Am delighted to announce a yahoo for verse--yes, who’d have thought it-- a selection of poems are up on Here and Now.
http://www.7beats.com/herenow.html

A requiem for J Dey
This Saturday
While the police were asleep
Not midnight but at two in the afternoon
A scribe, senior crime beat chief
Was shot down, in a posh lane
Not too far from his home.


So do they teach this at media school
This job hazard
Live by your creed and pen, fearless
Chase the oil mafia, water mafia, land mafia, police nexus
unravel the connects, cross connects, the give and take,
But always keep your will handy
For you never know
When you stub an invisible line
Trigger a bullet hailstorm

What coward hired gun
Pumps eight bullets close distance
Burns tire running away
The lone biker no more
The real villain roams loose
Mafia man or politico
Which cutting edge story, which expose
Pushed the buttons, scorched too close?

Now, if this were Bollywood,
We’d have staccato beat, clues unearthed
And a killer brought to justice by the last frame
Not pelting rain
That made a joke of the sketch the police circulated
Of the pipsqueak that ran tail
The scribe martyred, mowed down
So close to home
The vermin a needle in this city’s teeming haystack
Or ferreted to some distant corner
Never to be traced.

The goons changed faces, put on new names
But no escape, no succour or refuge , no place on earth
Saves from a mother’s wrath
And a wife’s lament
Because I like endings, I believe
justice of some kind will be done
perhaps

I do the math
chase the banks
nitpick, cross check dates
poring over yellowing notepaper
covered in your fragile handwriting.
(perfectionist personified.)
Fight with strangers over polite email
You’d have done it too,
shaking a fist at idiots
grimacing over the phone line, dulcet.
Is that being judgmental?
Nothing poetic I’m afraid,
about being a bad copy.

quote
To celebrate Emerson's 208th birthday, The Domino Project is republishing a work of art that's especially relevant today. Self-Reliance by Ralph Waldo Emerson urges readers to trust their intuition rather than conforming to the will of the majority

#Trust30 is an online initiative and 30-day writing challenge that encourages you to look within and trust yourself. Use this as an opportunity to reflect on your now, and to create direction for your future. 30 prompts from inspiring thought-leaders will guide you on your writing journey.
Unquote

I signed up for the prompt y’day, and took the journal route; pen and paper, my scrawl honest, direct hard-hitting and very personal as I wrote to myself five years ago and five years from now. Amazing exercise. Some things are best left off line

The philosopher Bhaan-dev, in his essay in Navneet Samarpan June 2011 presented an interesting hypothesis, one for me to surely remember if not read a few times a week. What he says is that Indian philosophy, Indian thought, and he quotes the sources from the scriptures and volumes, is all for living, for life as a celebration, as an offering to the Lord if you will, insomuch that war, death or decay are parts of a wholesome life as well. And that the thought of life as something to be renounced, to be shed, to be outgrown, a suffering to be borne with patience and tired fortitude, endless cycle of birth and death, is a later intervention, an influence perhaps of Buddhist thought.
Must read that essay like a mantra.

Cloudburst
Eddies race, gush swirl downhill
Kinetic energy, unleashed
Sometime a river here, the water remembers

#
Thunder drumroll
A clap makes you jump
Flashes of daylight
A church outlined.

#

Raintime medley, marching music
Tunes to wade, slosh to
Snatches, an antra here, club song chorus there
Music to whistle in the dark
Ladies and gentlemen, announcing the advent
The first ever rain!
#
Sun kissed morning
My usual park
An artgallery
Raindrops edge a bough
#

The sky four shades of charcoal
wind whips the gulmohars
rain!
mrignayni waits by the window
#

Frangipani, cloud in blue sky
The sea beneath - a glittering carpet
One could get used to this lifestyle
indolent
#

Chilled room
Incisive suits, sharp questions
The ocean generous, past the French windows
I better sit with my back to the view
#


Old ruin of a mansion, but what a mansion
Curving staircase, vast porch, balustrades
What a grand place this must have been
The nameplate faded, tattletale

Chanting in groups
Builds a energy difficult to define
Voices reach skywards, soar
Past the lamps, past the rangoli and marigolds
Irrelevancies, inconsequentials fall away
Sanctity-- perhaps this is what it means


#
The amaltas are a shade paler now
Waiting, still
Holding on to the sight of a cloud or two
The sun burns deep
humidity plasters the air

Haven't laughed as much in YEARS.
The kid and I used to have these laughter gales when neither of us could stop
laughing. And we'd have to stop because we'd be out of breath.
In years, I said.
Thank you, Amole Gupte.
Thank you, Stanley ka dabba.
What a kickass movie.
How can your life view not change after watching this.
When we went in, we were frowny, discussing money, inflation, taxes, knees and etc.
We came out laughing- sobered. How can you crib and moan after this.How.

