The New Gods

The other day, 
I caught myself thinking, 
Wondering whether the old Gods, 
Still walk this earth. 

Do they anymore dwell,
In the din,
Of our shuddering cities? 
Or is the fuel for the fires,
The flames in our engines, 
All that remains,
Of their lifeblood we drained?

In the dust, ash and grime,
It is hard to find, 
Marks of the divine, 
When these desolate lands, 
Like the bent broken backs,
Shells of their bodies, 
That still stand. 

Maybe the old Gods are lost to us, 
We've been left abandoned, 
To perish by the torments, 
Of our own devices.

Yet we need to hold on, 
To hope,
That hiding in the breeze, 
And the shades of trees, 
In the gurgle of a cool stream, 
Are the new Gods, 
Gods who will rise to reclaim this earth, 
Gods who will heal the creation we've hurt, 
They who will lead us to rebirth. 

Love, Undefeated.

This time, last year, 
I'd been writing about love, 
As something that could only be, 
Spoken about in abstractions, 
A feeling which, I feared, 
I'd never again encounter, 
Blooming inside my barren heart. 

Love seemed to dwell in my poetry, 
Like a shadow that was just out of reach,
Words stained by the remains, 
Of what I ached for, 
And couldn't find. 

But now that I can breathe again, 
Feel the heart in my chest beat again, 
See my mouth open in laughter and kisses again ( Oh the kisses! ) ,
And notice her touch warm my blood, 
I know fortune has smiled once more, 
I have found what I thought I'd lost, 
I am in love once more.

The love that she has granted me, 
Makes me feel ageless and pure, 
I feel boundless when I look into her eyes,
Her love gives meaning to my life.

Revive

It's been a while, 
Since I've written some poetry,
And I think I know why,
That words now elude me.

Over the years, poetry,
Had become for me, 
A way to survive,
    The hell inside,
A silent scream for help, 
Words that hoped to be heard,
All the cries that they held.

I had learnt those words so well,
Words of sadness and pain, 
That when you arrived, and the hurt ebbed, 
I  was left unprepared and ill-equipped, 
Stranded with phrases that didn't fit. 

Can you tell,
That I am trying to write something happy?
That I am once again learning to smile?
And I am looking for words anew, 
That let me show you, 
The light and the joy,
That inside me rises once more.

I am in love, 
I have the strength,
To not drown in the deep, 
In the sea of darkness that I've let,
Lap on the edges of my soul.

I am happy, 
And I am alive, 
Maybe now I will find words that glow,
Write a little poetry,
With lines that flow,
To honor what you've made me see,
That I am revived, 
At a place where we can thrive.

A Broken World

When last I wrote,
I thought I could break through,
Stir something in you, 
Find the depths of apathy,
But maybe there's still some ways to go, 
Until I find the collective limit. 

Would it be more sad, or less?
If the other reason, 
Is that all of you are now just numb, 
To the pain,
That there's just too many words around,
Too much of the same,
And if that's the case,
I don't know what to say.

But that doesn't make the pain,
Any less real, does it? 
And those who can write about it, 
Perhaps they're the ones speaking,
For the rest of you. 

Tell me, we're all so angry now, 
All the time, aren't we? 
Pretending to care for others,
Acting as if we can feel,
Their hurt and agony,
Yet all the while, 
Unable to care for even our own selves,
All of us are in grief, 
Just beneath the veneer of peace,
There's so much hostility,
But surprisingly,
I find myself simultaneously,
Incapable of violence.

I think we're an angry people,
Living in a broken world,
A world of rising seas and burning forests,
Of tyranny and failing democracies,
And I think that you need to wake up,
Wake up to the fractured society,
Wake up and let yourself feel,
Because words are failing now,
Falling on tired eyes and frozen hearts,
Words are no more enough now, 
It's time we rose, it's time to move,

So what are we going to do?

Would Kafka Be Proud?

A little every day,
I inch towards certain death,
A worm eats its way,
A gaping hole through my head. 

Defenceless, I bear witness, to the hurt,
And the cold, cruel, unfeeling,
Hearts of the new world,
From which to flee,
I dream, 
        Of either my own dying,
Or I scream,
For destruction, 
The unravelling at the seams,
Of the world around me.

This darkness that I carry, 
                             I would shed gladly, 
This wall of words, 
                           I'd let crumble freely, 
If I was held today, 
Cradled by gentle hands,
Caressed, 
By a solitary sign of being wanted,
Onto the scraps, I would hold, 
                               Shreds of desire,
Swinging from the pegs of hope,
I could rest my shield, 
                                Quench the fire,
I would finally yield,
Walk away,
                  From the blazing pyre.

Alas, this earth is tired, 
Over us all a dismal, desolate shroud, 
If he knew, of the depths of my despair, 
Would Kafka be proud?

A Pile of Lines

At every hint of hurt,
And every sign of pain,
I've turned to poetry,
Turned myself into poetry,
Bleeding words, in meaning sparse,
Over and over, until a pile of lines,
Is the only thing sheltering me.

I haven't been feeling much of late,
The silence of my heart has been,
Disconcerting,
Shallow, dreary days, and the burden of fate,
Had me thinking,
There was no more to bleed. 

But I need the words,
I need the verses,
Today, I need every letter,
That I can muster,
To stem the torrent,
That threatens to flow,
From under the scabs on my heart,
Stirs raw, uncontained,
Grief from long ago,
Stains the links of the fetter,
That I so urgently strain against.

Words, fickle words,
To soften the blow,
I turn to poetry again,
To keep myself from going insane.

Grace

Someone asked me,
What are you looking for?
How do you want, 
Your lover to be?

I couldn't say anything then,
But I've been thinking,
The woman from my dream,
Who is she?

