A persistent companion

He takes a pill,

for he feels ill

with his loyal disease,

which replies with ease

that it will go, for now,

but will be back, and how.

अफ़सोस

तजुर्बों में खुद को यूँ घोला तो था, खुद से अमूमन ये बोला तो था
खूब तन्हाई में खालीपन है, खला है, फिर भी बदतर है इश्क़, दूर रहना भला है

था भरोसा हमें हो गए हैं सयाने, नाजाने फिर दिल आज कैसे जगा है
है डरता बहुत फिर भी अपनी चलाता, अफ़सोसन मुझे इश्क़ होने लगा है 

खोज

किसी खोए हुए किस्से के खोए हुए बंज़ारे सा

खोया हुआ हूँ ख़्वाबीदा ख़यालों में इस तरह

जैसे सालों पुराना ऐब कोई खुदबख़ुद खो जाता है

Commotion

On Friday evenings after work,

while walking to the Subway station,

brushing aside pangs of anxiousness,

I stand outside the Rockefeller,

and look at the people

looking at the famous X-Mas tree.

It’s a swarm of selfie sticks.

At every step,

I hesitate.

I wouldn’t want to ruin

anyone’s holiday picture;

“Who’s that in the background?”

It would be a minor shame.

I am not exactly a festive scene.

Unfolding

I am aware of you in love with me.
I am aware of you in love.
I am aware of you.
I am aware.
I am. 

Waiting

बेक़रारी सी बेक़रारी है, वस्ल है और फ़िराक़ तारी है
जो गुज़ारी न जा सकी हमसे, हमने वो ज़िन्दगी गुज़ारी है

- Jon Elia

(1)

She will have no more

of his impatience.

If he really loved her, 

he needed to learn to wait. 

Wait how much? he asked. 

A lifetime, she said proudly.

He waited.

A lifetime.

[April 2014, Princeton]

(2)

You told me, politely,

to go away.

I did.

[June 2009, New Delhi]

छोड़ो भी

जब हम में था क़रार, मिलती थी हफ्ते एक बार
अब  जो कुछ भी न रहा, अब क्यों रोज़ आती हो?

अब तो फ़िराक को भी गए हो चली हैं मुददतें
ये कोई सलात तो नहीं जो सुभ-ओ-शाम गाती हो !

शब भर मुस्कुरा के कहती हो माफ़ किया छोड़ो भी
आँख खुलते ही मगर पल में चली जाती हो।

बेमिजाज़ी

जब से तू मेरा ना रहा 

किसी से कोई गिला ना रहा 

नौकरी-पेशा, गाडी, घर-मकान 

हसरतों का ये सिलसिला न रहा 

न रहा शौक़ घर को आने का 

बाहर का भी काफिला न रहा 

झिझक

यूँ हिचकिचा के तेरी तस्वीर फिर उठाई है
जैसे लौट जाता हो कोई शख्स दरवाजे से
अब अगर गौर से देखूंगा, तो मर जाऊंगा

Happy Idiot

I've been happy, as much is normal,
and most days sleep a full 8 hours.
When I wake up, and look at folks,
it seems to me their joy is a farce.
And whenever it is they look at me
with that air of inquisitive frown
"who the hell is he talking to,
this talking-to-himself clown?",

I am talking to you.

Sisyphean wish

I have sought you for years.
And now if you'd yield,
It'd be of great value.
And if you don't,
invaluable.

Delhi 2016

I am in your town again,
which was once mine too,
until you, happened.

Now there are no towns that I call my own,
there are towns where I work, where I'd grown,
there are towns of my friends, of my mother.
But not mine, I go from one refuge to another.

Don't get me wrong, I love them all.
I love them, but they're not mine.
Towns are like people, and that's fine.

I'm in your town now, but I don't feel its beat.
I do probability for a living, and yet, naively, I
expect you on every once-friendly street.
Faces that resemble yours in faint ways, say 'Hi',
as they see me solving their contours, and that's also sweet.

