of Conversations and few martyrs

after a very very very long time with meaningless commas and few thoughts

2011-07-12T12:55:00.000-07:00

such a long sabbatical. it's been a year and a few more months since i have posted some-anything here. i have had a deluge of thoughts; most of them have vaporized, but luckily some thoughts are still within my grasp. whatever these thoughts of mine may sound and in all probability, wish to say a thing or something, i know, they all bear my being.

it has been such a long time thinking about the being that i am is; and some 'it' inside me continues to favour them, harnessing every loose end it associates, with those very thoughts and cultivating every seed into my belief, thus harvesting a person in me. with every thought i become something else. this happens continuously until i am bored with what all these thoughts. that's when i thought, again, to write again and start posting here.

let me think with my thoughts intake, then i will write

Poetic Dreams (for Poems)!

2010-03-12T01:42:00.001-08:00

Unable to meet their demands during the daytime
Poems, they come haunting in my dreams
Disguising sometimes as my beloved
Sometimes as sworn enemies
And sometimes, bringing caskets full of flowers
Found only in Manipur, like girls going to temple

I know my beloved she doesn’t languor in the night
Yes, except when my bouts demand her comfort
Neither has she got any liking for flowers and temples;
Perfect and in her brutal best, lassoing
My unstable heart; she knows the innocent flowers
And blind Gods in the temple, they can’t see a fiend in me

I also know my enemies, numerous though;
They have their own businesses, devising and
Laying traps for me to fall in, but
They never dare trespass my dreams,
May be they are afraid of my pillow-knife
That I ordered from Japan.

And the flowers, those lovely flowers
I only pretend I forgot the bloom
That brings me wet fragrance after each rainfall
And the droplets of water falling unwillingly
From the leaves, in the whips of winds
Like inconsolable tears of parting lovers
After each meeting

But the poems, I find them rather amusing
Staying awake, up in the late night
When the whole world is asleep,
Seeking an easy prey in me, while during daylight
They play hide and seek, with their furry words
And in the night, they seek their poetic dreams
Wearing masks borrowed from everywhere

To the Serpent!

2010-03-11T21:07:00.000-08:00

Living by the daylight of lecherous dreams
The serpent tried not to hiss. Yet its fang, all pronged
And dripped in convenient sarcasms on the epiphany
Of being raised a fortunate parasite, with unsound claims,
The serpent, hissed again, in its favourite tune
Finding an easy target for its fangs, in my walking feet!
But I wouldn’t die in haste; for dying,
It’s all in my blood, ever since I was borne an eclipsed soul
With a body wrought from promiscuous coffins.
I wouldn’t die; no matter how ruthless the jeers are
For I have lived weaning this body
With venoms milked from the agony of living!

Kids in Graves!

2010-03-10T17:15:00.000-08:00

It is unusual for this to happen to me. I thought thus.
After all, I was born there, in the wilderness, in my paradise
In distinct symphony with nature; in my profitable ways,
The morning dew in the feet, the sound of streams
In the classroom, winds stalking sugar-cane leaves
And vanishing with a promise to come back
And of course chirpy girls, like sparrows, chirping about me,
How do I see red in their cheeks and pink in their smiles!

Then, how is this vacuum in my heart? No, this isn’t a paradise.
This is a mound, a vacuum inside and my body in it. No,
This isn’t the paradise that I saw. Or, am I in having another incarnation
Or, in another paradise? I doubt that too! There ain’t no bird.
Paradise, in my wilderness, they have birds and trees. Yea, may be
The kids, they might have taken all the joys out of here.

No title

2010-03-10T17:13:00.002-08:00

Unable to sleep, with my unwritten poems swimming in my head
And waiting for my body to succumbed, I waited for someone
To give me company, and came Thangjam Ibopishak,
With one his innocuous poems, about a lucky blouse
And his poems; all proud and ready to confess...
Why he chose his wife’s chest to write in poems
And why he can’t buy a decent cloth for her!

He said, ‘Very soon, his poems will be in market.’ And
He left in hurry leaving me an advice, ‘Don’t write poems. Instead,
Carve statues of woman. They sell in good price.’
With my marriage looming, I am thinking of my nights
And my wife, with her chest all smeared with inks!
No, I don’t know how she will like it. But for Ibopishak,
And his advice, I think, he is right, at least to me.
And I know nothing, except writing poetry.
Pity on her!

The Truth!

2010-03-10T17:13:00.001-08:00

They said: ‘It’s the blaring truth,
Of the time.’ I said: ‘No, it’s the mute truth, of our time.’
Then he said: ‘You both are wrong. There is no truth, at all!’

Thus, the eternal argument continues. Me taking
Many a avatars, like incarnations with my own truth;
They waiting for me to arrive, every time the flood recedes
And He, ever present like the truth itself, but doing nothing.

Then, we erect a pole of truth, and a flag atop
With questions scribbled on truth, about
His non-existent truth, my mute truth and
Their blaring truth! We all wait for the flag
To talk, in the wind and spread our message
Of truth and gather the majority. But it never fluttered,
It never fluttered for the truth.

The Misreading (of Time)!

2010-03-10T17:12:00.001-08:00

As a result of a continuous living,
I have learnt the misreading of time
It has indeed helped me understand
The vulgar it carries with the living,
And the breezy lies of time
And the moments that carry the tinged hope
Of bequeathed lives!

But as the misreading goes
Without any comma or semi colon,
This living becomes a thick morass
Of seconds and minutes;
Chiming against the rim of faith,
Just like the time ticking and ticking
Inside the wretched watch of memory
And sometimes swirling inside my body,
The clock that doesn’t tick!

This misreading, with time
Reminds me my brutal romance
With her words
With her ludic expressions;
The nun that she was
Knew how to caress a reflection
Like my own writings
In my heart’s parchment
In colours, garnished like never before
And the texture of her skin
In intimate consummation
It seethed in imperial lust
Seeing my narcissism!

Yes, with time
I have misread her lines
Unable to satisfy the appetites
Whetted by time.

But at times
This misreading
It’s like an idyllic dream:
My poems falling
On the tin top, clattering
Dripping with words
In some monsoon night
And me
Holding back to myself
Watching her play with raindrops!

No,
It’s only a living.
But it seems
I have gone too far with time
Waiting for that patrician whore
Who once brought me life
Every morning!

To the Shirt!

2010-03-10T17:11:00.003-08:00

Oh! My shirt,
Lovely you! Posing as me
In this season of fake,
Giving me an identity
And representing me wherever I go about
And humming in their tunes!

Oh! My shirt,
You allow me to live this life
Like never before
In this season of tardiness
Playing my own body
Like a poor man’s cruse
Empty though, yet fill with pride.

Oh! My shirt,
I have no qualms living like this
Carrying you, instead of my body;
In fact, my body
It befits a décor for borrowed coffins,
From some crafty carpenter
Ready to be buried
Without the parting ceremony!

Yet my dear shirt,
Bring me the finest of robs
I want to walk these fine roads
For one last time, in your garb
In the finest grandeur,
So bring me the best of your robes.
Don’t you know:
They all come in their finest attire
Silky smooth shiny clothes,
So that they call me their friend;
I am tired of this isolation,
Hiding, wearing only you
Like my own skin
They even said, I stink
But you don’t know, that’s not me
They were talking about
It’s you, in your fetish for this body
Tell me what’s it in this body
That you can’t let go,
No, don’t say you can’t shed me my skin!

Still-death!

2010-03-10T17:11:00.001-08:00

I was miserable
That’s how I saw myself
Walking through these graves

I carry with myself burdens of deprivation
Seeking poems of happier times
In recollection, in remembrance
Of happier times, when
The streets echoed with poems of abundance
But this deprivation that
I harvested for myself
It carried me afar, far from my home
In the unknown streets
Leading to the graves

I looked miserable
Walking naked in those graves
With flakes of poems
But the questions that I asked
‘On my anguish’;
The streets and graves
They responded rather clumsy.
They said: ‘I am still-death!’

Poem for a Missing Person!

2010-03-10T17:10:00.001-08:00

My mother, she is a matric-fail
But she reads newspapers well, every morning
Before we could wake up and disturb her
With our petty demands for a day to start!

She reads it for us, picking news of killing
Helping us digest the scores of missing
Sentence to sentence, word by word
For names and organizations
Like her favourite weaving threads
With twisted threads ready to warp and weft,
Entwined between her seasoned fingers
For her favourite fanek
And mapping it like a plain we could live in.

Shredded and torn, that’s how we find the newspapers
Each morning, and she would read aloud
Audible enough to the entire locality,
The moment we scratched through the remains.
Bemused, we brothers and my little sister
Would searched for our inventory of peoples killed
Or either missing, for yet another morning
Of listing, for the record!

Today morning, a got a called from my father
Saying, my mother went into hiding last night
After serving him the best of ngafak kangsoi,
With our inventory! My father’s worried.
He said, ‘my name is in the newspaper!’

Amnesia!

2010-03-10T17:08:00.000-08:00

The sound reverberates
And the ambivalent response echoed
Through the myriad limbs, of the body
…Hearts, spine, ears and hairs;
The influence of existence
It embraces the qualms
To a mere provocation of desires
Like a dream beyond the shore
Compromising the wavy presumptions
Of this soulful heart;
And it dies quietly, die
An amnesia, in the sound
Of fictitious lines!

Questions on Life!

2010-03-10T17:07:00.000-08:00

This morning, I woke up with a purpose
A purpose to live another day
To settle few scores with certain questions
With choicest answers
Learnt from last night’s nightmares!

Some questions,
They have become parts of me, to the self;
Like my own skin and other assortment of limbs
Carrying wherever I dare go, and
Leaving the odour of its eminence,
Off the shelf
Every time I move, carrying
These questions and the body
For answers
Even before I could asked myself
Even before I could identify myself!

Sometimes,
I think I am groping for answers
To the questions that I have never asked
Sometimes,
It looks like I am painting my dreams
Even before I could fall asleep
And at times,
I feel disgusted with myself
Even to think about my existence, and
The eminence it portrays
In shadows and its many glorified shades!

But the morning
In its many glories
Brought me strength
For a day to challenge myself
Asking questions on my being
And many forsaken truths
Like double headed riddles
That, for so long
I thought for excuses
In the grasp of life
With its many demands
Comfort, cosy dreams and
Cherries and blue nights!

These questions
Now they let me live
And I better not ask
Until I live my life
For all the truths that I seek
In questions for answers!

The Plight!

2010-03-10T17:05:00.000-08:00

Initially, I thought
I was borne for the occasion
In celebration of life
No matter how I do look like
A clown, a tramp or anything
But,
Looking at the plight of these poems
I think
I am lucky
Even to fancy this look
Of varied misdemeanors within our struggle
Of a chorus
Though in tatters!
Unluckily for my poems
Their plight, I can’t grasp:
No one reads!

Are they that bad? Or
A lousy scream of few scattered words
In its many faces, some volte and some lewd;
Are they the worst form of reprisal
Like verbal tirade of soured dreams
Or like words conjoined like Siamese twins
For people to despise in heart
Yet pretending a heap of cheap similes?

