Once in a café 

The following few poems were written in a space of one month, while moving through three different cities. Each one has been triggered by a random image, a fleeting moment, or by a phrase caught inadvertently by a curious ear.

1.

"just forget 'bout 

it";

A bit lonely 

repetitiveness

slips in...like

the hollow slow

call of a solitary 

crow pheasant

lying unanswered

on the other side of

a buried reality

"just forget 'bout 

it";

it turns to

silence, but the

insides still scream

like cassandra.

echoes rise and

fall against the

sanguine darkness

lost to time

and lessness 

"do you remember?"

2.

do not mourn for us

who existed always

in each other's dreams

even without knowing;

strangers no more.

each listening quietly

in the wordless hush

of silent yearnings.

eyes closed, we brush

past each other

in the folded darkness

and lo the sparks that

rise, the cinders that

fall...a chrysalis aquiver 

on this rainy day

3.

the gentleman 

with pink umbrella

under the cupolic sun

forgot his wreath

of smiles somewhere

along the cemetery

he passed on the

way to work

now there he goes

wondering why

today feels a little

emptier than

yesterday; his hand

clutching the smooth

wooden handle 

wishing it were holding 

the light brown palm

of the beloved, with

infinity etched on it

4.

      

in the old bookshop

renovated, smelling of 

fresh paint and defunct

identity, they cruise

from aisle to aisle

searching for fragments

of departed time 

with its musty smells, 

coffee dregs, and pages

aflutter with impatience;

hearts racing past its 

'silence please' corners

drumming pulsations

slowly dying like embers;

hissing

5.

infinity squandered in 

trying to forget the few

moments we spent

together: yet who could 

have known that every

leaf  sighing in the wind

would remind me of you?

6.

i shall merge 

forever in the now, 

the then pressed gently

against my heart

The Way...

It passed noiselessly from our front yard. "Good," my mother exclaimed. "This would take care of those thieving rats raiding my papayas right off the trees". Yes, the enormous whip-tailed rodents were not only partying up there, but also leaving fat chunks of turd right by her entrance door as though to rub it in.

"Great," my husband remarked, chuckling. He was thinking of the fate of all those toads which had turned our shoe-rack on the porch into a convenient housing complex, with each slippery individual occupying the cozy interiors of our infrequently used sneakers and sandals. However, as part of his morning ritual, he went through each footwear on and off the rack and shook it vigorously,  waking up the sleepyheads and sending them scurrying to look for some other place to house-sit. Needless to say, he also had to ensure that they hadn't left any proof of their eupepsia behind. So, for my husband having a snake around was reassuring and translated into one less chore to preoccupy his morning hours.

My brother too was overjoyed. His reasons were quite different, as he nodded his head thoughtfully and said, "hm....very auspicious indeed".  For the legend has it that we are the descendants of King Agrasen of Solar Dynasty. And King Agrasen is reputed to have  married  the  beautiful  princess Madhavi, the daughter of Nag Raj, the Snake King. Somehow my brother was very taken up by this legend and proud to have some reptile blood coursing through our veins. The conspiracy theorists like David Icke who propagate the reptilian humanoid/reptoid theory would surely feel vindicated by this belief.

Two-meter-long, dark green and unaggressive, the welcomed visitor, which came and went as it pleased, was a harmless rat snake. Soon a mongoose too had begun to drop by our yard in a casual 'howdy' kind of way. And the brahminy kite was heard circling the swirling heights above the cashew tree. The sprawling indolence of summer-swathed days assumed an air of alertness with shadows once still, beginning to breathe, and hiss, and  glide.

"Nothing is permanent" , says Buddha. One morning we were woken up by  a sudden commotion of excited voices. An image of two drunkards in a tussle swaggered across the mind briefly before I was nudged hurriedly back into the tempting arms of Morpheus. Later, on waking up, the dead snake outside the gate met my eyes: killed, slaughtered, hacked. "It is released from this world of Maya", my mother philosophised, adding, "now, it might  be reborn as something else". She had found her peace. She always does.

The memory slowly slinked away, leaving in its wake the usual cavalcade of unanswered questions; the whys and the wherefores. Summer days grew hotter and clammier. The three amaltas trees in our neighborhood with their dangles of golden yellow blossoms refused to bloom. Even the vermilion gulmohar was reluctant. The wonted abundance of the mango season eschewed us. 

It was only May, the wee beginning of summer, and most of the country,  embroiled in communal upheaval,  was already reeling under an unprecedented heat wave. History was being dug up to resurrect the past, while the present itself was being quietly buried. 

  

Let's Get Serious

It felt surreal to find Ravish Kumar on NDTV's Hindi channel speak about Trevor Noah. Suddenly the living rooms of Ravish's prime time audience were alive with Noah's unstoppable humor which seem to be pumping up  an animated Joe Biden with an insane amount of laughing gas.  Interestingly, oftentimes the butt of the joke was President Biden himself. Yet, the 81-year-old leader found it within his ambit to be a good sport. 