Here's my answer. 
Fanciful, perhaps,
Presumptuous, probably,
But this is a draft,
A very rough draft,
Of how I want my partner to be. 

I want her to be someone who understands,
not just art, but the importance of art,
the necessity of creation,
Someone whose life is art. 

The woman I love, 
I wish her to be attuned to the Earth,
Respectful of the natural way,
Who seeks to unite the knowledge of the ancient people,
Despite the modern life far-removed from the roots.

I would like her to be invested in the history of humankind,
The stories of our ancestors,
Because in those lies the wisdom,
That illuminates the coming days,
The right path, the good path. 

The partner I choose,
To be by my side till the end of our time,
Must have a conception of,
The greater purposes if being alive,
A woman who, for all the regular successes,
Understands that life should be lived to be fulfilled,
A person who seeks adventure easily,
And each day is,
Without regret,
Without boundaries,
Without compulsions,
Someone who prizes freedom,
One who is mindful of,
The indispensable liberty of the individual. 

I want to be with a woman,
Who has a touch of the insane,
For her to look at the world, 
And see it with a vision of her own, 
Wild, 
Divergent,
Unrestrained.

And most of all, 
I want her to have grace. 

The Stranger

I have no poetry for what I want to write now. The feeling is at once out of place and familiar, and rhymes will just hold me back. Last night, I couldn’t sleep, and while listening to music that takes me away to a peaceful place, I understood what’s been bothering me, what eats at me.

I have understood, that I am a stranger in my own land, that the places that speak my name aren’t here. The books I’ve read, the songs I’ve heard, all of that has taken me away from the places I’ve lived in, and away from the people around me. It has put a distance that I have been unable to find a bridge to. The gap between me and them, has grown much in the recent years. The more I’ve found my true calling, the more that I’ve found the depths inside myself; the more I find myself distanced in my heart and mind from the ones around me.

It is no wonder then, that I have felt so abandoned and lonely for so long a time. Not just in my search for a romantic relation, but in even in other aspects too, there is hardly anyone who complements me in the breadth and depth of my thoughts; someone who resonates with my beliefs and the values I live by.

So, I am left a stranger in my everyday life. What I see in my mind’s eye, I have met none who share the vision. It’s as if I am unseen and unheard by anyone I talk to. The language I speak in, it’s not of the here and now, the life I live is not of this place or time. I am the stranger to everyone I know. Never understood, never accepted. I have never belonged, but everywhere I’ve gone, I’ve felt that I’ve been there before.

In my heart, I pray to the Gods that have looked upon us through time, that I soon find my people. People who are not of this time, but of some age in the past when humans were one with the Earth, when honour and morality wasn’t so alien, so hard to grasp; when the words we spoke was truthful till every last syllable. Misfits now, we belong to places where the divine isn’t lost, and we walked with the Gods. A way of life where the children never lost their way, and we found wisdom from the ancestors, where nature was respected and feared, and legacy was of values, not material. I hope to be with those people, who love with all their hearts, and live with all their souls. People who are not afraid of the old ways. Companionship that speaks through time, in the language of the universe. Human beings who understand that we’re meant for so much more.

If You’d Only Ask

If you'd only ask me,
Say, " Tell me what you want? "
I'd let my tongue be set free,
I would show you what I need,
Speak of what I want. 

I lean in close,
To whisper,
Softly in your ear, 
Secrets that I've held in my heart,
The depths of my desire.

If you ask me what I want, 
I'll tell you, that I want you, 
That I long to breathe in, your skin,
Drink long and deep,
The scent that flows from every pore, 
Intoxicating. 

In a trance, a slow dance,
I'll undo the knots and the clasps,
To peel what covers you,
To reveal, the flesh that holds me,
Captive.

Enraptured, an eternity in time,
Where our bodies lay entwined,
When the world holds its breath,
And the earth stands still,
By the hand I take you, 
Lead you up to a breathless peak,
On that burning, shimmering hill.

Afterwards,
When the outside world,
Has started creeping back in,
And the light of the fading day,
Across the floor is spread thin, 
In my arms you shall lay.

And then, 
In that shadowy space,
We'll speak of our dreams, our lives,
The ideas we chase,
Bridge our wishes, shape our fates,
Of what we are to build, 
The legacy we'll create.

If only you'd ask,
I would tell you,
Everything that we need to know. 

An Offering To Death

Oftentimes, I've imagined myself sitting in a field,
Alone, in the middle of an empty expanse,
Away from spectators, and their prying glance,
I listen to the heavens in their silence, 
And think, is this where I shall finally yield?

But in that sanctuary, I fret in an uneasy peace,
Far in the distance, there is a growing gloom,
and I am defenseless in the face of impending doom.

Often, I've found myself in a field of grass alone,
While around gathers an awful storm,
So before I can rest, and take a breath,
I have to brace against the rising gale,
I must first stay and wait, to keep ruin at bay. 

There have also been times, 
When I've sat under the bright blue sky,
I've looked into that limitless depth and wondered,
A question that perhaps is as old as thought itself,
And has already been a million times pondered.

In the scale of the Earth, and immensity of space,
What import do our lives hold, what are they worth? 
How do we dance and sing, and write about our dreams,
In letters so bold,
When it will all be gone without a trace?

I've sat under the wide spread of the sky,
And felt that all of the art we make, the words we write,
Hold eternity inside them, a hope that our fleeting lives,
Though nothing at all, but a blink in an instant of time,
Reach out to become everything at once, 
That is wondrous in the universe,
And endure until long after our days have ended,
A reassurance to those who are to come after, 
That it all means something, 
That to be human is know of coming death, 
Yet to sing.

So I still go to sit in that empty field, 
Listen to the coming storm,
Look up to the skies, laughing I wield,
Words that I form, into a shield,
To death an offering of this verse I give.