
and starts to weave a labyrinth of sunrays.

A tune jingles inside her.

Krishna

playing a flute
beside tufts of kans grass
in full-moon

**

a lotus blooms --
faint Anahata sounds
deep inside

**

subtle waves
on the river
carry starlets

**

moonlit treetops
immerses in divine bliss --
universe listens

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