Oh no!
You all seem to know me and my poems
Within its many dead incarnations,
The flirt of the dreamy town
With corrugated shilling of a beggar
And my poems, as they be read as my soul
I can only breathe them
Though the haze of lies and pretensions
Like such a poem and its easy price
In praises and contemplation!
But my poems
I swear, bleeds in your adorable flacks.

redemption: a poem!

2010-01-27T01:31:00.000-08:00

so many of them declared me dead
seeing the muse succumbed in gloat
for poems were growl growled
but for me, who has stood
the hearing of deaf
i have chosen to walk away
"from their torments and wretched petticoats";
walking and dragging myself
"for the begging and their mercy laden taunts"
over the belief that, there
not so far away from my view,
lies my beloved, sleeping,
hiding inside a mound of requiem;
and i thrust myself
thinking of each morning i have waited
dreaming of each night i have wandered
in her tender dreams;
for her,
my poems were the corsets
she died into every night,
my poems were the birds
that took wing for her soul.

of late
the muse
she dressed rather unceremoniously
and in her invites
pleasures flew in remorse
so,
i wrote few poems
like dead birds flying and falling
and hiding feathers inside the pages,
like wedged memoirs of cursed duets
sung rather coarsely during mating
of intellects and socialites.

i have chosen to walk away
defeated and terrified
from such rituals of poetic extravagance;
those poems, i am afraid
shouldn't be buried with my dead body
for i will lie next to her
with her favourite poems

*** 01/26/2010 ***

lucky dogs!

2010-01-27T01:25:00.000-08:00

if you ever looked through that window
through that window that rest
on the far right-hand corner of your painted room
you would have seen many a street dogs
prying on the foetuses,
foetuses of all sizes and audacity,
big, small, resonant, breeded, waxed
just shed form the womb
and thrown on the pavements
in the drain by the pavement
in the dustbins
in the schoolbags for books
they were all borne in the shackles
but walking as if they all borne
with the knowledge of the paths
and wriggling in the bin,
as if each one of them already knew the filth
and the lucky dogs, for them
kids, are the best of feasts
soft bone, silky smooth yet munchy flesh
and yet not a spray of dust
lucky dogs having a taste of human, their masters!

***01/26/2010***

why is that i couldn't cry

2010-01-20T06:52:00.000-08:00

why is that i couldn’t cry, aloud
for us, brought up in hidden ridges
with scary nights of gunshots

tears have run dry
and we paint the pain like a dichotomy
on numerous patriots
dying hungry and in desolate cravings

why is that i couldn't cry, aloud

am i waiting for the coffins to fill with tears
am i waiting for the deaths to walk again
am i waiting for children to swear dead wombs

waiting for me to cry again
i have wrought dreams through umpteen promises
teasing martyrs in their graves
for every single drop of tears
may be they will chastise me
seeing me pretending a poet

waiting for me to cry again
i have harvested my soul with fickle desires
writing eulogies for each one them
and sometimes praying them to live my life
and to burry me there, in their graves
for i have done nothing of sort
other than waiting for tears

yet, i am still waiting for tears

a testimony, a poem

2010-01-20T06:50:00.000-08:00

of many sleepless nights
there lives the odour
in its many layer of sits;
i seek virtue
for who i was
though, its beknown to all
no vistue for tramps
and the odour of tramps
who walks random streets
picking rags of torn relationships
wrtitng testimonies with words borrowed
and there, someday will be a full-circle
for i pity on those sleepless nights

silence breeds poetry

2010-01-20T06:41:00.000-08:00

your poems hurt as much as my silence
they speak the untruth of my un-being
and i seek a canvas to paint my guilt
like meaningless noises perforated
through dilemmas of words
but how often did i played with the secrets
thinking them to be sources of my indignation
may be towards what i was fed to believe
then, your poems…
one after another
even after i have buried my sonorous claims
your poems...
one after another
continue to exonerate the untruth that have lived with me
like my own affirmation on your so called truths

poetry nausea!

2010-01-15T14:27:00.000-08:00

"what do you do with your poems"
a slut asked me!

i said:
"i sleep with them,
they are my mates and
i am a polygamous poet, and
each poem,
they inhibit my fertile appellations
within each strand of belief, and
in the subsequent morning..."

she undid my eloquence and little subjectively
continued:
"do they beget children?"

i have a quaint look at her
then explained:
"my textuality,
at times figuratively overwhelm the congenial serviles
like wombs ready for cross fertilisation
and, we beget epigrams
in the subsequent mornings"

after a brief gasp
she said:
"is this your slutty poem
that i have been waiting for my response"

i said:
"no my dear!
i can, no longer, read hymns for you"

little later
i died in her lap!

My Whispers!

2010-01-09T12:45:00.001-08:00

My whisper pierced through the womb
Asking for ominous revelations on the morning,
Waiting for a body;
Of the self!

My whisper, it waits ever eagerly
Ready to face the shivering December
Even like the hazy reflection trapped inside a mirror
For some images craved form the misty breathe
Of sleepless nights!

My whisper is burdened with a body
For it cannot drag the body,
My whisper, it consummates every night
With my thoughts thinking it for a womb
Through dreams and shadows;
But it cannot conceive a soul
Except few severed limbs.

And my whispers
They all die like my poems
Imitating burning voices and dreams
Of a generation lost in wilderness
Of freedom and its many loose interpretations!

***01/10/2010***

my drunken wisdom

2010-01-09T12:40:00.000-08:00

thanks to my drunken wisdom
my heart is now filled with dying landscapes
each dream asking for exoneration, and
my frenzy deliriums, it seems
have taken the deepest slumber
never to be awaken, not even to contemplate
for a nostalgia called hope

thanks to my drunken wisdom
i can now prepare for a final journey
like a bird against the immense sky
of sunken blues, and silence
in the backdrop of black rainbow
searching the non-exstent "chumthang-makhong"

thanks to my drunken wisdom
i take few more names and happily
arouse my senses to headless rhythms
like licherous nights watching the full blown moon

thanks to my druken wisdom
today, i forget myself, for better
for a drunken wisdom
for a mute wisdom

***12/25/2009***

tears and farewell!

2010-01-09T12:34:00.000-08:00

in a distant valley,
my wings lost the flight, and
my sadness crumbled within the memoirs
like tears of a moistened heart
that pants in the mist of vague truths
soaking the shroud, but
never to ease the pain; and
my memoirs, it kept hidden
inside a closet of few scented poems

when this clown returns home
with few coloured lollipops for his dead poems
bought with bloodstained dimes
their lyrical farewell welcomes
ready with garlands and jeers
of a battle lost to the self
ready to bury a petrified corpse
with my broken wings

and my eyes weep without any reason

***12/25/2009***

For The Benefit Of Mr.Poet!

2010-01-09T12:26:00.000-08:00

I can’t write a mere poem
Poems need classes
Poems need freedom
Poems need a mouth.

But for me,
I need to write my kind of poems
Like a self effacing lie,
For a tomorrow I would never lived
I need to write my kind of poems
On dead and its many manifestations
For death is all, I can afford in this life.

***01/10/2010***

A Window For You!

2010-01-09T12:21:00.000-08:00

The abundance of nature
it creeps inside my heart
ever slowly like a rainbow
beyond my floating dream, grazing the
distant horizon, after a brief spell!

Only then, I realized
i have been a blind man
shrouded with trembling truths
like a dead man in some splendid coffin
searching a gap, and
peeping through the indelible holes
left after violent strikes of burial;
there, I wished to open a window for you
without any wavy mirrors
that seldom reflects what we saw in each other’s eyes;
for you, I thought
green shoots and some flowers, and
pictures of lovers holding each other’s hands
like I hold yours, may
Open your heart!

I know not well
The pain you have endured waiting
Haven’t had the share of promises of meeting
Like you have searched for a fallen pen
That bleeds death’s chastity.
But I wish to open a window for you
Without any expensive curtail,
Curtails, for me, they hide stars

I wished to open a window for you
For these flowers, for these living roses
Whatever colour you choose to paint
I have kisses in their petals, like
I have stolen one from you!

***12/21/2009***

Let me sing you a song on freedom!

2009-12-20T05:13:00.000-08:00

Let me sing you a song on freedom
It has been going on for ages, and
I couldn’t hold it anymore,
It has indeed started to harness its own will
Against my claim that I am still a free man!

This song on my freedom,
It cries in its morbid soliloquy
It plays my part, it plays your part
And you and I, somewhere under a gloomy sky
Recite many an untamed verses, and they thought
We are here for the waiting, for a brighter tomorrow!

This song on my freedom,
It summons many a trial on me
It seeks many unsound reasons!
Yet, I continue to sing
Listening alone, like a cry
For numerous gallows, in a single cry!

Let me sing you a song on freedom
Let me sing you a song on freedom
For your freedom
For our freedom
It has been going on for ages, and
I couldn’t hold it anymore!

Requim of a lost Dream!

2009-12-20T04:43:00.000-08:00

My silence and the darkness ahead
I feared, what if I looked damn for a demon
In the dark, without a word for the soul
Standing in silent vicissitudes and
Ever approaching living dreams,
Like a staccato in a rhythm
In some wintry evenings
All bleak and hoarse, and
My being came to a halt
In audible screech…

And, My friends,
They proclaimed of a dream
And the dead song, unequivocal
Of the dream, dreaded feared, for
A requim in the dawn, of
Some late risers, like
You and I…

Then,
Every one of us
In my silence
Called me a dead poet;
But did we know
I was long dead
Even for a dead poem
That I recite in our numerous graves!

Forgive me my friends
I did tried to weave few dreams
But it seems
We are singing songs of dead
Evermore!

m still happy

2009-12-20T04:34:00.000-08:00

i tried hard to weave a cocoon
but the seasonal weavers have already harvested them all,
i tried hard to fake a corpse
but the occasional nightmares drove the dreams away,
i tried not to die a deluge in the ocean of poems
but the anonymous fireflies bring me my private literature!

you may not have known,
i have tried to conquer my heart and body with listless steps
but the gait, it has taken my back a toll,
i have tried to save a morsel a day through the hopeless nights
but the earnings have lost the chequered in the midst of tears!

but i am still happy with these little pains here and there
but what i abhor is me wraping in half-eaten mulberry leaves
even the silkworms in *Ishok Ching*, they have their dues cleared
before the moths mate, with few coupling here and there

Cactus and Poems!

2009-12-20T04:31:00.000-08:00

I buried my poems
With my body
In a barren dream
And plant a cactus
Above the insoluble grave
Of fear!

Next morning
I found myself with sprouts of thorns,
Thorns, everywhere
In my chest, everywhere
In the body, for every hair;
And the poems
They resurrect
As thorns!

Of each poem I betrayed
There is a thorn, and
They grew like quaint dreams
Of December, and
My poems with every concoction
In its easy demeanor and
Craven of weary words, hushed:
‘My body is still buried,
Dreaming and still worshiping visitors;
In dreams, in a vainly wrought coffin
Of hope, for a future yet to impregnate!’

Soliloquy: A commando in melancholy!

