The Chemistry of Love

Love exists in allotropic forms.
Happiness could be the purest..
Or let us say most benign?
She is also Fear sometimes
Hiding her hairy moustache
With her transient tears.
In absence of patience or sometimes acceptance
She turns into the serpent
Of a constant,insatiable Anger
Or most of the times
Between wives and sisters
Crystallizes into a putrid substance
Called Jealousy.
She can turn into tyrannical authority
Without any warning
And sometimes extreme disappointment
So much so that every day
Seems like a big burden
There are nicer forms too
Like the one where eyes well up
With hysterical laughter
And all the other allotropes dissolve
Into a warm bubbling concoction
That suddenly makes everything
Seem happily possible
And makes you smile. Involuntarily.
I think that form is Friendship.

Breath

Poor impalpable breath!
Always gets overshadowed
By the opinionated mind.
But keeps his master's house
Clean, by going everywhere
With a bit of fresh air!

He puts his fleshy hands
On his master's shoulders
Only when really needed
When the nagging mind is left
Insufficient and exhausted
He comes out as a sigh!

Or when running up the hill
When the persistent bespectacled bookworm
Is muffled by the throbbing heart
He provides rhythm to the tired master
And prays him to go on.

Sometimes between sobs
Sometimes between laughter
Sometimes singing from a clogged nostril
With the change to an early winter

And in desperate moments of confusion
When the conscious wants to unwind
A deep breath in salvages sanity
From the tortures of the restless mind!

Grace and Gravity

Is Grace the reaction to Gravity?

It could be in the world of 

Trees, Birds and Dancers. 

Or even in the world of the freckled pebble

Thrown by a turbid mind

Into the calm lake that makes

Hypnotic, beautiful ripples. 

A little red dot skiing on a snowy slope

Or a tap dancer trying to make her point

In the gypsy drummer's argument

A butterfly flaunting her weightlessness

And an elephant showing off his gait

To an awestruck angry dog on the street. 

And even in the dimensionless world

Inside the black and blonde heads

Flippant thoughts trying to settle

Sometimes eluded at others deluded

Being pulled towards the core 

But trying to defy it, in their own adamant way. 

And when they eventually gather 

Over a day or a lifetime of fight

They turn into graceful dancers 

Who know when to leap 

And when to give in ..

And gracefully fold on stage!

Sea Meditation

Turquoise blue on golden sand..

Each seems to push ahead

Just a little here and a little there though

They are all like the ones in my head

But sometimes when the wind is right

 And when I get little mirrors for eyes

Sitting on top of  the Yogi rocks

The sea inside looks at the sea outside

One wave at a time, 

And one thought in my mind

Fifty,ninety till I lose the count

And also everything that I left behind..

Fresh air, bright sunshine

And my breath gives me a high tide

Then there is no sea behind my eyes

The sea outside becomes the sea inside! 

Empirical Worship

I try to reach You in my way

Sometimes like a scientist,

By resolving Anger and Fear

Into their primary colors

And then getting tired, angry and scared

Just to doze off in Your arms.

Sometimes like a poet,

Loving just to know How it feels..to love.

Sometimes honestly alone

And sometimes honestly sad

Sometimes finding happiness

in watching a line of ants walking by my bedside.

You are in the recipes I invent

In my own kitchen, just to realize later,

That I discovered something written ages ago

But then, the joy of finding You

Overpowers all the labels.

And in the free moments of my fearless solitude

As my eyes see a colorful kite

Playing hide and seek with the sun rays

I drop all my hopes in joy

And I call You my freedom.

I know by now that it is not easy

That all mothers are not free

The difference between hopelessness

In joy and sadness alike,

And the boundaries of liberty

I am grateful for that place

Between my heart and my mind

Where sometimes You come to visit me.

Gardening

Answers to a lot of everyday puzzles
grow in the vegetable patch in the backyard..
I used to wonder why people like gardening
Now I know.

Juicy tomatoes help forget
The dry and pointless discussions at work
Hot chili sometimes soothes
The chilly winds between two people
What you sow comes out faithfully
And usually grows in direct proportion
With the care taken.

A fully grown garden
With mango and gardenia trees
Invites yoga mats and garden salads
And so much companionship!
Probably because trees don't talk
And don't have opinions
People converse in silences
In the gardens that they make

Gardens never break
Never fight and never let you down
Maybe that is why everyone travels inwards
Sometime sooner or later
Into the Gardens.

Journey

I like being suspended between lands

Just for a while when I travel

You are on a plane, all packed 

And dressed in your casual best. 

The frenzy of leaving done with

And the haste of arriving still far away

On a cloud, sipping your wine

Picking fruit from the little fruit box

Presented to you with a professional alacrity

Going back after a long time 

With your immediate future taken care of

Flights,hotels and train tickets all arranged

But the far away future is like scrambled eggs

No room for ten-years-later 

Questions after questions and lots of them

To be answered (or dodged) starting from Mumbai airport. :)

At such times,  poor mind seeks solace

In this little comma in the air

That is going to keep you away, 

At least for a few hours..

From all the panic of arranging full-stops for you! 

Thank Heavens for Journeys.