Remembering my own dabba- a pinkish tiffin from kg onwards,
accompanied me thru various schools, gangs, groups, lunch under the mango tree.

Saluting Arora madam how terribly nice and patient she was with our
queries in Hindi,nonstop "difficult word maam, difficulty maam..." Not khadoos at all.

Also remembering Mrs Ganguly, classteacher, class 1, and whatever made her select me for a good behavior award that particular year, what exactly did she see, what did she latch on to, haven't figured out yet. The first and last of good behavior awards.

Go see the movie.

And I thought it only happened in fiction…Why do two people who once evidently cared for each other, willingly and willfully set out to destroy the other to nothingness, a pale shadow of their former selves? Past the cardboard pretence, so much so that there is nothing left, nothing much that one could call worthy or respected, at most tolerance, a living arrangement? Does familiarity breed contempt, after which ennui sets in, ensuring you whittle away at all that was vital, good and pure once? And fool me, I thought people were meant to grow together, reach for the sunlight, with overlapping and independent areas of interest.

To life, then...

EDITED: This is not about me.

I am good.
Watching deadlines whiz past overhead.
Sometimes chasing them.
Sometimes letting them go
At work and words.
Precarious life balance, imbalance
Impatience, tacky, not quality work
Want to hide in the hills
(go home, turn the clock back, but there is no home)
Balance,imbalance
Work and non-work
Empty walls
The words dried out
Till I grit my teeth, pull them words out.

The other day, a mint fresh copy of Reading Hour landed on my desk,
has "Flight from the Bastions".
Earlier issues: 7, Chinar Woods. Shefali Kamdar (trans.)

The nicest part about Reading Hour, other than the rich content, completely thorough crits, is how prompt they are with payment and copies. Rare.

But we have a tough skin.

Word tramp~

what I do then
Bloodhound-like
(private eye is too polite, way too polite)
in pursuit of hints and clues
or a trace, just a trace
of what may be a story, or not
anything for 400 words,
I sniff and scour the air
Wade through stacks
of yellowed newsprint
Stare at page 3 photos mostly,
Or sometimes page 3 types
Overhear conversations quite blatantly
while pretending to read book titles,
shrink,
look into the distance, holding a biscuit or
a cup of tea.
(looking nondescript helps)
while I hunt for chinks,
gauge pauses and cadences
tides and ebbs, in the rhythm of talk
sieve past chit chat
like a prospector hunting for gold flecks
patiently,
the adrenalin thrumming in his veins
knowing that a nugget is in there for sure

I’m not there to clap,
gawk at celebrities
collect autographs
Or make friends on FB
no prisoners taken, no mercies
all’s fair in love and words.
build up a story,
tweak or ignore an occurrence, or blow it up big
master of their fates,
I do as I please

Or, I try.

I’ve never seen “to be continued” placed as strategically as this, and it makes me wonder if all tbc’s are like this. I’m reading “Miskin’s” concise commentary on the Geeta that appears in every issue of Navneet Samarpan, in the opening pages. So in the middle of the battlefield we have Arjun losing heart, wringing his hands, putting forth one argument after another. Arjun here is described as valiant, the conqueror of sleep, and yet.... And we have the charioteer, Parth, laughing at him And one entire month to wonder why. And ruminate as to whether most of life’s tbc’s are as perfectly poised, teetering on an edge.


“I am…” is fantastic. Real, gritty. Not for the squeamish or faint of heart. All the randomness and incompleteness of life.
My take: In the theater, to see “I am…”
http://blueline.goobertree.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=22650

My poem on Holi is in In Focus,the newsletter of the California Writer's Club West Valley.

Yesterday I got my copy of the Mass Review. Finally.


A BOOK perfect~
Yesterday, finally the book got here
From wherever that is,
Red brick and college square, spiffy, in my mind’e eye
(photos in catalogs that dot the road not taken)
Though Belgium is what is says on the brown cover
I stare at the label, trace the masthead
think of caravans, and silk routes and loads of myrrh and spice
And breathe in a whiff of the strange places this must have been.