2009-11-28T16:24:00.000-08:00

Who are you?
Is this the simplest of the simplest questions, or
The hardest of the hardest riddle?
I never knew, your name would someday drive me crazy!

Like this: What is your name, or even
Like this: How would you like me to call you:
By a name or by a title or by that signatory stamp of a dead man!
Asking and wanting to know who you are
It has indeed become a maligned thought and
I hardly able to conjure up any signs of living
Even if the blood that oozed past your nostrils
Smells the dreams of lives!
I think I have endured it for too long
And now, it looks like I have become a part of you, each one of you
With each unreadable names and every unrecognizable face
That's why I wanted to know who you are!

Is it a curse unto myself, or is it just another plain revelry
With few descriptive symbols like a tattoo in the name of your beloved, or
The name of your little daughter in your wrested wrist
Then I professed not to harm you again,
I thought, you are a shadow unto myself and
I ought not touch you again, for the love that beholds too many dreams!

*** 11/20/2009 ***

paper bullets

2009-11-28T16:13:00.000-08:00

I couldn't afford to buy a gun,
Not even that toy gun of few rupees
For a bullet and few cartridges!
I couldn't dare a dream without dream
So living among the corpses of unknown affiliations;
I thought of using some paper bullets
To fend myself off the stray bullets!
Don't you know bullet respects bullet?

Sometimes, it’s better instead to die holding a gun
However it looks funny, even with cartridges of paper
Then to allow myself harness with nose-pipes through intestines;
For here, in my land
Everybody is dumbfounded with each gunshot
And we all know, we always eat and speak, not with the mouth.

Yes, I thought of using paper bullets
For I know, I can afford to make paper bullets
For I have grown up with aspirations drawn from the books
For I have seen the tears of burning libraries and
Its tarnished scripts taking flight with ashes.
I thought, bullets made from paper,
They will do some kind of justice to all of us.
And the best part, we don't have to be a lousy illiterate first.
For heaven's sake, we will be using books
Though in a different form, then
There will be no extortion, no matter how we fare each chak-kouba.
I mean, we can all afford to sacrifice few books from our blurbs
And even more, by doing thus
We can flaunt the bullets, these paper bullets
Like a pen, like a…a pen in the pocket of ministers that they seldom nibble
But I am pretty sure, with all our aspirations
We will be using these bullets more often than not.

For a long time, since the day I was born a Meitei
I always wished to have a gun in my hand.
How it would have looked?
A gun in the hand of toddler Jayanta's hand,
And sounds of gunshots from his little drooling mouth
Sometimes with a suckling of complaint for the weaning dream
Sometimes with a crying curse against the real gunshots!
Damn you God! It’s so surreal
And, this is how we grew up with different names
With bizarre accreditations
In different leikai's under the cloud of suspicion
Entrenched from the decades of struggle!

But we dreamed on dream and dream and dream.

In these decades, we have lost our sanity
Oh, I wish I have had a gun, in the name of the freedom
So that I can die in the womb itself.
At least, I will have a name attached with the gun
But unluckily, there ain't any gun I can be proud of holding
Nor for my parents while I was still a lump of blood.

And, everybody is happy devising new forms of protest!

Do I need to remind,
Bullet respects bullet!
So help me make bullets of paper
And the gun, oh my dear!
There is no dream without gun
There is no dream without gun
There is no school without gun
There is no body without gun
There is no grave without gun
And the paper bullets
Our best friend!

A Drunken Poem!

2009-11-28T15:55:00.000-08:00

Who else need a song for the broken heart
Who else ever thought of a nice trickling

That damn lucky bullet
It hit hard in my conscience
It’s still wedged inside my abdomen
Where every morsel rots before digestion
Where every bowel of intestines panics
But I continue to survive
Sucking the bullet
Through mutilated veins
And we both survive
In mutual understanding that
Lives and let live.

A damn lucky life, for
A damn lucky bullet!

*** 11/18/2009 ***

a heartless soul

2009-11-28T15:44:00.001-08:00

never have i known
me becoming a bastard of my own creation
then there were nights
through the haze called dream, and
you came calling every night, and
i continue to grow as just another shadow
happy waiting for the moments of ecstasy
in the filament of treason? or
trying to enliven another night
in the fields of pretention and ruse?

for you
i continue to slit each fang
waiting for few droplets of virgin blood
if your hearts were to be ever open,
for you
i fathom my purlicue
thinking, you once hold them ruffled
if you were ever to feel them alive

but each masquerade, i played
you were all there in joyous pretense
may be i was the wrong one
for myself, even to call a dream haze
may be i have created myself out of sheer fascination
though, i called myself a bastard
for myself in my own shadow
and you continue to chastize me:
how upsetting a soul can be
when there is no heart at all!

no, we have lived among the tricks
possibly asking for more pretension
where heartless souls play taunt
smiles, kisses, caresses
and i continue to remind her
they are all fake
like a heartless soul in the naked winter!

***11/18/2009***

Love Song!

2009-11-28T15:34:00.000-08:00

For me
Love stories are menace of uncontrolled hearts
The effete truth that begets uncertainties
For you
You will say ‘You are colour-blind'
Like fireflies in the fields
For you
Fields grow wih wild flowers
And fireflies hum in wild songs.

Whatever, please look at this love story.

Who has rotten to the heart
Can never be redeemed with a mention of love
The boredom of highest order, if it could be written off, ever
For a mere trouble of certain generation
For the sole reason that it besets the reason
Then, my dear, what’s the ordeal
You say it?

Love wasn’t the only thing!
Dont say that I didnt paint your back
When you dry your hair in my eyes
I know this much though
Lovers draw images of loose cannons
Some smoked, some stuffed, some mellowed
Instead, look at these images
These few images, I wrought from the streets of Manipur
They penetrate deep inside my heart, and I cry
With every mention of love and reconciliation
Because, I know my heart has rotten
And your back, my dear
It's all red
Red with stamps of my name
Red with strokes of your swab.

Whatever! This is what you said.

Damn you, my beloved
That touch you often complaint about
I have lost long time back
When we were young and tender
And now, you feel it for the men,
The touch of gloat;
Damn you, my beloved
You are such a misery to me
You made me hump my own back
And my love lost its way.

So where is the love that you blamed me for?
I haven't got any heart to love you.

Yes yes
I am a colour-blind.
What I knew was the colour of red
Drawn from certain spectrum of my existence
A moist colour
A lukewarm colour
The colour that stick
And you thought
I stalk you when I touched you
You might not have known
I have tears for eyes
My lung lugged your heartbeat
Feared was me
For your name
hat you have sold to his surname.

And you called me "My Name Is Red"
I should have asked:
"ঐবু ঈরো"

Then my dear
My streets are painted afresh
And your back
It reverberates what we have lost in the ordeal
Of love and hate
You being the one, and
I being another.
So sad!

*** (November 20, 2009) ***

I Want To Wear My Freedom!

2009-11-28T15:33:00.001-08:00

I want to wear my freedom
And conquer the world in love
I want to wear my freedom
And live a life in harmony
I want to wear my freedom
And die a peaceful death in her arms.

Look,
This is my freedom
That he is wearing a camouflage
In the fields, in the forests, in the villages
Afraid of farmers
Afraid of Christmas carols
Afraid of kids going to school
And my freedom
It looks torn and tortured
So how do I stitch its being;
For they say
‘A stitch in time saves nine’
But for my freedom
A needle big enough to prick the earth
I guess, can only stitch it,
And a spat of sewing
Like machine guns firing at will
I guess, thus can only sew it.

I want to wear my freedom, at any cost!

***(11/27/2009)****

My Psychedelic Poem!

2009-11-28T15:31:00.000-08:00

If you ever see your favourite rack
You will know, it has got smuts left by my invasion;
There, in its every shelf
I have hidden my prominence like titles of expansive books
Some gifts and some bought, but
All hollow except the rim of covers, and
Those bookmarks of yours through every page
Of words and numerous blots
They are like my lies for a lifetime of moonlit dreams
I couldn’t hold onto myself
So I tried interpreting myself
For better or worse, that I don’t know
But, I was sure with one common alibi
I wasn’t me and I can get hurt in lot many other ways;
In fact, life itself wasn’t that beautiful
For me to hold on and expanding like a swelling balloon for a bang.
That wasn’t the truth, to say the least
But the common denomination for a living
It has to be the bliss and hope and forgetfulness.

After a brief living
I accept life receptively
Like an ever expanding mind dotted with coalescing new collages
Of dreams and few conversations on death and its afterlife!
invitation!

***(11/27/2009)****

a hEAvY bOOkSHelF

2009-11-28T15:29:00.000-08:00

A Gray Poem!

2009-11-28T15:28:00.000-08:00

My body, it reminds me of my lies
Within muffled voices in some raunchy streets
For every grotesque face in its crooked by lanes
I save my body like a heap of fool’s gold
Within aggrieving charms of glitters
Yet the voices within, though muffled
Yell at my steps, for every single step
They have million reasons to chastise me.

Then, my dear friend
How do I live thinking it’s all fair
For a body, a soul and person
Having to survive a torrent of abuses
Like love, kindness and help
Within the realm of unknown walls.

My dear friend,
My body, if you look closely
It wears a pie of colours, streaked with
Random strokes of nature
In jealousy, hunger and lies
And it looks a portrait of self effacing wave
In tatters, spread across the face of existence
Splattered with ignorance and disbelief
And this was when, I touched you.

Then, there lies ahead
The street I couldn’t fathom,
In your image, like a creek with few trickling of hope
In some dim lit alleys down your way
And my lies consummate in final ecstasy
For every hope that I professed humble, and
For every step that carries me through your street
Yet, my body wasn’t there
And I worried:
Was it a lie, for the body to survive all these while
In your shadow, following that ugly shadow of yours
And how I dare myself
Reminding, I am myself a lie!

So my dear friend
I don’t have a body, nor a soul
In fact, I am a no person
So, no pain in my existence
No repentance, and
No identity to haunt you!

***(November 21, 2009)***

Landscape!

2009-11-28T15:21:00.001-08:00

For an old miser like me,
Who frets over the qualms of life,
Dying silently in the obscurity, and
Waiting for one last journey, is
Like a futile adventure against the destiny.

Talking about Destiny
It reminds me of certain trail, of a
Poet, a barking poet
Who barks at everything
For the black holes of undying chasm
For the graves that embrace unknown souls;
And with every pause, he says:
‘Graves and black holes
They are the landscapes with new meaning
No pretention, no fluttery, but
The landscape of a new civilization’.

Then, I kneeled
And watched the space between my legs
Upside down, it looked a morbid architecture
Left unwanted for the future
With few urinated walls of ruins
And there, I saw my body
In resurrection, like a landscape drawn poorly
For a makeshift barrage
From the lame shin who can’t follow a girl
To the mouth of sinking lips, cursed with kisses;
Little far away
Through the space between my legs
The black holes, they swerved through the nadir
And raised as graves, there
Souls hovered wearing familiar masks
And again
I am frightened for the life.

My legs,
They dropped with an awful thumped
There the poet stood tall
With his half grinned humanity
And I was left for the body.

For him
My body was one of those black holes, and
For me
My body was the grave!

