CUMIN

Taste cannot be caged in closed jars or steaming woks. 

Like minstrels wandering in search for the divine, 

the ridged beads of cumin travel the world 

seeking new tongues.

In her kitchen, the seasoned cook remains patient 

for the oil to reach just the right heat. That moment 

when the jeera seeds for the daal tadka crackle is 

the cadenza her eager ears wait for. Her nose smells 

the warmth of sweet sweat releasing from the seed 

beads' oil canals.

Like languages and jokes that never remain what 

they were when they travel to new lands, cumin creolizes 

into fresh flavours and sounds. Gamun in Sumerian cuneiform, 

kamûnu in Akkadian, cumino in Italian, jeera in Sanskrit, 

the humble seed is a master of travelling light 

and charming palettes.

Crushed coarsely into foul and hummus, spluttered whole 

in spicy lentils and the ambrosia of curried meat, roasted 

and crushed for the magic bhaja-moshla touch that transforms 

a pedestrian ghugni to a gourmet  pièce de résistance.

Even without the shapely beauty of a cardamom pod, 

the lanky superiority of a cinnamon stick or the stud-like 

grace of a clove nail, the cumin wins. Unlike a monarch 

and like monarch butterflies, it rejects borders and bigotry 

and makes new tongues its own.

#30

(This is the last one, so I decided to go all out. In all fairness, I wrote this just for myself.)

For twenty-nine midnights, I have been talking to 
the angel on my right shoulder. My neck is titled to the right, 
a little, and the world is titled to the left, a little. We both make do. 
I forgive it, it does not forgive me. I go out into 
the night dressed in sequins 
and worry for my safety. 

It is a rebellion all the same. 

My mother says that the current signs of the world 
are foretold, and I believe her. I believe the old people easily 
now, they have been right all along. About the food, the six children 
one must have, the hair and 
the lack of it. 

I fight the urge to look back like Lot’s wife did. 
I know she did. I don’t question whether men ever loved 
me or ever will. The strange, stray pieces of love are collected 
in a glass jar that sits on my desk, behind 
which three, white sticky notes
have the words: 

Believe
Fight 
Marvel

I wrote them down in a journal session at the 
cat cafe, where cat hair was everywhere including my 
nose and inside my clothes, and it made me more angry than sad. 
Still, the words.

Still, the disobedience to apathy. 

Still, the yearning for a small blade 

of light that peeks through the sheer curtain every 

morning and falls beside my bed. 

After the journal session, I asked myself, does the 
Cat G-d care about its indifferent animals? I suppose not. 
You can only give what you have, they say. That says a lot 
about what cats have, what that boss of yours has, 
what the giant capitalism 
machine that whirrs 

so loud every day, we might as well be deaf by now, has. 

But, if I could measure myself against what I give 
(now is a good time to listen, angel on my right shoulder) 
I would be very generous. This, despite the fact that I re-gifted 
an embroidered purse a couple of moons ago, 
and I’m starting to see the 
point of a cyclical universe. 

I’m seeing the point of the lunar calendar, 
the ‘period’-ic following of the moon, the word darakth, the slow 
cooking on a consistent fire, the noiselessness of the 

twenty-nine midnights. 

They say time travel might exist. 

I know it does. 

There is a path in the forest that appears at midnight, 
from where you can travel to another place, wait there to leave, 
and if you want, you can return. 

অন্যকারুর গাথা: translation from Kamala Das

অন্যকারুর গাথা 

আমি একাই অজস্র অগণ্য মানুষের 

একসঙ্গে কথা বলা...

