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Published Poems in The Rigorous
On Losing My Wallet in Rome
We were in sweaty jeans and long-sleeved shirts,
a little over-dressed for a day's walk through Rome.
The long winding paths through the ruins of the Forum onto
the road that led us through more ruins
to the steps of the church of St. Peter in Chains, where Moses lives.
Michaelangelo's Moses that is, in whose company
we spent one whole hour.
Not the taxi driver who took us home
after a long sticky day through Rome.
It was then that I found my wallet gone.
Was it gone when I stooped to drink
some of the ice-cold water at the Colosseum?
Was it at the foot of the majestic Marcus Aurelius
on horseback, a statue we stood admiring?
Was it in the crowd at the Pantheon, as we leaned into
each other to squint through the perfect circle in the sky?
Was it when we giggled throwing coins in the Trevi,
you a quarter, and a cheaper dime from me?
It must have been at Campo-di-Fiori, where
you licked my gelato, and I yours, you had a pink one, and I, a delicate key-lime;
as we wondered whether it was this hot
when Giordano was burnt here at the stake for heresy.
Perhaps, that was when I left some of me in Rome.
Broken Hearts in May
Life here slows down in the afternoon,
the brick-red crunchy lanes lay bare,
jackfruits hanging from twisted
tree-trunks ripen quietly,
colorful balconies sit deserted,
and sticky skins on sticky bodies search for
comfort away from the mid-day
summer sun of May.
This year, May came to Kharagpur
like a fast moving train that is compelled
to stop often but cannot linger for an extra puff of breath;
with frequent visits and phone calls,
memorials and remembrances,
customary rituals to bring closure,
quiet reminiscences over cups of familiarities,
tea and snacks, savory and sweet.
May this year is a month to stay busy,
to jump through bureaucratic hoops
to officially erase your name from records
of consequence, the bank book,
the tax form, administrative
ledgers, the phone bill -
from now on all will know that you are no more.
The world though, bears all the signs of
any other May, an abundance of green mangoes hang in your garden,
the crowded and colorful vegetable market,
the morning paper, the mourning friends,
your work, our laughs and tears, and the large
blue pillow that supported your frail physique
while you wrote in your room with windows wide open
to let cool breeze blow from the east and north.
Those writings of yours show up all around the room,
as we spend our days trying to organize
and somehow mend our broken hearts
but wake up early every morning,
blankly look at the ceiling
and wonder why we cannot go back to sleep?
Making Summer Memories
The shock of finding a new Zucchini in the kitchen garden!
The monotone of mosquitos above our thinning hair-lines.
Slender, ever-growing corn plants,
embraced by the curly tentacles of a overflowing bean-bush.
And you holding that sharp serrated blade,
slice through watermelons, and honeydews.
The sweet fragrance of the juice oozes out
from the gash of a wound on the fruit.
A line of ants march across the deck-table
with the evening sun on their backs.
The distant laughter slices through, just like the constant
buzz of a table-saw cutting through pricy lumber.
You pout and focus as droplets of sticky nectar
crawl down your bare fingers and pieces of fruit
steadily fall into the bowl like cool, sweet, gifts of love.
In your hands, the deft swish of the sharp tool
has the assurance of a master sculptor.
A bright eyed bunny lays a longing gaze across the grassy patch.
A faint shadow of a deer tiptoe through the woods,
the lazy summer day changes to dusk, into twilight,
and then into a pretty, starry night.
Fireflies twinkle around us and we
wonder in silence, if we will get this back again?
Summer bells ring as we settle down
around the lamp, for one more session
of memory creation.
Stresses and Strains
The call comes right as you are
to go in for the first exam of the term.
The bank is declining your loan request;
no collateral, and parents don't earn enough!
Questions crash on you like waves on a rocky shore:
-Calculate the stress?
Why me?
-Calculate the strain?
Why now?
-What is the Young's modulus?
What now?
-What is the combined stress? The principal stress?
Wait!
The Greek symbols suddenly look very alien;
the teacher, from his ivory perch, suspects foulplay.
His eyes remain glued to your pale face, your sweaty palms, your brown body;
while your mind agonizes elsewhere:
financial hold on tuition account to be lifted,
need to leave class early, sibling to be retrieved from babysitter,
not enough Ramen in the house to last the week,
dad may lose his third job, his second!
Stresses combine with each other in lethal ways.
The principle of your existence gets clearer:
"money rules, money makes the rule,"
as your anguish from stresses all around,
settles in.
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