*** (November 18, 2009) ***

The Sisterhood!

2009-09-20T14:33:00.000-07:00

she went home searching for a new reason
and send me a season
wrapped in the colour of blood
and here, i called myself a red

like a message wrapped besieged
within the realm of sisterhood
it brings me spirits from home
and, I continue to dream

for a fasting soul
many a feasts look meagre,
the hunger will never die
and the spirits will never rest

and my dreams
you judge them for snorts
but for a dream
it costs me a lifetime

a dream within dream

oh! it is the season of ningol chak-kouba
but for every tarmac that paints red
and every pebble that soaks blood
it will be a season of vengeance
for each one us who dare to roam restless
even after scorched through lies and lies

and spirits continue to dream
for a sisterhood this ningol chak-kouba

GOD IS A FOOL!

2009-09-19T07:33:00.000-07:00

I
being a god
he must have known from a long time back
it is not easy waiting for the sacrifice
man are handmade specimens
not borne off any promised womb
as he has been made to belief
through the ages
from the flood of seeds
to the drought of fear
but, man are sewed from the bits and pieces
though through lies and imitation
and feed into the wombs
like a living ghost in the streets
waiting for its gestation
waiting to be accepted as human
and even thinking of an altar;
and poor god
he is also just another dreamer
he doesn’t know
there is no sacredness in man’s secret rituals
offering him demons
in his own image
for every occasion
in death and birth
god, as he did so many times
moves his mask in intrepid sacrilege,
it seems to him,
the sacrifices that we offer
completes the scheme of existence
in unison and truth
but he is a fool
waiting for sacrifices
in these times of horror
all impure and fake
II
even for a lesser mortal
even in the meekest of meekest gloat
even in the cruelest of seasons
even in the lousiest market of bidding
you will find the offerings
apt and genuine
but
waiting for a sacrifice here
it deserves you a rebuttal
in the face of your own creation!

No Title!

2009-08-26T10:55:00.000-07:00

My body lays idle like a corpse but it has got no shame
It breathes and smells the soil
And pretend to move in the whiff that brings the news of rain;
It still thinks breathing makes us alive
The smell of the soil soaked with blood,
It thinks, profusely makes our senses shiver in half-truths.

Yet, this body lays idle
In the streets, in the fields, in the mortuary
Everywhere it goes, like a stone seeking redemption
In silence and solitude, and in defeats!
Looking at it,
It seems I have become so death
That there is no dream for me;
Looking at it,
It seems breathing is all that I can do.

***(August 23, 2009)***

My Dead Poem!

2009-08-26T10:54:00.000-07:00

As my life nears a conjugal obsession with death
I thought of writing few more poems on dead
May be, this way, I will hold on to live
Another thousand year, within myself
Stalking the death itself!

Everybody says I am a dead poet
But I think, my poems are alive
Much more alive than myself
My poems affirm a recourse on living
My poems challenge lives
My poems fear death
What else do I need from my poems
They are unto themselves
In dead and birth
I only write the way it comes
Even in dead thinking about another birth!

You may seek a sacrament
Saying these lines, these very lines are pitiless whims of a mortal
Or you may even think them to be a portentous shadow of my lies
But I carry them wherever I go
In my heart, knowing good enough that someday I will die
So what’s the harm writing few more dead poems
While I am all alive.

***(August 08, 2009)***

Killing Feilds!

2009-08-26T10:52:00.000-07:00

I was mistaken
He wanted to kill me for a deer
In some dense forest
They came with all their gears
For a hunting, no prejudice
They thought, it moves
And true, I moved for my limbs!
Little later, there was a cry
They have shot someone else
In the field
They thought, there is no name
No identity, no fruit of tomorrow
‘we better off to a new terrain,
We better cleanse it off, for
a smooth path’.
After few minutes, another bang in my eardrum
It reverberates, recoiled like a spring:
You hold it tight and it sprung.
Some rallies, some cries…
Damn it, my ear was not a tin drum!
Again, little far away from my grave
They stroll and dogs barked!

***(August 08, 2009)****

Monsoon And My Dream!

2009-08-26T10:50:00.000-07:00

They said, finally Monsoon is here
In its full glory, clouds wrapping dreams
Blood sweet raindrops, and ever opening arms
Of lovelorn souls, with occasional echoes
Of names lost in waiting game of meetings and promises.

I too knew Monsoon, for its date with dreams
I too loved Monsoon, for its grandeur of royal reception
I too wait for Monsoon, as my heart is parched, and
I wanted to soaked myself, the soul and body
With the raindrops distilled from the sky above
So that my tear never ran dry in this abandoned desert
I wanted those raindrops to hit my bare chest
So that it bore another well of summer springs, in my heart
I wanted this earth to embrace the Monsoon
So that the grave that laid evident to her innocence is wet again
And I could smell her sweat, drenched with tender remembrance!

They said, Monsoon has arrived
And everybody walks beside me
Leaving me behind in my own trail
They said, Monsoon has indeed arrived
And they all talked about me, looking at my hollow being
And blamed me for the reason, of Monsoon being late
In a land of dreams and continue talking:
Every July, somebody will cry and the poor Monsoon
It changes its course in depression, thinking:

"What do I do looking at the tears, in fact
I have no match for tears
Tears have silent wishes, and
My thunder and lightning, and they fade;
Tears are trifle and petite, but
My torrid downpour only caused floods of desire and
I got the blame of having a merciless despondent
But the tears, every single drop carries warmth of the heart;
And, tears don't dry even if I have to wait for a seasons!"

They said, this time Monsoon is fair to us
I continue to dream in closed room
Trying to feel the life in her lifeless body!

***(July 27, 2009)***

My Bible!

2009-08-26T10:45:00.000-07:00

Oh! Man
He is as good as any other poem
Disturb your conscience, was Eliot afar;
When he clear his throat
You will know, he is about to make you clear
Of all the doubts that you think hampers you grow a man
There is no hymn of Amen or Ibudou Pakhangba
But he knows where is Burma and what did our little sister did,
There is No Waste Land, there is no any Byzantium
For him, Tiddim Road bleeds at Malom.

No wonder,
I count myself an educated, civilized and a worthy patriot
With my untamed poems on death and its loose conclusions
That someday I ought to die in her lap
One among her numerous sons!

Oh! Man
There were nights I thought of him, and I got
Dreams stoic and dreaded like a pineapple in Churachandpur
All eyes but blind
And I laughed
What have I done,
In fact, Oinam High School wasn't too far
Few rapes and a lake of sorrow.

Let’s laugh a while and celebrate...
Only yesterday, he is back from the killing fields of Manipur
And he brought a book in the name of our lost literature
That sang Kwairamband Bazar and its many crooked by lanes
With each name spelled like a Gandhi and Nehru
And I wished to give each sojourn a definitive verdict.

On the Kanglasha and its Sahebs
But, look at him
He brought a book, few pages old and wrought in the mist of Sahitya,
A book seasoned with extinct Lamgi Chekla and Pi Thadoi;
Each word I uttered with drunken wisdom,
It proclaimed a bible for Apaiba Thawai!

Help me, I wanted to cry
Help me, I wanted swear
And this Bible, within each imprints,
I seek a vigour, a new morning
Sometimes I thought sacrosanctfor its sake, but what do I do
That’s non-native, in the land of Sanskrit hymns and Bengali script
Oh! He brought this book
That’s bible for me
That speaks of Chaoba, Kamal and Meenaketan;
Tonight, my drunken wisdom says
Embrace it tight
This is my Bible
A Bible surfaced by Akhu!

***(July 20, 2009)***

I THOUGHT OF DEAD AS A NEW POEM

2009-08-26T10:37:00.000-07:00

I didn’t know that it takes time
Even for the dead to adjust and act upon accordingly
And look at me, this little lousy son of a man
Trying to walk like a phantom
Undying and haughty, head on, like an un-castrated bull!

Dead takes time to build its empire
It creates heroes out of nothing
I can be a hero to these lesser mortals anytime I want to be
But the dead, it thinks, I am not worth a dead;
Dead takes time to heal the deadness
It invokes and fascinates the living, thus
Harnessing every agonizing aspects of life, and
Me, a tasteless little moron, appreciate it for nothing;
But, the dead, it thinks and act, and
Wait for the right moment to build and expand its empire
From a wobbling distant cousin to life
Today, it carries a heaven of festivals
For each of us, with our choicest feasts!

And just now, I am recollecting myself a life
Bit by bit, from the first wail of a kid to todays hoarse complaints
And thinking about dead, if it really cares for what we do.
May be it’s a dream, asking for myself in altogether a different robe.

Sorry, I am still alive.

***(July 18, 2009)****

BEING MYSELF

2009-08-26T10:36:00.001-07:00

How do I accept myself in this rot
Of faith and sin?
I did it by writing few lines a day
Like my own breathing,
Though sometimes choked up with all the lust and pain
Of being myself.
That’s why I asked myself, many a times…
How do I accept myself while the whole world is against me?
My poems, my rituals and emotions
They feel like allergic, and
Their imprints are all evident in the air
Like a ever hovering prison for me
Waiting to hop upon me, and
I living in these tortured months of exasperation
Seeking pleasure out of everything!

***(July 17, 2009)***

Oh July! Don't let me sleep!

2009-08-26T10:34:00.000-07:00

How many days, for
How many days, did I slept
Hands tight, clenched fist, swollen heart
Until woken up by these cries!

July is a horror month
It bore me my curse
It pants ever slowly like a dying old man
July, the monsoon, the moisture
I don’t know what to mop and what to soak
But, someone cries every night
In this month of July, and
I sleep carrying my dead body
Wherever it wishes to go,
From gardens to graves
From libraries to mortuaries.

Oh July!
She still smiles at me;
You are a horror month
You let her go, with all the smiles
And I sleep every night
Waiting for her, to touch me again
But, how do I endure
Your cries, calling for a date with poets
Yet asking for a reason to be aloof, and alone.

Oh July!
Don’t let me sleep,
Even if my body brings the qualm of a drunken daily wager
Don’t let me sleep,
Even if my house drips your heavy downpour, like a crying widow
Don’t let me sleep,
Even if I have to wake up early for my gate, to welcome the thieves.

Oh July!
Don’t let me sleep,
I can’t wait for another July!

***July 16, 2009***

COMPOSING AN EULOGY

2009-08-26T10:31:00.000-07:00

It was only yesterday, that
I wished to compose an eulogy on the death of man;
They said, man is dead and its remnants are all scattered,
Like tatters strewn all over a raunchy street
Like unpublished poems of some anonymous fireflies
Like the fabled alteration of hope
Like a poem in hurry, all gloss and some lethargic comments.
It was only yesterday, that
I wished to bury the hatchet, against an animosity called writing
With certain last page for a torn folio;
They said, there’s nothing like last page, it’s always like
The first draft that got drown in the sea of disbelief.
Man are never to be trusted!
Little while ago, a broken window and
A heap of cow dung, and
Few flies above, that hovered like some sequential paradox
They seduced me and I forgot to blame the howlers
For all the nasty euphemism;
They said, I look lot like a closeup man, ready
To be impaled and jeer for what I have siege a subtext within a rhyme.
That’s half truth and another half naked:
Me writing poems;
I blame if for who I am!