আমি একাই হাজার লক্ষ নৈঃশব্দ 

কাঁচের পুঁতির মালায় 

গাঁথা, যেন অন্যকারুর 

গাথা। 

একটা জায়গা খুঁজে নেয়ার সময় এসেছে : Translation from Eunice de Souza

একটা জায়গা খুঁজে নেয়ার সময় এসেছে 

একটা জায়গা খুঁজে নেয়ার সময় এসেছে 

যেখানে আমরা দুজনে চুপচাপ বসতে পারি।

আমি বকবক করেছি ক্রমাগত 

কখনো স্টাফরুম-এ,কখনো করিডোরে, কখনো বা রেস্টুরেন্ট-এ 

যখন তুমি থাকো না তখনও  

আমি মাথার মধ্যে কথোপকথন চালিয়ে যাই। 

এই কবিতাটাই যেমন ধরো 

প্রায় আটচল্লিশটা অতিরিক্ত শব্দাবলী। 

For Anannya, as always - a not-quite-ghazal salaam

 

Not amaltas, not lilies, the roses are their own 
Kind of new this year. Not in longing, not
In nostalgia, they bring a red white and blue
This year. Not finished, but not famished,
This is still an ode for you this year. 
In inspiration, exhileration, I extended my
Purview this year. Another stage, another
Page, another cast and crew this year. Call it
Paying it forward, or thirteen years
In the making, but Giti's doing
An Anannya too this year.

(Because 13 years of Daily Riyaaz later she now lives in my head, this year I channeled my inner Anannya and started a similar blog for foreign born writers in Iceland. You can find them at https://skaldreki.wordpress.com/ )

What if – a Ghazal on love

What if love is simply a scam, after all
and the heart’s gonna go bam after all

What if these odes to flowers and trees
are killing like white sugar in jam, after all

Of your sighs and dark-circled eyes what if
your life’s love won’t give a damn, after all

When your head screams, “Don’t go fall anymore”
what if you turned and let the door slam, after all

Beautiful are love’s tropes and tricks what if
it’s worth neither ghazal nor epigram after all

Poetry Month

The words
I sought to spin
Sometimes dissolved
At other times flew
They were always
Always an invitation 
To look beyond reward
In their quest I was
Lured and seduced
Bewildered and beguiled 
Word images wove
A tapestry so rich
I was not the weaver
Just one of the many threads
Going nowhere 
I went everywhere 
Words have been 
My pilgrimage 
Both the journey 
And the destination.

Solar Moon

Through my shoe,

Safe and well,

Uniformed so all can tell,

Peeps a toe,

Floats a bird,

Not the moon in your acclaim.

Freezing cold,

Winter musk,

O'er the pale, the sea seems lush.

Call me names,

Drowned in whey,

Or you'll scream at me for once. 

Solar moon,

I'll go soon,

Or evaporate the flames.

Solar moon,

I'll go soon,

I'll go soon,

I'll go soon. 

Fluid speech,

Warm and dry,

Grant the hailstones, foe so spry. 

Space is made

For lying boys,

Always just too small for birds.

On your back,

Lying awake,

In old age, you'd damn to shake. 

Hades bring

Heaven here,

The whole world hurts in strange ways.  

Solar moon

I'll go soon. 

Or evaporate the flames.

Solar moon 

I'll go soon, I'll go soon. 

Lift your feet,

Feed your hope,

Or only I'll decide to show. 

Solar moon,

I'll go soon ,

Or evaporate the flames.

Solar moon,

I'll go soon, I'll go soon. 

Solar moon

I'll go soon,

Or evaporate the flames.

Nebula moon

I'll go soon

I'll go soon (Solar moon, solar moon)

I'll go soon (Solar moon, solar moon)

I'll go soon (Solar moon, solar moon)

I'll go soon (Solar moon, solar moon)

[This is a reverse "Black Hole Sun" by Soundgarden]

#29

I remember kayaking 
in the ocean, despite 
not knowing how 
to swim, feeling 
immortal, unafraid of
the water, a slow
blue creeping 
over the horizon
and me paddling 
towards the bluish
sunset on that
black glass as if
the ocean was 
calling out to me.

And I remember me 
unable to float in
the swimming pool
laughing as the 
water sucked me
in, you pulling me 
up telling me I would
not drown, and me
failing to be weightless,
feeling gravity, 
still laughing, going 
underwater, unable to 
breathe, but also 
unafraid because 
you were there. 