Doors

Here, this is the day
of many knocks
on your door.
I made sure
that I have locks
on my doors today.

Shadow

You always praised my memory, as I sat
bloated, and yearned for more of that.
I wish now that you had praised my heart,
and in yearning, I may have learned the art
of loving, not fueled and fooled by ego;
of being at home, wherever we go.
But what choice did you have in the matter?
I gave you no chance to praise the latter.
I worked for more of what I got
(I can not lie, I loved it a lot).
For years apart, it's clear as hell
that I had memorized you well.

[January 16, 2016 | Princeton]

Soulicitation

Call me some time. It will very likely be awkward, yes,

but just a little. Tell me what work is like, what you do,

and I'll respond with measured interest, no more no less,

crack appropriate jokes - some old ones, but mostly new.

Important things hogged all attention, and time has shot.

Yesterday, I loved your taste, and you loved Wodehouse

and Rumi, who have grown on me, and Eliot, who has not.

Recommend a book, maybe, or stuff on the web to browse?

So much of life is hard work, and planning for tomorrow,

and that may be how it ought to be, by jove, for all I care!

But of that precious ticking time, I'd really like to borrow

a tiny bit of listening to any words you'd like to spare.

[November 30, 2015 | New York City]

Postlude

Some truths can only be said in jest and some necessarily in verse;
and then there are some nutcases that must come out in a curse.
Which one of these I'll use today should be evident to you by now:
it's only fair that the mode I choose be one that really was hers.

There are those who always want back what to them is dear;
to champion them is not in me, despite how it might appear.
It's rather late, anyway, to want, but there's scope, still, to fear:
what if unlike so much else, love would not disappear?

[February 23, 2015 | Princeton]

Nonlinear jump diffusion

In wintry dims of after-rains

like filigree my fingers shiver

as does my mind, 

jumping back and forth in time,

one moment I remember

lying in my balcony in 1999

reading with teenage fascination

about Mohenjodaro at 2 in the night

and thinking "wow, how cool"

living vicariously in BC 2000,

as I now live in AD 1999,

and sometimes, farther back in time,

my dad, who lost to me in 100m sprints

to make me feel victorious and vain,

until he met with an accident,

in September, 1994.

After which I won no more.

And then I sit and wonder what

it must have been to have continued

watching "Johnny Gaddaar" that day in '09.

After all, it had been a wish of mine.

Artist ?

He started something unworthy and his conscience did revolt
He continued for fun, telling himself, “To confess I’ll write a ‘post’.

I’ll put some strange character in, one with a ludicrous name,
His descriptions very unlike mine, of a very different fame.

He’ll do the sin for me there, and invite furious curses;
While I’ll still digest applause, he will for me take the blame”

How that’ll free him of his guilt, the blogger never stopped to think
How it qualifies as a ‘confession’ has a rationale rather lame.

It is surely more unworthy, sinful, than what it’s meant to cover
The ruthless abuse of the non-living, of a character mute, helpless, tame.

A guilty conscience needs to confess. A work of art is a confession. – Albert Camus

Teacher ?

वक्त इतना भी मेहरबान मुर्शिद तो नहीं है
करूं मैं एहतियात रोज़ ऐसी जिद तो नहीं है

नादां न वो बच्चा जो कहे वालिद हद-आलिम
हर सांच उभारी जाए, ज़रूरी तो नहीं है

हर ख़ता की तसल्ली कि भूल भी इक सबक है
हर सबक का यूँ सीखना वाजिब तो नहीं है

वस्ल को चला है जो राज़-ऐ-गुलशन की ले तलब
वो है तो कोई फलसफी ; समझदार नहीं है

The Girl at the Shopping Mall

Today at the shopping mall a girl had in her hand a rose.

That girl wore fabindia, was fair, and had a pointed nose.
I looked at her afar for long, only to eventually rue,
That you were not her, that she was not you.