***(July 16, 2009)***

THIS IS THE POEM OF MY LIFE

2009-08-26T10:28:00.000-07:00

1.
how would i know
the cries of words
when they are left unheard
to the mercy laden taunts of jingoist
how would i know
the worries of dead
when seasons are shoved and heaved around
for the wreckage called life
how would i know
if she ever cried
when the crops wail for a trinkling of hope

but i know why i write poem
i write poems to appease every restless word
i write poems to disown me, in the crowd
i write poems so that i can walk like a death man
2.
no more, thus i announce the death of me

i don't know how my corpse would be buried
i don't know how my grave would be dug
i don't know how my body would riled in the pyre
i don't know how my funeral would reek

but what i know is
my grave will host a scroll of poems
my funeral will be a procession of dead poets
3.
when i write poems, it invokes no magic
when i recite my poems, my voice crumbles
when i read your poems, my heart sinks

but the cinders of wood from my pyre
they will sing songs, and the sparks
they will applaud my poems

4.
oh, you don't know my wife
every night, when i kissed her
she recites me a poem, everynight
a poem a night, from the scribbles
that i left after each intercourse
she thought, my poems are fake
and she blamed me how i made her fake

i don't know how
but she did hate my poems
when i returned home after days rigour
she would recieved me with my poems
at the doorstep
so that i could see the hunger in her face
because, i did recite while she moan
so that i could feel her frailty
because, i did feed her only the poems
i didn't know how
but she survived, until
one day she dragged me at the altar of oblivion, and there
she slit her throat and offered me every drop of blood, and said
"this is the poem of my life".

***(July 10, 2009)***

2009-08-26T10:23:00.000-07:00

they said, i hoarse
they said, i sulk
they said, i fake
even when i was dying,
then oneday,
one bright sunny day
i proclaimed thus:
death be my fren, in good and bad times
because, this living world
flowers, pretty damsels
blood and soul
they all think,
i fake
they all think
i hoarse
they all think
i sulk
when i die
when i cry
when i fight.
thus death becomes my best fren, and
he teaches me how to stand
he teaches me how to breathe
and he is always near me
waiting for me, every night!
and i never ask
how many frens you have got
and i will write poems
no matter he loves me or not

***(July 06, 2009)***

Manipur, Do I Need To Cry For You?

2009-08-26T10:20:00.000-07:00

Manipur, you are a long lost dream
That is how I lament, that is how I mourn
But should I never cry!

My village, it overran a river
With few dotted bluffs on faith
And I grew up there, like pebbles
In the river stream, nothing disturbed
Except few ripples in the navel.

Today, that navel is growing deeper
Sometimes, it looks like a gorge in certain discreet highway
With many a unnamed veins for blood thirsty mongrels;
Sometimes, it looks like a pond of serenity
Revered by not many, but filled with tranquility;
Sometimes, it looks like a bowel of uncooked intestines
Ready to be feed upon and absorbed in the veins.

Manipur,
Tonight, far away from your valley
I ponder for a reason not to cry for you
There came the answer with few trickling of teardrops
And, that same ripple bowel
With infested malice,
It gathers what my teardrops could offer
And, it smirks!

Do I need to cry for you?

***(July 05, 2009)***

I Stopped Praying For The Death!

2009-07-02T12:11:00.000-07:00

I stopped praying for the death,
It bears no fruit, even if the dead has got any womb
I stopped praying for myself,
It doesn’t suit my scheme, even if I had to wake up early
I stopped praying for my brothers,
It doesn’t make them patriots, even if they die fighting for the land
Oh, I stopped praying for the peace,
It doesn’t end any war, even if my heart yearns for it.

From today, I promised to myself, thus…
I will only pray for the living, whatever it counts
Living bullets, living souls and living dreams
Even for a dead body, that lives in my mind.

Drought!

2009-06-28T16:32:00.000-07:00

Something didn’t quite die
It continues to live, day after day
Asking questions and raising million mutinies;
Perhaps, I was still there
At her doorsteps, waiting for an answer
Or may be,
I am unto myself, alone in the grave, waiting
For a resurrection!

That day,
She returned home late, and
Brought home a fiend mask, and
Said, somebody plant her a bastard for the occasion
So that, she be accepted a ceremonial bride for the occupation
That day,
She returned home, and
The lore continues and my morning toil ceased;
They said its drought!

That day stood evident for her lost fertility
From that day, my grave was my home
And everyday,
I stood at her doorstep asking for the answer!

I Don’t Need An Army To Sleep Well!

2009-06-18T16:59:00.000-07:00

I don’t need an army to sleep well
What I need is a meal, a bed and a pillow
I am not asking for the blanket,
Not even the warm body of my beloved
She can sleep where ever she wishes
Yes, I don’t need an army to wait for the morning!

I Hate Freedom!

2009-06-18T16:54:00.001-07:00

While I was still a kid
They bring all sorts of guns and lots of ammunition
They bring lots of pamphlets and cries
And suddenly, they all died
Leaving me with some dreams and their anthems!

Few years later,
I found myself fighting for the freedom
Though I couldn’t care much about it,
They said, I need freedom
So that I can be raised like one of them
In fatigue, in camouflages
In the drain, in the ridges
In the psyche, with hunger
They said, freedom comes with hunger!

Today, I hate freedom
It dies with liberty
Every time I open my arms, for some love
It came asking for the reason.
It asked: give me a perfect reason;
I had no answer, thus
I continue fighting for the freedom.

Another Dead Poem!

2009-06-18T16:48:00.000-07:00

In the dead of the night,
I pretend to be a dead man,
So that I can sleep a while, like all of them
In the dead of the night,
I pretend to be a wise man,
They all said, dead men are wiser
They know no worries,
They live for values unknown to life
For which every second soul howl.

In the dead, we all sleep, and
I want to sleep a while like a dead man
Be wised and happy.

Watching The Dying Moon!

2009-05-19T17:43:00.000-07:00

The planetary movements
The rising of the sun and glowing of the moon
And the whims of mortals; as
Good sermons on the creation,
It invokes me my infatuation.

By the threshold on a procreation
I observed too long to called it a living,
For another universe, with many a stars, and
Inconsequential moons, with more creatures
Calling for life, living everywhere
In the universe!

My nights are lonesome,
Even more are the stars
They blink unto themselves
And the dying moon, in my sky
I create numerous paintings, with
Falling stars and congregations of monsters
On virtues of having a world within the grasp of a mind,
In the mind of a poet, like my dreams
On a busy traffic, beggars, limbs, luster and waiting!

I see everything, in the night,
While watching the dying moon!

His Plot, The Stage and Me!

2009-04-30T09:40:00.000-07:00

Somebody came to kill me
He wanted to help me understand this life
By killing me, with his bare hands
With a knife, sharpened for the purpose
With few silent strokes, pulling my hair
Cutting my limbs, toes, fingers, ears
One by one, dissecting the chest,
Plucking the heart and lugging the intestines
So that those pieces can be packed in a box
Like a package for best kept secrets
As a gift to the life, the life himself!

He said, no use of coffins
They are so expensive, they are
Rather weird too, to fill pieces in a coffin
It’s odd, it will look funny
So, better a box, cheaper and handy
There you need only a pair of hands, to hold it
And carry it wherever you want
‘Why disturb others for your death’
And you can even place it next to you, like a pot
Wherever you wish to lay sit from shrines to morgue
And those pieces inside, pieces of your body, people will think it
For a gift pack, or even the holy water, and there
Half the purpose is served for being borne, another
Half was consumed when you are death, for the purpose.

So no worries, while you proudly reside in and
Have a better understanding of the life,
Inside the box, within the rim of a box
The world outside, will admire you, they will
Wait for a glimpse of the box that contains you
Though in pieces, and they will think they are blessed
You know, this world is made of confusion,
That’s what I want you to feel, for the life
In the midst of it, you are the answer and them
The scraps from your shadow,
No need for the cross, no need for the inferno
The box is enough; a box is enough for a modern man like you.

Then I said, if that’s all you wish me to experience
Why the box, and what’s need to be killed, or
To be a dead man in pieces;
I can experience that feeling of living inside the box
By simply living in my thatched hut!
He countered it, and said
You have limbs, and your hairs flaunt a living, and
You may even stretch your leg and
Open your mouth, in a yawn and
Someday you will think that
Someday, like these birds,
Can fly in the sky, with joy and freedom
That I don’t want
That’s what I don’t want from you
For you, a little confusion is enough,
Even after you are dead!

I didn’t know, he had a larger scheme for me
He wanted me, my body, my being to rest in peace, and
He knew, there aren’t any better place, proposition
Other than being stuff a box, though in pieces
To attain the nirvana, of what we could call peace or
Understanding life!

Box is good, much better than my thatched hut, and
Even better than what we called motherland,
They have these sulking prerogatives,
Like obsession and responsibilities
But once you are packed inside this simple box,
There will be no obligations, no worries
Of what’s going there, outside its rim
Thus you will know what is life,
The bliss of ignorance!

He said,
You don’t!

Sick Days!

2009-04-27T09:09:00.000-07:00

Should I count my sick days
Or, should I count my birthdays
Either way, I have lost the count.
Good things do they come
But, did I ever asked my share
I know, I have lost the trail.

Never mind.
We have to respect the man,
The man who knows filth and dirt
But, do I have anything to do with him?

Let’s see again:
The distrust that overlook the faith
And the wish that plays evident with the sin;
Are they a worthy couple?

May be!

In fact,
My body is a clay vase,
My soul is sinner’s paradise
And my heart is placed little around the bend
A corner, where love digs faith!

This clay vase, often I paint dreams
But the soul sucks the heart
And the pastel sinner counts the sick days!

I Didn't Grow Up Properly!

2009-04-26T01:14:00.000-07:00

I didn’t grow up properly
I had numerous infatuations, and they slapped me
For every slogan I shouted
They said, I disturbed their agenda, and they slapped me
For who I was?

The first age, I was obsessed with guns
The tender age of seven eight nine, I didn’t know
How they all went smoked, with billows from the barrels
And somebody hide his second hand gun beneath my pillow
And I thought I deserve a try, whichever direction it fires
The sound was bustling and the next morning
I have had my first slap in the face.

Mama wanted me to behave and grow tall
The gunshot was forgotten and I became a darling
And my grandpa called me Gandhi, he said
I obey and can write difficult names for invitations
For marriage and obituaries,
Spellings of names I couldn’t pronounce, and
Nonnative spellings of words from the occupation

Then, my first long pant came uninvited
Something tickled me, I was a lousy connoisseur
Wanted to taste the bud, flowers and nectar
Bees and buzzes, thus I got my second slap
I didn’t know the reason.

And I know, I didn’t grow up properly
But happy was me, with all the slaps
They said, I deserve them, for the following
To be a good man, one day, to live a good man!

