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.

Silence II / Nornir

At the foot of the world tree, 
Sit Urðr, Skuld, and Verðandi,
Tending the sacred Yggdrasil,
With the waters of Urðarbrunnr, 
The wise maidens three.

The Norns, they're called,
Daughters of giants old, 
In silence they braid,
Weave and untwine,
And snip the strands,
When it's our time, 
Of the threads of our fate. 

It is said when the Norns,
Work two threads into one,
The lives tied, converge,
Their destinies merged.

My heart is quiet,
Of late,
Not from sorrow, nor from fear,
I converse,
But not in the words of haste,
In the silence of the empty room,
I listen to the sounds of fate.

For if the threads of our lives,
Are being woven with each other,
I pray the Norns work the knits,
Close together,
And fashion the yarn to last.

That in our days to come,
There is peace, 
That we seek honour,
There is hope, and joy, 
Our hearts kept safe from hurt,
Our flow of time in concert.

Peace

As I start to write this,
I am filled by an overwhelming,
Sense of futility,
So many words, and for what?
Doesn't it look like we're all stuck in a rut?

I've been praying, you know?
Praying for peace,
A peace that can embrace our world,
I've been praying to all the Gods.

Because right now?
Our lives are chaos,
Days spent in fear of what's coming,
And all we do, 
Is look on in horror.

We look on in horror, 
Powerless, 
As our world is wrecked,
Our kinship brought to its knees,
By whom, you ask?
It's only the few,
The few  who hide, 
Hide behind pretty words,
From behind the glittery shadows,
Their vile plots reach,
Tentacles that are a puppeteer's strings.

I'm sure we all know what needs to be done,
Do you know the meaning of insurrection?
There's a time to wait, 
And there's a time to go,
And this, this is that time, 
I'm just afraid that we're already too late.

It's our country goddammit,
Our world, our planet,
And it's sick, 
It is dying,
And if we don't stop this,
All of it will be for nothing, isn't it?

I hope we know what we need to do,
I hope we're brave enough to do it too,
Cut the cancer out, 
And if the roots are well past revival,
We need a resurrection. 

I've been praying, you see,
Praying for peace, 
A peace for you and me, 
A peace that saves us all,

A peace that isn't war. 

Hunger

We humans seem to have forgotten,
That nature is not kind, 
And it never was,
Through these years of civilization,
And cultivation,
Of emotions and our mind,
We have strayed, misplaced the knowledge,
Of what is natural,
What is wild. 

I don't think nature knows,
Or cares,
That in it we see beauty,
And seek grace,
These words are just human sentiment,
Emotions we've conjured to brace,
Our race against a creation without pity,
The universe, does it weep for every death?

Even if we turn a blind eye,
To our instincts, hide our wild side,
With our urban lives,
Behind it all is something cruel,
That doesn't always show,
But it isn't easy to hide,
At times the violence spills,
Out in twisted ways,
Deviant, the savagery in our lives,
Cloaked in culture, it roams the streets.

You see, nature is unforgiving,
In all of its elegance,
It only seeks efficience,
We think we're past it,
Over the ruthlessness,
That survival demands,
But what is morality?
What are values, to any other being?
To an eagle, or the fish it picks,
A lion, or the fawn it eats,
What is right, but only the hunger inside?

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.