Poems

Hooves have marched up the moat The glint through an eclipse – a rounded deceit Black flags ululate the kohl-rimmed hearts Burns the muslin Queen with the other rajputanis In pyres of vermilion. Tormented Hooves have marched up the moat The glint through an eclipse – a rounded deceit Black flags ululate the kohl-rimmed hearts Burns the muslin Queen with the other rajputanis In pyres of vermilion. Tormented flesh, the scattered Taj, Looted gold, slaves handcuffed. The Sultan’s mighty, is this how he loves? His savagery proliferates Branding surrendered arms, the royal Darbar The war cry has long bled the emblem, all sons Headless heap now, ... Read More

That summer unbridled a kalbaishakhi on our delta door and three terracottas landslided a quarter of the sky over my bed, soaking with petulance. I gazed above at that biasness of an open eye crackling a threaThat summer unbridled a kalbaishakhi on our delta door and three terracottas landslided a quarter of the sky over my bed, soaking with petulance. I gazed above at that biasness of an open eye crackling a threat on our soggy sorrows perimetered by our tribulations while the fronds outside ruffled and wrestled the jargon of electric poles, bird nests, and langurs, driving them away jubilant. As the wailing wind lashed hailstones that turned water ... Read More

Those crunch-green translucent ferns drink pools of sunshine, rain, birdsongs off the red-footed pipal dance, beneath which they blossom bursting with paper-thin choir of their mantle that grieves its bushfireThose crunch-green translucent ferns drink pools of sunshine, rain, birdsongs off the red-footed pipal dance, beneath which they blossom bursting with paper-thin choir of their mantle that grieves its bushfire veins running, drawing from the soil of other - its otherness. In their giving the native elements shine with a light made more beautiful having found something to seep through -the chiffon mist, latticework, leaves, others. ... Read More

On that rain swept day turning from the ATM Strepsils in my tongue rolling I manifested that boy from our school science fair who had braved our convent-bred meanness with his rhyming ink gurgling in my throat On that rain swept day turning from the ATM Strepsils in my tongue rolling I manifested that boy from our school science fair who had braved our convent-bred meanness with his rhyming ink gurgling in my throat which I gulped whole with the lemon lozenge. I grinned with the hard deposit choking my chest taut, which his libertine mistook for my coy fortitude, Asked if I’d like to grab some coffee, the weather playing perfect ploy? My veto slipped ... Read More

With its blind faith to the sun the carrot plunges deep, so deep it has nowhere to go. The heights thus forsaken bulges it into a saffron weed pulled and dangled at best serving a piece meal modi fied.With its blind faith to the sun the carrot plunges deep, so deep it has nowhere to go. The heights thus forsaken bulges it into a saffron weed pulled and dangled at best serving a piece meal modi fied. ... Read More

The falling autumn sun on my back ripcords the colours into a bloom as you enter my garden woody with the notes of my perfume bottled in the roots, resins, russets: r a m p a g e d, which trips you afresh with The falling autumn sun on my back ripcords the colours into a bloom as you enter my garden woody with the notes of my perfume bottled in the roots, resins, russets: r a m p a g e d, which trips you afresh with wilderness of a love sown jade as I cough a pinwheel of petals in a pink cascade to remind you that the day’s done. ... Read More

The rasp of sand on sieve, flipping urgency in rice grains on heat, an entourage to the jangle of her dozen green translucent dreams sold to her at the village fair wafting of love through hordes in sherwThe rasp of sand on sieve, flipping urgency in rice grains on heat, an entourage to the jangle of her dozen green translucent dreams sold to her at the village fair wafting of love through hordes in sherwanis and seheras alike matched with mannequin reds conceding to a horoscoped fate indistinguishable like the men in her new home, who take turns to unveil her at nights distributed even by the hypostyles of power and precedence, ... Read More

In her dream she's sitting beneath a coral jasmine tree needling a bloom smelling the freshly mown grass, coral mulch, lemon tea stitching the moment into timelessness. Her handiwork hooped within a frame hasIn her dream she's sitting beneath a coral jasmine tree needling a bloom smelling the freshly mown grass, coral mulch, lemon tea stitching the moment into timelessness. Her handiwork hooped within a frame has screwed tight the starched vulnerabilities for the pricks of silk tradition. She has spent hours imagining the final design _ a pretence of choice. ... Read More

I wake up in the night feeling the same seismic shift When my mother had died Seventeen years ago, at eight fifty-five to be precise Or perhaps even before- when her tongue sucked the diagnosis like sorbitratI wake up in the night feeling the same seismic shift When my mother had died Seventeen years ago, at eight fifty-five to be precise Or perhaps even before- when her tongue sucked the diagnosis like sorbitrate Cancer: a foaming ancient lute which calcifies the core into an instant fossil The opposite of life is not death It’s the silence that’s ever so alive in the surrounding mirrored tiles when you first listen saying it to yourself: Cancer ... Read More

Snuggled under the spell of the Doordarshan newsreader who only looked at me, I first felt the adult flush of a Cold War chattering the stormy newsclip transmitted from the snow-blinded USA and USSR whichSnuggled under the spell of the Doordarshan newsreader who only looked at me, I first felt the adult flush of a Cold War chattering the stormy newsclip transmitted from the snow-blinded USA and USSR which tinkled and drifted the two ice-cubes floating in my synthetic orange drink. Soon after, marooned bare on a glacial ice slab licensed to bring me back from a fever burning 226 Fahrenheit I had tasted foreign at the age of eleven T ... Read More