Anyway, I was growing that very way, for that way
But a single slap, I couldn’t agree with, and
The chilled morning, the chilled bone
The expensive fare, the back bench
The tuition, the examination
The dream, my parents
And the slap
This is loose
But the slap was the humiliation
It mortified my being and the dreams gone sour
But I still don’t understand why he slapped me
Early in the morning,
To a boy who was going for few lessons
On Physics and Chemistry;
I still don’t know who was he and why he was waiting for me
Early in the morning.
I still don’t know had he got any kid of my age
Going to school and waking up early for an extra class
I still don’t know, how many he would have slapped
I still don’t know, had they all went quite
Like me for all these years
I still don’t know, how many kids deserve the slap

Yes, I dint grow up properly
In the land of million mutinies,
My land, my land
Spare those kids
They are innocent
They are the dreams, and
Someday, they will sing songs on you and your valour
But, for every single slap, my land
You lose a son, you wreak a dream
With every slap, you destroy a family
With every slap, you create an outlaw
So, spare those kids
They are innocent.

Yes, I didn’t grow up properly
In my land, and today
I am in exile, weaving a dream for the land
Earning a few pennies, to grow a farm
Full of innocent dreams and
Create a my own land
Where kids can wake up early and got to school
Without any fear of slaps and checking drills
Where kids can learn lessons on best of sciences and poems
Without worrying about strikes and bandhs!

Has The Dead Arrived?

2009-04-24T07:37:00.000-07:00

Everybody is singing the songs of dead, and
Nobody really cares if it has, indeed, arrived?

I have known a long time ago, even
Before I wasn’t conceived inside my mother’s womb,
For a matter of fact, that time,
Mother, all of a virgin and naïve
She didn’t even know who my father would be, and
That someday, I will be writing poems on the dead.

My father, he is still a proud man, with little money
And my mother, worried about the future, pray
Every night and quietly my plan weaves in the dark
For another poem, for another dead poem!

Today, as I write another dead poem,
Existence becomes a mockery and it ridicules
The passion, that we called life!

These dead poems, I worry
Had they borne along with me, in their shadow
Of innocence and pittance, to celebrate
Subjugation as debt of alliance;
Those dead poems, I worry
Had they conspired along a generation, in the shadow
Of illiteracy and exploitation, to mark
The extinction of a clan!

Lot more dead poems
Lot more dead poems
Dead poems from classrooms
Dead poems from kitchens
Dead poems from farms
Dead poems from offices
These dead poems, they can’t be silent witness
These dead poems, they are the songs of our time!

My worried mother, she called me back home
She has graves ready for each of my dead poems
So I asked:
Has the dead arrived?

Death Cries In Manipur!

2009-04-18T23:55:00.000-07:00

My presence was suspicious,
It smelt rotten spirits everywhere, and
Questions on morality repeated itself like a rhyme.

Something strapped my soul, it has got
Spikes that swerves between faith and betrayal
Yes, they are all legends in the streets of Manipur,
With play-cards, with fancy slogans,
And the Death stood there alone!

Little suspicious, in the games we play
Of killing, of brutality and brotherhood;
Ask me, are they real, these corpses,
These bruises, these slogans, these gallows?

I leaned on him and explained holding my guts:
No, these are the remnants, only the leftover
Of a great feast, fed upon and
Of carnal existence with revenge and extermination and
Of cleansing for a great civilization!

He cried.

Running Away!

2009-04-18T23:33:00.000-07:00

What I knew was death, yet
It seems, I am afraid of it
I have known it and I am aware of its eminence
Then, why I need to bother about it?

Yes, I have nurtured this life,
I have even dreamed of living a thousand year
But what?
Millions died and millions continue to dream
Few more despise it, lot more hate it
But what, what for me;
I know it’s coming, yet
It seems, I am running away from it!

Kennedy's Question!

2009-04-18T23:27:00.000-07:00

My friend Kennedy, he said
He is afraid of death and according to him
Dying in the hands of an illiterate, like those
Numerous killings in Manipur; and
What is even more remorseful is
All the education and dreams gone wasted in the drain
For every single corpse, known or unknown
There’s no reason for it, hell or heaven,
For good deed or sin!

And I said, you too portray like me
How we should die, then
I remembered, we cheered for the tenth time,
And continued talking about Manipur!

While drowning another peck of whiskey
Cigarette in one hand, he asked me:
Can you bear the first bullet, for the cause!
I didn’t answer and he heartily laughed, and continued:
Everybody is afraid to die, whichever form it is;
You die of cholera, you even die of accidents
But taking bullets, it’s not worth
Even for a patriot, whose bodies are like mine,
All flesh and some tender love!

I looked at him and filled another round.

The reminiscence looms large, and
Early morning newspapers and even the news
Brought home by keithel kabi(s),
They all bear the frightening aspects of life,
In Manipur, an eight passed pity upon a professor
With certain demand letter, with or without an insignia
And the stamp was the thunder of cheap bullets
And we were guilty by association, with
Dreams and aspirations and Hunger!

* Written some months back.

Waiting For Another Morning!

2009-04-03T08:03:00.000-07:00

They called it morning blues,
For me, they were appetizers, for the day ahead;
My days start with little starters, that
They called whimpers, being not able to recite
In the morning, unlike crows and cows
And they called it morning blues;
Sounds without sounds,
They are yawns!

Hard to believe though,
Like the music in the background
Shrieks, fire guzzlers and chants
In the morning, I seek words that sound wise
Profound words and lots of words
That explain yesterday night’s hangover, over
A fickle play called life!

In the morning, I hate to recite
No matter how disturbed I was yesterday night;
Shadows and all, so I need starters
But they still called by whimpers and
I continued to celebrate life;
No matter how fickle it’s shade are,
Quietly, waiting for another morning!

A Talking Poem!

2009-04-03T07:47:00.001-07:00

Few more lines could have done.
But nowadays,
Words are more or less like deadpans:
They obey my whims and
They boil.
My whims are self-effacing, like myself.

So where are those lines?

I found myself,
Most of the time, humbled by words and
The perils chug along.

On Hope!

2009-03-21T07:43:00.000-07:00

Nothing more, nothing less
A justice exonerated for a crime,
Another crime meted out for an engagement;
Restlessness, the fervour of new generation,
Had a say like a sermon, with
Good wine and cheap thrills;
Nothing more, nothing less
We still lived for an accidental cause
Like an overdose and a wild raunchy ride;
Simulation, the new essence of humanity
Procreate along the origin, and
Borne are we
Nothing more, nothing less
As humans, as greater mortals and
Dies a quite dead...
Nothing more, nothing less.
Someday, they will exonerate our fickle lies
Even after we are long death
May be for a greater cause called Hope!

Mr.Patriot, I Am Waiting For You!

2009-03-18T16:26:00.000-07:00

When I listen to those finger pointing songs
I think of you, Mr. Patriot and
Wanted to blame you hard: Where were you,
For so long, to comfort these bleeding
In the hills, in the plain, and in my heart
Should I tell you, Mr. Patriot
That we are late for the occasion
To sing our patriotic songs and convince them
That we are correct and true like morning sun!

Listening to those songs,
I think of the rot and dirt and the irritation
And numerous gentlemen with outrageous reputation
You know, they too called themselves patriots
I guess, might be of a different ilk, unlike you
I know, I even heard you singing in pain
For what you have seen in the dead men
For what you have heard from the wails of widows
But these patriots, they praise the death and
Never hesitate to hold the hands of widows;
What a shame, they even promise the compensation
Like poll-time gimmicks and rigged ballot paper
What a shame, they measure the virtues of the decease
And nobody was there to throw him a shoe!

Mr. Patriot, do you still think
Words are enough to awake the sleep and
Restore the hearty contempt for them
To feel alive again, for the endangered species? Or,
Do you still fear those cheap bullets and
Self-styled reformists who can’t read
What you have written, thinking
You are the only son of your parents?

Well, I too start writing poems
Voluminous poems on ghastly jokes, like
Death, self-respect and patriotism; you know
For us endangered species, these are jokes
Even to think of a natural death,
Even to talk about self-respect and
There is not a single parlance on patriotism, and
I incite myself, waiting for you!

I am afraid of this life!

2009-03-14T23:13:00.000-07:00

I have a frightening little secret
I am afraid of dying
I know not too well its deadliness
But, I know it is quite frightening a prospect!

Somebody died yesterday, and
The corpse, I didn’t know, so beautiful;
Asked for a make-up, I don’t know why?
But, it said, I am afraid of its revelations,
And it wanted my company, I guess:
It wanted me to give a feel of it
The feeling of deadliness
The weariness of living,
Oh! What a thought for a living person, and
What a generosity from the death.

I am afraid of this life.

Shumang Leela!

2009-03-13T08:03:00.000-07:00

Anouba Ming!

2009-03-13T07:37:00.001-07:00

Dirt Poem For A Lost Patriot!

2009-03-13T03:41:00.000-07:00

On a certain bright, sunny day,
A self proclaimed patriot, wearing flakes of pittance
Mocks the dirty road, spits in the manholes
And jeers the stakes of skeletons in the pavement!

Later in the day,
A pacifist, swelled with hunger, cleans the dirt
And signs a treatise for the day, singing
Rhymes out of hunger.

In between, few glossed ads, and
Promises galore, all in the name of martyrdom;
In between, cacophony of anthems, and
Blunt bayonets, for many a mimed soldiers!

Then, suddenly the clash of ideologues
Stages erect and flags flutter,
There they met
Me in the crowd and duel,
I was the sole witness.
A weary duel,
I thought thus and left for home;
I wanted to spit again but my face wriggled, and
All of them follow my path, in hordes,
Like my shadow, poor stony shadows of skeletons!

A petrified soul, burdened with the treaty
Seek ways to becalm the unrest, in the dirt
But the nadir and the glow-signs, they
Drew me far, leaving flags in the wilderness, and
Anthems in hollow drums.

Rendition of a timid Patriot!

2009-03-11T00:54:00.001-07:00

I took a deep breath, and
Pondered about certain sheep, black or white
For a moment, I thought of William Blake, and
How he did professed the sheep, or the Lamb, and
The obvious Innocence and the evident Christ!

The subsequent moment,
I was there in the ridges, hiding my skin
Because, I was afraid
Of cultivation they ploughed with spade and a rough mallet.

While counting the sprouts of freedom
Someone in the bush, next to me, hushed:
"Here lies the spirits of silent soldiers, and you crouched;
Rise and look, these blood streams to the plain, and
The present, past and future; all burnt in the trail
So rise, and rear many more lambs, if not now
Wolves will howl in daylight and weeping widows will curse endless nights!"

I sunk deeper, weak in the knees, and
Blamed the heart that nibbled in harmony, and
I know I am still a timid patriot, hiding in the ridges
But the rising inferno, it also burns my plight.

Whose Poem Is It, Anyway?

2009-03-09T23:13:00.001-07:00

What it really takes for me to write a poem and what makes me write a poem? I think, I will never be able to understand. And I am not too sure either if it has got anything to do with what I feel. I still remember various one-liners, quotes and sayings on poems and why people write poems, more or less with the rhymes and forms. In fact, my poems are more of words in whichever form or order they wish to come by. We have got so many poets and self proclaimed poets amidst us; sometimes it is utterly amusing even to think of poets and this trade of being in poetry! For me, I think, I write poems, my so called poems, in anger. Yea, as a kid, I used to compose words to impress my friends. May be I still do it. But, those friends have left with their lives and I am here alone, seeking friends within myself, who can understand what I feel and why get angry. I think, I write for myself and to channelize my anger.