Yesterday, finally the book got here
After I’d panicked and “If it may please your lordship, may I please …”
(supplicated the editor)
Even as I wondered about the Mayflower and therefore the Bostonian royals and protocol
should-nots,
When patience gave way like the ice on a pond that muff-covered women in an old postcard skate on
I’d fidgeted, mumbled and then asked

Yesterday after the book got here,
I traced my name on the back cover
Wondered with a lump in my throat, at its perfectly bound form
Neat orderly rows of gracious fonted letters, marching down the page
Stared at the index, with section titles in latin, and heavyweight contributors,
Agape

Now that the book is here
I shall begin my day
Touching the pages, tracing the gracious curve of assorted alphabets
Trace the smooth loveliness of the art pages, wonder black crayon can do so much
perfection
a gulp in my throat at the beauty of it all
my personal prayer
of reassurance, backbone.

Routines are good.
I end up setting routines for the most mundane things.
The “what-next’s” keep me on track. On the straight and narrow.
Keeps me from over-thinking, is there a word for that.
Or slipping into brooding.
My voice sounds chirpy, a friend says.
A time to rest and a time to get up, a time to get set, a time to run…
Yet, for the difficult stuff there is no time
For the really life changing stuff. Orbital shifts and all that, you know?
I read through the pages, marvel at the work done.
I know it can matter, life-changing.
But I still stay off. Perhaps digging, unearthing is not comfortable.
Today I looked around blogdom, followed links and realized how inward-looking this blog has become.
So be it

last night
at the concert paying tribute to the reclusive maestro of Maihar
but I was there cause you'd have wanted it
(like I do so many things cause you'd have wanted it)
a shower of musical notes
shook up neurons, long asleep
pushed them into high drive
listening to the bihag play out, expansive
flowing,swirling, adding energy with every turn, like the ripples in a lake
the joy of knowing the words to this classical piece,
satience.
yet the ear is alert, waiting for a voice
despite.
fragile times
yet, satience.

(yday was Ustad Allauddin Khansaheb's birth anniversary. today is baba's b'day, or would have been)

MUST READ:
http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/print/2011/04/stephen-king-on-the-creative-process-the-state-of-fiction-and-more/237023/

Lessons

You stare at the blank screen
Watch the cursor
Pace its blink
And sigh
the story you’ve just read
is perfection, refined
like an artifact in wood some craftsman has perfected, polished, and gone his way.
The master of gore and vampires
Turned to poetry and golden light
Flawless, with a turn of his wrist
And you’re awed.
A chaotic swirl
Of respect-admiration- wistful
Permeate your brain
A golden wash, satiated
With pokey “I wish I could’s”
All you think of
How layered the story was
Crisp and quick
fine
Characterization jampacked in a few quick lines
You sigh
And push yourself to your humble four hundred.

Sometimes you view brilliance.
Three times three claps, like at school?
Sheer brilliance.
The sort that shakes up your mind.
Dhoosar, the movie, is like that.
Life through a blurred lens.
Forces you to think. Think tough. Pokes you.
Unsettles, asks difficult questions.
What if you forgot? Everything?
And never knew you were forgetting?
If memory were an swirling, dancing mist?
Unfunny joker?
What if all the frames of reference, alphabets, phone numbers, colors, mail passwords
Look like gibberish?
Who’d be there?
What if nobody were there?
When reality crumpled like a house of cards, what would you do?
Cause to “do”, you’d need to know reality from your left foot.
What if the next step was a vacuum? And the one after?
So well etched, you don’t need the subtitles. Not really.
The body language of the dementia-afflicted shouts in mute compound sentences and unspoken underlined.
For all this, the aesthetics are perfect.
And classical runs through, tying it all up like a scholar’s knowledge in palm-leaf .
Its only once you’ve rubbed the tears off your face
That the question barrage begins.
When you look at your face in the echoing mirror.



Dhoosar, which means blurred, is the title of Amol Palekar- Sandhya Gokhale’s new Marathi film.
http://dhoosarthefilm.com/

For long now, one has stayed away from the music, at times its wiser this way; but the rich notes in the deepest classical baritone dip and soar, and play on somewhere in the backdrop of one’s brain,and on and on, they play on the emotions like a master pianist running up and down and all over the scales.
And all one can do is watch.

Just back from a quick 2 day trip to Calcutta.
The before and after poems say it better.

Before :
Calcutta
Sweet siren of endless lanes
matriarch of regal arch and dome
I try aloof, but
my blood quickens at your name
(like the beat of a drummer at a puja pandal)
thirty nine years away
is long
far too long to condense
(how later I learned to push into a bus)
into one spare afternoon and a few more hours
perhaps, this is best.
This incompleteness


http://blueline.goobertree.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=22498

After:
Stern Queen Victoria
Empress of the realm
Still reigns over marble and green
Yet the memory of Mother’s eyes
tugs at me, the many homes
And many lifetimes traversed

My scale changed
Even as the light on the lake
Reflects the shimmer
of many sunsets past

http://blueline.goobertree.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=22520