Soch

apne aap se hi baatein karna
hansna, rooth jaana
aur manane ki koshish karna
thak kar baith jaana kahin
aur phir shuru silsila wahi
dost main, hamdard main, humraaz mein
humsafar main or shayad raah bhi
khud ko khokar , khud mein khud ko dhoondhi main
aakhir kab tak bhatkoongi apni hi sooch mein
khud se khud ka silsila akhir kab tak chalega
kya is soch ki manzil hai koi?

Aas

kuch aisi hi hoti hai aas
komal shanbhangur si
pal mein mitne wali
mit kar phir bandhne wali
har vinash ke baad
aur dhrin hoti aas
jeevan ki pehli saans se shuru hokar
kabhi na khatm hoti aas
ankhein khul kar band ho jati hain
aur reh jati hai unme basne wali aas

Some thoughts

I wake up often enough
In the middle of the night
While my mind tries to go back to sleep
My eyes wander
And come to rest on my hand on the pillow
Needless to say the hand is empty
And memories of what it once held come rushing back

I still remember tracing the contours of your face with my fingertips
And the feel of your hair against my palm
I would have burnt my fingertips over and over by now
And scraped the skin off of the palm
Had I not known
That although the feel resides on the tips
The memories are in my mind
And I can’t erase those
One often thinks that reel life has got nothing to do with real life
And that truth is stranger than fiction
Yet, lying awake, with the moon for company,
Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind
Suddenly makes a lot of sense.

The prisoner in my mind

It's a lonely walk
On a long winding road
There’s a chill in the air
And it has begun to rain a little
Yet, I walk around.
Not yet ready to go home.

I do this often,
on grey days.
The darkness seeps into me,
And my thoughts.
Rather than pace
On the worn rug of my mind,
I walk it out.
In crowded malls,
And empty parks
Amid the falling maple
And sometimes the naked trees

Yet, it is an empty victory.
I rarely escape the churning of all the questions
The whys and the what if and what nows.
Stay like open beaks
Their cacophony drowning out my sanity
I can walk , but not run away
From the voices in my own head
Only when the volume turns down a little
Do I head back.
Tired , ready to collapse.

I am becoming
My own biggest enemy
And need a sanctuary
From myself.
I could do with an ally or two
But am captive within my own walls.
Just whose brilliant idea,
Was it to throw away the key?

Exorcism

Memories of you
Are like ghosts
That haunt my psyche
My mind
And sometimes,
Even my living breath

They rise up
When I least expect them
Hitting me hard in the gut,
Leaving me unable to breathe

I often wish for an exorcism
To end this torment
Alas, no priest,
Or spell
Can get rid of the residue
You’ve left on my senses.

You are not here,
But, yet are.
So much
More than ever

I wish, when you left,
You’d also taken
Your ghosts with you.

Chasing rainbows

With the sand scorching my feet
I chased my rainbow.
Followed it to its end,
only to realise,
there never is a pot of gold.
Only the myth remains
perpetuated by people
who only believed,
but, never dared to check.

The reason for tears

There are hopes and dreams
That lie broken
I’ve tried to sweep them away,
But random shards remain.
They can still pierce the heart
And draw blood
That has lost its color.