Falling

(This has nothing to do with mythology or history, apart from names and scenes.)


A golden land there once existed,
Bloodied by a war. Good and evil
Long persisted; vanquished
Were they all.

Pell-mell the men had swung and slain,
Kindness all undone. Amid them a man
Had waxed insane; his name
Was Arjun, Indra’s son.

Flying fish whose aim could blind,
He was an archer supreme. Gifted,
Noble, quick and kind, his wealth
Was a warrior’s dream.

Brothers fought from either side,
Five against a hundred. The royal
Court in great divide, lay dying
Upon the thousands dead.

In battle this Arjun like fluid flew,
Arrows whistling forth. But oft he
Stopped, wept anew, and wondered
Of its worth.

Krishna, the Lord, was at his wheels,
Driving Arjun’s steed. Duty, he said,
Was bread and steel; and the prince
Could only heed.

The sun thus set and rose again,
Redder every day. Till the archer
Faced his only bane; his eldest
Brother was in his way.

Airborne coins he used to nail,
Eyes into the sun. His prowess
Bore a flaming veil; he was Karna,
The Sun God’s son.

With thunder the sky responded,
Rain beheld by fire. Krishna,
In his head, knew Arjun couldn’t
Lay rest to Karna’s ire.

So Karna’s chariot sunk in mud,
Cursed unfairly so. And then there
Sounded a final thud, as Arjun
Slipped the fatal blow.

Victorious, he wailed a battle cry,
The wind in his voice. The night
Then breathed a tired sigh—how
Men are blown by choice.

-------

In a day there arrived bitter news,
Arjun’s son was dead. Caught in
A vicious chakravyuh, Abhimanyu
Had rivers bled.

Maddened with rage was the father,
Avowing to avenge. Like a madman
He killed, and rather, in evil
Himself drenched.

Krishna advised a nobler course,
To accept and depart. Too many
Lives had bent to force; time
Had come to part.

But Arjun, for once, disagreed;
An equal life he craved. To make
Them kneel and mercy plead, he
Had his visions saved.

Bhishma, their general, hence arrived,
Challenged by this cry. Immortal,
Immune to death contrived, he dared
The archer try.

Broken was Arjun’s crimson dream,
Thus taken to task. How could he
Start, even seem, to live up to this
Mammoth ask?

He stepped instead to Bhishma’s feet,
The chariot high forsaken. A smiling
Krishna went upbeat, as a prudent
Path was taken.

-------

An epochal exchange then ensued,
The dead sky watching still. No one
Even dared intrude, as Pitaama
Weaved his worldly will.

“This war has taken lives enough,
And I am tired now. It is not an
Answer to your call; but, son, it is
Time you take a vow.

Plant me over a bed of arrows,
Drown me in abject pain. Refuse me
Water, ignore my throes, and let
This struggle not remain.”

King of his fate, Bhishma had spoken,
Choosing his demise. Arjun, shocked,
Knew not his ken; and wavered
In surmise.

“Take him,” said Krishna, “Shoot!”
This was his chosen end. His
Rider, still mute, struck Bhishma, who
Did nothing to defend.

One by one the shafts embedded,
Ripping the statesman’s spine. Each
Arrow, two headed, pushed him
Closer to recline.

The general fell, so did the sun,
As did the somber night. Falling
To his knees, the battle won, Arjun
Lost his sentient light.

Splinter

The denouement was
a dream; extinct now.
The dream inspired
disaster; I’ll explain how.

She was the Eve
to my Adam in Eden
reclaimed.

And I the apple
to her taste, forbidden,
unclaimed.

Like fire we came
to touch;
and fire that burnt
as much.

We loved to smoke
and smolder;
and stoked the flame,
turned bolder.

And in that furnace
a dream was forged;
two hearts in ardor
thus engorged.

We vowed to live
as hellfire, never still;
and fueled, the flame
maddened with our will.

Till all that was left
was cinder;
and all I could do
was hinder.

It was done;
the ash said it loud.
The fire of our pride
Had consumed us, proud.

Grace was now
An impossible crest;
And the apple, now bitten,
A ruined test.

So I let her go
with the apple stuck
in the scalded way
of her breathing, strained.

And I was left
with the apple's twig-
a splinter driven through
my soul, seething, maimed.

... and the swine flew.

Once upon a torturous time,
I lived at a place called IIT—
A stinking sweatshop, called for a dime
The place for you and me to be.

So there I remember an evening new,
When in a filthy tee and threaded jeans,
I strolled in search of the females few,
Unwatched, ignored, invisible, unseen.

My dream was love, young and slim;
My hope a catch, thin and fair;
And just as the dusk grew cold and dim
She turned a corner, my fairy of air.

In wonder I picked my nose afresh
And pulled my knee-bound trousers up;
Why, I thought, in wire and mesh,
Could this become the coffee of my cup?

Idly I sauntered, closer and cleaner,
Eyes and ears and nose engaged;
With every step my belly went leaner
As with breath a battle I bluily raged.

And then I was there, a meter away,
Bathing in her beauty of foreign make;
And it seemed my heart could forever sway
And dance and see and smile and shake.

Excuse me, she said, and I said, oh sure,
And made to give her the narrowest berth;
She squeezed in, I squeezed more,
And then relented in latent mirth.

She had passed and I had turned to stare
At a back and bottom so uncommon,
Only to be shocked to the pulp of my ware
As she turned beneath the westbound sun.

Oh, this dream, and I knew it was not,
For my nose was slick with slime again;
But oh, what else could a female hot
Want to say to a lover so plain?

Whatever, I thought, but want she does,
For here she comes, her eyes on me;
And my own went gaga in a frenzied fuzz
For her lips seemed curved a tiny wee.

And then she was there, an inch from who,
Her smile a pout of a kiss like glue
Plant that she did, and tongued, dear Pooh,
Your snuggles is sick with dead-swine flu.

…

Years have passed since that time
And I no more live at IIT too;
Hell’s my shop, and for chuckles a dime,
I tell them how the hot swine flew.

This and That

This love, that love…
My word! What love?
This life, that life…
Wake up! What life?
This want, that want…
I’ll say! What want?
This need, that need,
Good lord! What need?

It’s a joke, this world…
It’s a hole, this mind…

This love in that
That love, and my life
Two loves in a love
Two loves, and my life
This need, I need!
That want, I want!
This life, or that,
I’ll live, I’ll live!

It’s my hole, this world…
It’s my joke, this rhyme…