Darkness

is only a compression of light

so dense that it seems
to pull everything into it
so that there is no room
for any movement, any quiver
of breath or meaning
an emptiness that is packed
full of absence; simultaneously
an arrival and a departure.

but darkness is also presence
a container for buried longing
a place of deep resonance
a time of timeless width
where pilgrims stop to rest
and seekers relent
to the relentless cycling
of the wave upon the sand
and the stars in the night sky.

darkness can seem harsh
and yet so infinitely soft
it is an endless unravelling
an abandonment of self
that which feels abandoned
yet is always, always found
in the waiting stillness
where shadows swirl
settling in myriad patterns.

the veil of darkness covers
just as much as it uncovers
gently embracing loss
even as it deftly hides pain
in the unmaking of being
where desire seems swallowed
but is actually unspooling
like the ongoing whirling of
every dervish who danced.

the darkness is my unknowing
and something of my knowing
in a world that confounds me
as certainly as it awes me
and knowing gets in the way
of remembering the awe
as it takes me to places
where darkness obliterates me
as we obliterate the earth.

WRAPPING LOVE IN BENDED GEOMETRY

At first it was about bending geometry.

Folding a square into a triangle and turning

that into a circle wrapping your head.

You could have been a Russian or Ukrainian

peasant woman working hard in a field.

In reality, you were only a school girl

braving a north Indian winter.

The head, a biological sphere spawning

ever new worlds. The head, also the seat

of intelligence and silken hair, treasures

to protect.  Women in worship, ladies

in church, school girls in Kabul and Delhi,

desert belles in Kutch, we all wear it.

Every Sunday, my Nigerian neighbour's head

is the prettiest in the entire neighbourhood.

Geles of Nile blue and Grand Canyon vermilion,

Amazon green and canary yellow burst upon

her head like bird nests and ocean beds.

Love is what wraps you, I was told.

But I say love is also that which you can wrap.

A scarf. A wimple. A hennin. A hijab. A dupatta.

Favourite day in April

 A month of summer showers

blooming flowers

searing heat

school holidays

train journeys 

long days

playing house,

a birthday

Jacaranda, gulmohar and I

are in it together

heralding this month

and today happens to be 

my favourite day

Seeking

Stillness is hard to paint

For it doesn’t lie flat
It sweeps through the landscape
In torrents and flurries
Existing only in the centre

As the world keeps swirling
In a maelstrom of madness
I long for a stillness
That doesn’t demand
The absence of chaos

Silence cannot be recorded
It doesn’t live on its own
But arrives in the spaces
Between notes of music
And the crashing of thunder

While the air around is rife
With an explosion of sounds
I yearn for the silence
That doesn’t require
The quietening of cacophony.

Kotobagari

In Nippon, someone's finger pauses before it hits "Send": kotobagari. 

In Dilli, at April's end, I seek to up-end kotobagari

The euphemism treadmill is sufficient to express its efficient inefficiency.

Nihongo, I seek to refashion it when you lend kotobagari.

For now it stands for fear and men of straw.

To rescue the beauty of its kanji, please send kotobagari.

This conversion is from the yen to the Indian rupee. 

Is it counterfeit or legal tender when I spend kotobagari?

Xenophobic purists will scoff at this Japanese intruder I invite.

Regardless, to my last breath, I will dauntlessly defend kotobagari. 

Put down your Oxford and Cambridge; translate the Nippo Jisho. 

Come now, be a gracious host. Try to befriend kotobagari.

"Is it a noun or a verb?" I hate prescriptivism. 

It is your place and not mine to declend kotobagari. 

Should it sound awkward, I'll co-opt the privilege of English,

And with sensitivity, delicacy, generosity and grace, I'll bend kotobagari. 

I'll tease apart this compound noun, then stitch it up. 

With poetry, curiosity, diligence bafflement, and joy, I'll blend kotobagari. 

"風が強いです" means "समीर तेज़ है" in Japanese. 

