We know of stories
where eagle dreams have
fallen flat and broken necks
in silence.

So the scorching gaze
burns paper and trees

words that start as warriors and
end up hung around the broken necks
ornaments of wisdom,
cluster of indifference
market place hopes in motion.

Ghosts

That feeling of leaving one's own body 
and revisiting old spaces, 

with the hope of re-inhabiting them 
in the motion of the past. 

There are no ghosts, 
just people who are thoroughly misunderstood

Exception

They may be right
in observing that
flowers turn their heads away
and wipe their mouths dry
at the thought of strangers.

I know of one long season of autumn,
which spoke otherwise. 

Encounters of Insignificance

Part 1: Love

Our river may have
meandered and flown into
warmer, stranger waters.
We need not reflect on the absurdity.
Instead let's gaze at the sunburnt sky
because I just found our birds.
Feathers of blue, they were flying in motion slower than ours
from my continent to yours.

Part 2 : Longing

You'd catch my fever
if we shared time and space
for one sleepless night,
arguing endlessly about lust and loyalty.
Soon we'd roll into one,
blow up in smoke rings
and disappear into our chain of syllables
before they discovered us.          

Age

I feel it moving inside my belly
not a baby, not a worm
not an insider that wants to transform
some flesh into future possibilities.

I feel age and with it,
the unputdownable urge
to look at things in their nudity and bleakness.
No open windows or running water
or sparkling walls of busy city streets.
Only some lightbulbs hanging over my table,
fatigued, refusing to keep me warm, by the end of the day.

She said I needed a fresh prism
She hoped it would be love that could sew my nerves together
She waited for something to melt inside my head
as though problems are blocks of solid
which needed some heat to pass through them.
But I shouldn't lie to her and I never do
when I am with her in bed every night I convince her
in soft hushed tones that
I'm not insane, just very, very old.

Friendlessness

The pages have not

been able to preserve

any scent of people going through them.

Often crowded corridoors lead to empty rooms.

Beyond differences

All unhealthy interactions

are welcome because

they mend, they diffuse

and obliviously,

complete the passage. 

For the love of travel,

for mutual difference,

they come in a full circle
to remind us that

the mess we make of

our present situation
is an unfinished business

that has waited long enough.

Strictly Prosaic

I won't believe in loneliness
because you will be away.
I won't lose my vision or my voice
or preserve them in little folded papers
containing tantrums.
Before the whiteness expands,
you might want to unpack and
leave behind certain parts of you
which are strictly needed.