Good times have passed since I first wrote my first poem. Theme was rather funny; on a tree. A tree soaked in monsoon rain. I borrowed the words from the books I have read, listened and imbibed in the classes, in tuitions, in playgrounds and from funga wari. Those words have able to leave a permanent mark on my life. I still think, I think with those words. Even more, there were stories, real or make-belief, from my parents, grandparents and local guardians. The bullets whizzing past my grandma's ears, long rifles with bayonets, saving the last cruse for another day, having to eat only the dried fish while hiding…during World War II and many duels involving Japanese and British armies. Those stories were real stories for me and I can still relate with places and remnants of that great period. The stories of many a rituals and celebrations, those stories still reverberate and I compare those events with what is happening, including my own part, playing roles. Unluckily, these recurring roles eclipsed the stories I have heard and cherished for so long. May be, I have also changed. I might have involved myself with these roles I am playing, sometimes a terrorist, sometimes a poet, sometimes a thief and?

Then, whose poem is it? I don't know!

Today, death comes easy in my poems. Everybody dies in my poem and the graves are the pages I save to write. Those stories were overshadowed by the events I cannot understand. I have beautiful memories. I enjoyed my childhood in the abundance of nature and freedom. Until this happened?
They carried my first poem in school magazine. From that day, I have become the seeker of angst. And my land also started to fume, giving company to my anger and restlessness. Now, I am comfortable with death poems and happy to harness the anger within. Hope, I will be able to keep this anger as long as I am alive. At least, it will keep me busy.

Reasons for anger: everybody knows!

The fields I once roamed freely have become killing fields, my classrooms where I first learn to respect the National Anthem have become barracks of armies carrying the National Flag of that very nation, our famed Nine-ridges have become another thousand ghettos; what else? I am angry because, places that live in my heart have been reduced to ashes. I am angry because my Motherland is bleeding. I am afraid if our children will ever understand the stories I have listened from my grandparents! And I really doubt if we will ever have our children!

And most of my poems, they manifest the anger I harvest. I think our children, at some point of time, will read these poems in their full glory! Hope this is how stories continue…

1.

2009-02-28T00:39:00.000-08:00

Once, we were farmers
Every morning, at the bark of a crow
Many a yawns gasped, and
Sung songs tilting the fertile soil,
No urea, no phosphate
A spade, a tilt and a pair of bullocks, and
Look today, a pair of goblets:
One in the hilltop, and another
Deep inside the psyche, and
All the sermons, shadows of occupation

My dear, I was destined to forget the servitude:
Farmers were long death!

Recently, my heart beats rather insane
My cold hands desperately seeks trigger happy guns, and
My eyes, somebody told: red, red!

Dead Poem!

2009-02-22T20:07:00.000-08:00

In the land of dead
All the poets write dead poems
On obituaries and dreams
Without graves and shrouds, and
Death becomes just another face of life.

Far away from my land
I still try to smell the dead,
In my dead poems, through
The faces I see and images I grow up with
And all you can do is: read,
Read these lines, without knowing
I am bleeding!

A Poem!

2009-02-20T21:21:00.000-08:00

I am a poet, who wear bullet proof vest
I am a poet, who is afraid of stray bullets
I am a poet, who dies every night with his words;
And I am a wasted poet.

Siroy Lily was sweetheart,
I have had a photo of it.
Now I have another fence,
And few more graves.

That day, I proposed a Thangkhul Girl
Today, I know a Meitei widow
And my mother wants me to marry
But the girl is caught in the curfew.

I am a poet.
I know I can write poems in hurry
I know I can chide them all
Guns, roses, condoms and strikes
But I am not sure
If I am afraid?

A cozy gun, hidden below my pillow
Another rose in my garden
And few used condoms in streets;
A frightened poet isn’t enough,
I know strikes are coming.

Marriage Of Stones!

2009-02-04T11:37:00.000-08:00

I walk towards my grave, unknowingly
And the petite pebbles, they
Promise to be my mate, in the journey;
And I accept the proposal in fancy.

My feet, few joints and
Other incredible limbs pray, and
Each one of them takes on the journey.

You need little prayers and
Not so pleasant pleas,
They are afraid:
The bondage, the delight and the haunting!

Little beyond the gaze,
I see my grave
Few sprouts of marigold saplings
Few careless cinders, and
A tidy mound.

My petite mates, they
Ask me questions unknown, and
Wanted me to molest their inhibitions
But the journey continues
Chants, garlands, pipers.

A beautiful marriage.

Dull Limbs!

2009-02-04T11:04:00.000-08:00

Me, as a human being, is dull
My body parts are of no use
They are rather mundane
And I hardly refer them with their names.

Each night,
When the whole world sleeps;
Each one of them tries to wake me up
They writhe and score
And the bed sheet,
It mopes the bleed, silently.

The stain of blood and the sweat;
It smell trivial to my senses
And I continue to ponder over a dream.

A dull dream for a dull person!

My waking dreams and
Few talking wheels of the night,
They furnish my living aspirations and
I travel few miles more
Fighting for the limbs that I don’t know and
I observe few more genial events for my dreams.

My dull limbs,
They can’t see the pitiless depiction of life
Instead, they watched the blood stained sheets
And appreciate the misread in the stain.

Passion Poems!

2009-02-04T09:41:00.000-08:00

Passion poems
Like crimes of passion,
Live in tender infatuation, towards
Unknown slavery, and
We mere mortals seek fancy pages
Like tombstones in the desert.

Poem Of A New Year!

2009-01-06T20:35:00.000-08:00

A half naked woman, in her late twenties
There she stood with scratches, waiting for me
In the lawn, waiting for a magic.

A part of a true story.

In the shadow, a shivering movement of limbs
Another dismantled stretcher, and a crying daughter
In my lap, a pillow of her bosoms.

Another true story.

A window with a torn curtail
A door without lobs
And a passage of torn letters;
The house couldn’t interpret the pain
The half naked pregnant woman carries.

This is my poem of a new year,
True stories of heartless despairs.

Death Fragrance!

2009-01-05T00:04:00.000-08:00

It’s hard to follow the whims insane
It’s hard to understand the rhetoric lies
But the fragrance of livelihood,
And the certain evidence on inhibition;
They all come in hordes
While I am dying!

Like a routine,
I return to my four-walled rented room
Anytime I wanted to return home;
Certain fragrance draws me there
And I wish to call it my home.

Like a die hard habit,
I breathe my soul, in and out
Every time I wanted to feel alive;
The exhilarating gasp in the mouth
And I wonder about this life.

Not to be taken seriously,
I was not happy doing the rounds, of a life
Breathing, eating, sleeping
All I wanted was to smell the life, and
Lost in its fragrance.

Diagnosis!

2009-01-04T23:49:00.000-08:00

That day, I wore nothing but a thin layer of skin
And they put me through a machine
The machine sucked my soul through little veins
And they call hope in practice.

And amidst the duel
I observed a funny exercise
And they called it Diagnosis!

My beloved, who wore a sub-routine make-up;
She murmured and touches my breath,
Her tender palm in my rippled chest
And few drops of tears,
And I thought,
We have a lifetime to copulate.

The machines
They stoop so low
They devise all fickle mechanisms
And there, I was a pig
A dirty pig
A snorting pig;
A pig through the machine
And the conclusion was a pretentious hope.

The machine and me and the diagnosis;
My weary skin couldn’t care less,
Except for a hope:
Besides my body,
She stood tall!

Pity On My Expectation!

2008-12-17T04:49:00.000-08:00

My understanding never exceeds my expectation,
This is how I built my world around.
A rising Sun, it never disguises my sight
Neither the dying Moon,
They all charm me, and
I live my life, thoroughly understood!

But my understanding, it precedes my existence
I know the honest contemplation:
It survives amidst the ruins of livelihood
Again my understanding, it surrenders to the existence.

My expectations are limited;
‘A simple breathe in the fresh air,
Few threads of fibre, and
A warm wet kiss’,
And my understanding forbids me all the qualms!

So, how do I go about living, in my existence?

Every night, I burn myself, bit by bit
Not to arouse any further temptation that
They heartily called life.
I wanted to burn myself,
Not because I can’t sleep
Nor because I am afraid of the awaiting Morning
But only because,
There isn’t enough love to satiate my hunger
And there isn’t not enough prejudice in my favour
To love me, like I love myself.

In fact, I am hungry and this is my understanding
And I am afraid if it will exceed my expectation.

An Inconsequential Occasion Called Life!

2008-12-15T06:14:00.000-08:00

I stand alone,
In front of a disdained mirror, and
Tried calling myself a name
But a voice within said:
“He is no more!”
I respect its earnest disposition,
But my invocation was left unanswered;
May be it was a different alibi:
I stand there and it stood nowhere.

This isn't a poem on life, but on the occasion.

Life Vs. Dead!

2008-12-14T00:53:00.000-08:00

My soul wails:
“I am dying”,
And my eyes, all red
Try to weep, but the mirror;
It smiled back.

This is only a life
I thought thus,
And I carry on living
Day after day!

Please, I should die,
Life should never be spent in mercy
Not even in our own shadow.

Thus, I wanted to die again…
Snow flakes and cleavages
And the impending kiss;
Yes, I have nothing more,
For a life,
Except the beauty of it
And its procreation
For another life!

A Dead Man's Poem!

2008-12-14T00:30:00.000-08:00

I have a dead body
And it lives with me
The face reads contemplation
The body wears introspection
But it has no name?

Help me identify this body:
I am not a curator of dead bodies, nor
The merchant of dead.
Help me identify this body,
Or at least, help me give it a name:
I think, I am a social being
I should know who is he, and
I want to see how he would have ignored the name!

Tell me,
Will you be comfortable living with an unknown person?
Anyway, let me tell you what I think:
This is a simple understanding
I have had friends
They all have names
And their bodies, it all represents
Who I known them to be?
Some even died of generosity
And some even ostracize their names,
May be out of humility
But I still remember them all,
With a stroke of a word.

But this body,
Lying idle next to me;
Now, I am weary of it’s presence,
Sometimes, it stinks like my body
Sometimes, it reminds me of my lost body.

Oh, I forgot to introduce myself
I have no name
And my body was lost too.

Voice Of A Lousy Timid!

2008-12-11T11:16:00.001-08:00

So, here I am, again with few blurts
Look closely, you will see the fizz in the slit
That’s not the blame,
But only an upshot from a night’s stay.

Blurts, in a civilized society, is only a froth
With or without passion.
And the noise it fills, is yet another excuse;
You know, the bastards and their holy wars,
Who really cares if the noise shields the gunshots?
Anyway, a slit was there
And those blurts within the cultural paradigm;
Not yet done, the fizz in the air
And the blemish within the pretext of servitude.