In 2015, Trevor Noah, the stand-up comedian and South African television icon succeeded the longtime host Jon Stewart of The Daily Show, a satirical news program on Comedy Central. And seven years later, here he was, the 37-year-old Noah, invited to do a skit at the White House Correspondents' dinner. Poking fun at the President's many policies as well as the complacency of media, Noah was as much at home as his audience. 

The above example just goes on to illustrate that a vibrant democracy embraces criticism at the apical level. Here is a non-American, who is not even a citizen of the country, making fun of the highest authority of the nation in his presence and on his turf. To envision a similar scenario in our country steeped in a culture which encourages an almost groveling and reverential attitude towards the powers that be, is chimerical.

To be able to expose the hypocrisy of a society, amnesia of a system or short-sightedness of a leader through humour sometimes may be the most effective means to get one's point through. The front page editorial cartoons in the newspapers worldwide, for example, have long been considered representational of the publications' respective socio-political leanings, and often succeed in mouthing more than the editorial or the articles on op-ed page can. 

While political satire is as old as the Greeks, stand-up comedy is a twentieth century phenomenon where a comedian addresses a live audience. Even though India has had its fair share of popular satirists in artists such as Kaka Hathrasi, Ashok Chakradhar,  Safdar Hashmi, Pradip Chaube and Alhar Bikaneri, stand-up comedy has made its foray onto the Indian stage only a decade and a half ago. Artists like Kunal Kamra, Varun Grover, Hasnein Sheikh, Vir Das and Munawar Faruqui have not only become household names, but were once considered a force to reckon with. 

Lately however, this business of being funny is becoming less and less funny. Awkward

silences or an audience that is not in on the joke is one thing, fragile egos with easily-hurt sentiments, quite another. While the former might land the artist in an embarrassing situation, the latter could land him/her behind bars. The truth being that along with the risk of content-crackdown or a show-cancellation, there is always the realtime apprehension of being sued. And it is this  which is driving several comedians to run their stand-up videos by lawyers before uploading them on social media, just to be on safer grounds. "Getting shot dead while performing is not out of the realm of impossibility anymore. A slap on stage is quite a mild thing in comparison," remarks Grover on the mishaps of being a stand-up comedian in India.  

Whoever said, 'Laughter is the Best Medicine'? 

Are you serious?

From the Sublime to the Ridiculous

Composed, consciously shutting out the latent snobbery of my non-believer's heart, I step into the grand ancient interiors of the Meenakshi temple.

Two rock doves flutter above me to land on the monolithic buttress supporting the entrance. A tiny salamander slithers across the path. People dressed in silk, forehead smeared with ash and sandalwood paste, eyes filled with jasmine scent and fervor file past. I touch the stone-carved pillars, dating back to the 6th century CE, wondering if I were to reach the closest star at this very moment, would I really be watching dinosaurs rollicking around the earth? Their damp coolness feels soothing against the sun-soaked granite floors where we walk bare-footed on this hot summer day. 

A cat basks in  the snug embrace of one of the sculpted gods. Its proximity to such divine company hasn't spurred it to lose touch with its wilder instincts for in-house adventure. My eyes follow its maverick movements as it sidles up and down around the pillars, finally finding its way towards a hidden window and quietly disappearing therein. No doubt, in search of something new...or maybe merely seeking some privacy away from the bemused expressions of the devout.

Many temple guides are eager to woo us and show us around. They speak several languages and understand different psyches. Their locution and interpretation varies depending on whether the individual is local or a foreigner. But, it's getting harder and harder for us to walk on the parched grounds. We do not have the same stamina as these thousands of devotees who have thronged here from various parts of India. 

Mere observers, our little group of four is full of oohs and aahs and wows, captivated by the sheer magnanimity of such a project taken some 1700 years ago. The fervent beauty and the flowing rhythms of sculptures draw us into the very soul of rapturous harmonies. The painted murals too are immersed in the perpetual light of earthly colors. Marching down aisles after aisles, under the beatific gaze of thousands of gods, goddesses, twelve-hooded serpents, ferocious demons with dragon faces, elephants, bulls and The Great Rattus itself, a sense of awe gives way to a sudden surge of catharsis.  'Free me from myself so I can aspire to be Thee: Joyous, calm, filled with light in all thy myriad manfestations', I pray.

Back on streets outside the temple, it is business as usual. Vendors from rows after rows of small shops call out irresistible deals to attract customers. An out-of-place showroom seems to be truly cashing in on the spirit of the place with the following caption on its storefront sign: "Your Search For the Incredible Ends Here..". The store is dedicated to American brands like Levi Strauss, Ralph Lauren, and Route 66.

I want to buy something local for my mom as a souvenir from this holy place. The sun is relentless and the dry heat is beginning to rise in swirls. The cool dark interiors of small shops seem inviting. I walk into a non-descript hand-woven silk emporium looking for a saree. Within minutes my aspiration to emulate the great gods has ludicrously rolled off my being. I am human again as I dive into some petty haggling with the shopkeeper -- the adrenaline rush coursing through my bloodstream is wickedly palpable.