But you needn't be strong or fast to amend kotobagari. 

Afternoon Dream

Waking from an afternoon nap
in which we met and walked
with the same questions around us
but the pain dulled into a joyful acceptance
all losses of time and space were
seen in a new perspective inside the dream
tears turned to lingering laughter
and soft silence which then blended
with the colours of the setting sun

I wondered if I’d died
or if I’d been birthed by my dream
into an evening of healing light

Of Daughters & Mothers

It now seems strange

That at first we didn’t see it

Our resemblance I mean

Do you remember those days

From your middle school years

The astonishment we felt when

Friends and teachers alike

Knew I was your mother

And when asked they said

You look like each other.

So we’d stand together

Peering at our images

In the bathroom mirror

Convulsed in laughter

Seeing only differences

In the size of our noses

And the curve of our brows

Missing all the while what

Others found so obvious

We share the same smile.

We’re now accustomed

To hearing friends remark

That you remind them greatly

Of how I looked in the past

When my hair was unsilvered

And my figure less generous

Yet I’m struck by the comment

When you thoughtfully said

That in certain expressions

I may resemble my mother.

 

Lost Voice

Will you wait with me

While I search for a song?
The notes appear to jangle
The words have gone awry
Before this night is over
I must find the cadence
That awakens my heart
As much to beauty as to grief
I’m searching for a song
Will you wait with me?

#28

<poem taken down for submission>

Before Twenty-four

 

Bookshelves or wedding gowns.

Sometimes the choice between

Fineries and tomes is essential

In the building of homes. It’s

Bunk beds or dressers once

The kids come. For a few years

A bigger car competes with

Ballet classes but the need

For both is recognised in not

Getting a dog, and passes.

Then you get on and get

Complacent with your

Kids and your cars and your

Crystal decanters, and choices

Feel young and you’re happy

Being middle aged. The fine lines

Radiate from the corners

Of your eyes and the silver

In your hair is a rich replacement

For the things you had to choose

Between. So long as we’re

Laughing my love this home will be As beautiful as it’s ever been.

THE WISDOM OF A ROVING HEART

The vast earth was somehow round, to be 

circled around. And feet were meant for walking. 

The mouth needed fresh provisions all the time 

and the eyes a new tree to rest under and feel 

safe about. Being a wanderer isn't luxurious.

When famine doesn't strike, human cruelty and flat 

perception does. Aimless wanderers, Immoral, 

promiscuous and disease-ridden, a nomad must 

be seen with suspicion, always. Those who live 

in permanent (is there such a thing?) houses 

know better. Always. They only take hi-tech, 

weather-proof tents when camping. 

The wanderers know something else, though. 

They know that when you circumambulate the 

earth's, perimeter, the wind, sun, soil and fire 

to you are your child's fears, your mother's tears. 

Wisdom only a no mad, roving heart can live by.

Surrender

 

https://www.pxfuel.com/en/free-photo-eufhx

By the waters of the gurgling Giri lie stones of many shapes, colours, and textures. All seemingly the same, each dissimilar from the other. Some smooth, some jagged, telling layered tales of lives they've lived; some submerged, allowing the current to break them, shape them at will.  The ones in water have forgotten they were stones once. It may take years of weathering to do its work. But, the water will claim them one day. Unbeknownst, they will become Giri and reach the eternal ocean. The ones on shore will become Giri too, or be picked up as a relic for an altar. Every stone by the river has a chance for it is the nursing of the water.

April Snow

 

Make a wish. The wind will pull
One end of the wishbone and you
Catch the gusts in your hair and
You tug till the tree is full
Of your yearning. Till each branch
Is awash with your desire and each
Leafless twig stretches to reach
Into you, learning to listen for
Your wanting. And then the tree
Is a tuning fork that sounds
The depths of dreams tangled
In nightmares, seducing hauntings.
Make a wish, make a wish, make
More than one, make three. There
Is music in April snow and if you’re
Willing to let your need for
Summer go, your lust for it
Will set you free.