For me, they are just blurts, like my poems
Excuses, nuances and humanity.
So, few more blurts, few more slits
And the corresponding night,
That hardly brings a Good Morning,
It has few more pages to lived by.
For me, it is an upshot, and
My blurts are ever ready for the occasion.

Voice of a lousy timid, I guess!

The Lamp-post, My Sweetheart!

2008-12-06T03:36:00.000-08:00

A dirty lamp-post that I called my sweetheart,
It stood there, waiting for me
Every night, in a raunchy street.

Through the canteen, I passed by
And the undisclosed infatuation and the pervert thereof
Chide me every single night, and my humility, so humbled
Hug it so tight; it refuses to let me go.

Thus it became my sweetheart.

A step aback and a glance
Moments later,
My wife back home,
Her warm beguile
And some splendid creatures in the lawn,
They all forbid me my domestication with the lamp-post;
They all afraid, I am alone
And I wonder how do they know!

By the infidels,
They called it the blot, but
For me it is a replenish theme on life.
By the faithful,
They called it passion, but
For me it is dream-song.

It stood there, all by itself
Asking questions and looking for an asylum.

It is indeed my sweetheart.

How She Became An Exhibitionist!

2008-12-06T02:07:00.000-08:00

If beauty ever could killed,
I would never have had a scare.
Rather, I would have succumbed:
No more, no less, and
The beauty could have been blamed.
But I knew,
Shadows are there to stay,
Like a puff on ramp;
Few taunts and moments of ecstasy.
There I should have known
Even prayers could have gone awry, all wrong!

Did I know:
A heaven is not enough,
For me, seven colours wasn’t enough either.
A gaze was there, followed by
A grave, in silence.

Beauty, is all like that
Imperfections, tears and eyeballs;
Dolls, hairs and wails.

At least, she became an exhibitionist!

So I write!

2008-12-06T02:01:00.000-08:00

In the heart,
She loves to read and write.

Once, she talked about words
That breathed like her soul;
Initially, I was confused:
How do she breathes
And if there are enough words
For a heart, to
Read and write.

Again,
It’s hopeless, just to think about the heart.
In fact, words are useless
If they are to be buried like corpses.

Even more,
She knew nothing;
She only talked a rhyme, all life long.

And today,
I have some words, and
A heart.

So I write.

Smiling Faces!

2008-12-06T01:58:00.000-08:00

She will smile, but
You knew she was long dead;
A cold feeling!

What kind of poem is this?

A cold poem,
A bit of sagacity
A bit of love
And cold eyes
But lots of smiling faces;
Still a cold feeling!

I am afraid of smiling faces.

Innocence?

2008-11-21T16:47:00.000-08:00

Innocence, they called so
And he seeks the rime in the frosty nights
May be the chilled bones are gung ho;
Enough for a hungry life
That cherishes the untamed tranquility!

Once in a while,
The hungry soul veiled the cruse
But the subsequent moments were contentious;
Every prejudice and all the favours,
Should we still call it innocence?

Handshake!

2008-11-21T16:43:00.000-08:00

A rather lukewarm handshake and some other prosaic obligations; thus mark the meeting of friends and colleagues. During schooldays, there were no such routine announcements by whimpers of a ˜hi’ or ˜hello’. May be we were too raw to season for such servitudes that come with age. But we all felt certain warmth meeting classmates though only after a night’s hiatus. It went for some years.

And today, it seems we are contempt to hug some huge bellies that calls themselves friends. Bully me if I wasn’t a true friend. But the predicaments are more of a prediction like a tenured associate in a firm, who grasps hands like buttering do. Sorry, that shouldn’t be the equation. Rather it should be like: “Make friends before you need them”. So selfish! But think it other way around; you are also one friend to a friend. And the probability factors are high that you might also be just another friend for your so-called friend. A de-facto friend to a quasi friend! Have you ever wonder who stabs, at the back?

The epithet was handshake. Sometimes, it seems we are playing Merry-Go-Round-A-Bush, but without merry. A has three friends all by handshake; B has 20 friends all by obligation and all are happy to swim in the cesspool called friendship. Indeed, friend of friend and my friend! No worries! Everybody has got friends worth a sigma to calibrate the acceptability quotient. How well an individual can mingle and imprint the affable chubby chubby audacity in the group, it is too well decided by the numbers of swarms. Almost impossible to ignore the sight in the cafeteria and at the gallows of food plazas! And another one just fussed in the smoke, at the tea-stall; a sip, a nip, a pup; and we are all friends. Isn’t it?

Have you seen a hand always jutted out from the pit and ever ready for a grasp that we called handshake? Affairs of not so prominent individuals and their malign introspections on friendship kills me my thought on friendship. Only yesterday, I could finish this piece on friendship as one of my friends called me a wasted friend, may be out of sheer pleasure as I have forgot that handshake.

Next time, you meet your friends or in fact, any other human being, first ask for a handshake. A handshake is worth a shake.

Spare Bullets!

2008-11-20T15:59:00.000-08:00

I have no words,
Either to loathe or damn the curse
Of being born in Manipur!

So many bad dreams,
But not a single nightmare, and
Each day, a promise here and there;
It's bad.

If you can't digest, or even
If you can't annihilate what's infested in my veins,
Why you need to wield a gun?

Believe you me;
It's all pain in the name of resistance.
Believe you me;
We have blood in the veins.

It seems:
You have spare bullets for each of us
And wanted us to wake up late.
You know,
It's not safe to stay awake,
Late in the night.
You might remember,
It's when dark that do they hunt;
Or may be:
He wanted to check the grim reality;
No, ask his mother:
He was only a child with some responsibilities.

Are you afraid of his words, or
Are you a bastard?

Look around,
He is still here, next to you.
Look,
He smiles at you, at you.

Oinam High School!

2008-11-15T21:45:00.000-08:00

There came leaders in white suites,
They called netas.
There followed kids in pink sandals,
Smuggled from Moreh.
And we wide-eyes,
Observed the passing of the time, in silence!

Hello,
I wanted to count some days in my favour
But the silence annoyed me to the chagrin
'The silence is like sin',
I was taught thus!

Oh!
The school was 50 years old
And it has 50 walls for 50 seasons:
Few autumns, few summers, and
Lots of boycotts.
The patches of mud and straw,
And the naked black-boards;
They stand stubborn,
With stakes of low-waist jeans, and
The racket of cellphones…
The resistance of an institution, I guess!

Few blocks north,
Clouds of smoke blow;
In the classroom,
Rare gems taunt the alphabets
And it tarnishes the legends,
Dusts, noise, dreams, circles…

To Home And Back, And Lots Of Questions!

2008-11-15T20:50:00.000-08:00

I was on board, with safety belts. Going home after some years, I think four years. These four years, I have not done any traveling, except going to office and coming back and off course, few marketing trips. So, the journey was riveting and sort of adventure for me.

I didn’t sleep the night before, couldn’t wait to catch the flight home. Anxiety prevailed big time. There were images I never thought would be so lively, so far away from themselves. Mind-game? There were times; I would have loved to see them but, it was not possible to rest those imageries without seeing them in reality.

I wanted to see our new home that I never been to, I wanted to hold my little sister’s newborn daughter, I wanted to walk barefoot in the paddy field again and I wanted to cry again for my dried plants. All those memories of childhood, they were all in front of me as if I am part of it. I know, I can’t ignore myself from being a part of it. But I am aware that I have made myself vulnerable to my own belief that I have become distant from all of them; those fields, those evenings…

In fact, those memories have become a heavy baggage itself, a collective resonance inside me. Few tears drops could have done favours upon me, but I played stubborn player with little or no knowledge that reminiscences do haunt like anything. That was a art until I board the flight.

Beauty, in everything!

The thought was seminal, for a happy journey. Mother waiting for me, father pretending not to bother by my arrival! How happy they would be, that was a foolish reminder to me. Parents, they have all the love and we have all the excuses. I had a million excuses.

Now that I have returned again to my exile, I fear had I exhausted the excuses against the responsibilities.

A Few Words On Life!

2008-11-12T10:13:00.000-08:00

It’s deeply personal for me,
Water is not enough to quench my thirst; may be
My stewed body needs more than a glass of water; may be
A can of Diet Coke can replace it in the name of futility.

Somehow, something has drugged me my body,
That too in the name of struggle, that they refer life
And proclaimed a civilization on consumerism.

Man is also a good species
It only needs some love and tender.

Far from my courtyard,
Down to his factory
There are never ending trail of futile labour with
The cries in the roadside chugging along,
I have my guts swelled with panic
And it is personal for me.

Different versions of democracies
Different takers of liberty
How it differs with my neighbours
It’s all very personal for me.

There were queues, now
All we have is a partition,
A single partition
But so prominent,
It is no more personal for me.

The Pain with Wisdom Teeth!

2008-11-12T06:25:00.000-08:00

Is this pain worth? I doubt it. I was presumed to be wiser, by now. I mean, I am no more a teenager. But wiser, I doubt it too. Wiser or not, a pain never ceases to haunt me. First time, it happened so while I was just about to join Higher Secondary after my High School. It hurt, I remember. But it brought pleasant expectations, rather prospects of being a grown up. And I thought, the pain was worth for a person to be declared matured. It could be one most those defining phases of life. Unluckily, I didn’t know that it was only a jaw-cular pain, nothing more. But the experience was not a jocular pain.

Just returned from home, after attending Ningol Chakkouba. After a long time, I got to savour good enough delicacies to satisfy my hidden vice of gluttony. I was happy. Six days at home and some twenty invitations! That was not ordinary and mother’s feed, that wasn’t ordinary either; for guy who has been staying far away from home for some good years.

And that pain again.

In between, I forgot what has transpired within the last few months. I was naïve.

This past September, I had my share of trouble. Fever and all. I blame it on seasonal change for good. But the actual reason, no, cause was a maverick Wisdom Tooth, which has been trying to protrude for the last 14- 15 years. Its struggle associates my own struggle with lots of loathsome pain. I can’t eat, I can’t open my mouth, and I can’t even smile. And I had to take sick leave for none of my fault. It was not fault. I have good numbers of teeth. I don’t need that extra tooth, for whatever reason; of being wiser or grown up mature. I can even open cokes and beer bottles, with bare teeth. I am proud of my teeth, but this extra tooth, I am not happy.

Ok. I forgot to mention that, unlike most of you guys, my jaw does not have enough space for these latecomers.

I do wonder, where and how it lay dormant for better parts of the year and sprung to life whenever there is change is climate, from cold to hot, from winter to summer. Even, I can’t traveled from one place to another having different season. It will just arrive without any notice, every few months break. And poor me; I suffer the pain. Even my parents are worried lot. And at office, everybody thinks that I am growing it for fun.

And the worst part is, every time I consult doctors to remove it surgically, some said it requires some more time to mature it, so that they can hold it to extract. Some said, it is not good to extract. It directly links to nervous system. May be they are seeking pleasure in the jaw-cular pain.

By the way, it is called Mandibular Third Molar. I don’t know how the name Wisdom Teeth came into being. Whichever name it fits well, I am not happy with it.

Few months from now, I will have another duel with my Wisdom Teeth. I hope, this time I will certainly gain some wisdom.