Works of RK

  On the sidelines of a business meet Or the time spent Waiting for the guest of honor To honor There are moments of extreme clarity Wherein  I can see far into myself And I can also see the journey that brought me here. Across the trail Through all the climbs And the dips; Through hunger and sleep And absence of sleep My longing for you has been The only consistent constant.   The only cross I have carried Through all times Always.

The transience of my being Is in contradiction with the permanence Of this journey. I shall come back again And again Forever Until I get to travel Once With you besides me.

Cobblestone pavements Naughty Kites that once flew into the horizons The faint aroma of a robusta, rightly brewed The smell of Jasmines buds, recently sprinkled The big temple bells' chime An old Morris minor, polished chrome gleaming My English teacher's lipstick Grandma reciting grand tales from the Mahabharata A long competing hooting bout with a Cuckoo A short rare one with a crow pheasant. Thoma on his ancient cycle, selling fish Eliamma's six felines courting Thoma all the time. Green from the paddy fields of yore Red from the fiery musandas Yellow from the April showers White from my grandmas starched mundu   Love from your letters Reached out and colored All of my remembered universe Until I safely stored them For another lifetime. Come away The cities have invaded our kind countrysides Grandma is no more And the kids of today Don't bother with real kites. We will meet again And rebuild our little lives One cobblestone at ...

Raj? Yes Princess? This rice cooker is not working! I know baby. Will repair it this weekend. How much do you earn Raj? Baby, I don't like where this conversation is going. Why have you not bought a new one? It's always the same, the burner of this ancient stove, the rice cooker, that ramshackle apology of a washing machine that you have... Why? Why don't you just get some new ones? Baby, we have discussed this before. You know I won't. Shall I gift them for you? No Princess, these don't leave my house. I can't accept new ones. Will you always always be so difficult? Yes baby, always. Why? Cause that rice cooker has been with me for 12 years. So? So I can't just chuck it. What does that mean? It means that as long as it is amenable to repairs, I will repair and use it. I will use it even if it costs me twice the cost in repairing it. I won't give up on it, until it gives up one me. Do you know how crazy that sounds? I know baby. And you are OK with it? T...

As special as every single snowflake Before it falls on to the other And becomes ice. As special as the first born After years of thankless Tyranny of time. As special As the memory Of our first kiss. As special As first love As the first rains The first house The first pay The first dance The lost ones The loved ones The dear Lord And This life With you in it.

There was a turn up ahead on the road. A turn that I did not want to take. There are times when you don't want any further changes in your life at the moment. It was one such moment in my life in time. However, the concept of having a choice is rather overrated. If I had a choice, I would have become a deodar tree in the middle of Indian rain forests and lived quietly for a million years. Such choices are never available. There was a turn up ahead on the road. The turn required of me to move along its contours. The turn wished of me to succumb to it's long curves and stay away from its guarded rails. Missing the turn would have meant a dive into the setting sun. I can imagine how it would have felt, a white car trying to land on the setting sun. As the sun's saffron hue set the horizons on fire, I once again found myself on a road that leads to you.

Kiss me everywhere Stain my whites Let there be pink creases on my arms And let the glitter flakes raise a sparkle. When I walk into the night tonight Let there be disco lights all around. I pray for people to stop and stare And with a scandalous tch! tch! Look at me and think of you. Go on Princess Paint me in all your hues.

I followed your trail through the ancient by lanes of my memory. I could see your footprints span across all my remembered life. I have never really trusted my memory. I forget more than I remember. But of this I am sure, that those footprints are not from this life. These are from every life I have ever lived.

In the heart of darkness rests An unquenching desire for light. In silences that stretch Beyond unreasonable memory A cry of a shout sheltered remain Deep within the angst of time. Wake me up When this life is done Let the forever time begin In another lifetime.

Come away from the realm of sanity There is no reason why you and I Should live this profanity! Let's fly away To the land where fairies live And in the clouds of candies Let's be 18 again. I can hear the bells ringing I can even hear late Sr Anne Sitting by the choir singing. There is a hint of red In the forever horizon again Soon it will be that time of the year When you will find it easier To believe!

Stay a while A wee bit more. Let this night collide With the might Of a bright summer day. Let it gradually merge Into its nemesis. Let us, you and I Pull this night through Let this darkness subside. There are stories from the time You and I were alive And lived separate lives. I want to hear them All over again.

Many have tagged along, but you, you have been there all along. All these years on the road, I have been through trails thick and thin. My travails have taken me to edges of reason. I have been insane for longer intervals of time than I remember. And all this time, you have hollered along. I wake up each day, fiercely alone, tragically independent. I go out into the world, as if each day were mine to consume.  I whimper back into the darkness of my nights, nursing the bruises from another day of living. And when the lights go out, I know that you are right there, coaxing me to sleep.  Death does not worry me, as much as life does. For a grind that comes to a halt once in a lifetime, why should I care? Living a life devoid of your shadows... How do I dare?

No. We won't be together for a lifetime. Lifetime is a word coined by poets. Waterman just borrowed it since it made their pens look more interesting. Nothing lasts a lifetime. Over the years, we will die many a deaths. In some we will be together; in most, I will die my own death and you will sulk somewhere in the dark corridors of souls silences and whimper away little deaths, many, frequently, soundlessly. The best I can do is trust you. Trust you to share with me the storms that will rise in your life. Most, you will weather on your own, for they are not storms of this world. They will be the ones that rage deep within you. Storms that rise from the strife of everyday living. And then there will be those in which you will call out for me. You will hold my hands and together we will thunder into the storms. Lord be willing, we will survive. The tango and the waltz that we do is not all of life. It is at best our weekend at the movies. Movies don't last a lifetime my love. No...

I lost an umbrella of mine the day before. It had been with me for many years now and I miss it terribly. I ordered another one quite like the one I lost. They should be delivering it any one of these days. I know how I will feel when it finally gets delivered. I will love this one just as much but miss the one that I lost forever more. I pray that it is discovered by someone who would love it just like I did and care and polish its burnished wooden handle year on year. Not many people care for their umbrella the way I do. An umbrella has a personality you know. I had lost a blue Cross pen years ago. It took me three years to find a replacement. I keep the new one very guarded. It reminds me of the one I lost. There is something wonderful about the first of many. They all remind me of what was once with me and is now no more. Sigh!

Borrowed from: etsystatic.com What your golden glow  Does to a backless Cameo,  Is how i define Red.  Ah!

Life will find a way to ease down the aisle someday. I too shall walk into the sunset one day. Of late, there are wrinkles around my toes, of the kind that will not go away. Are here to stay. Of the many beautiful women in that pic, There is one who is more sensuous than you, looks fuller than you. You know that I love beautiful women. I observe those faces one by one. The dusky one I watch for a minute more. But then these are those eyes that you have trained over a lifetime. As much as I love the dusky one, my eyes are always, always drawn back to you.

A word never spoken, a line never penned, a desire never expressed, a song never sung. It went out with a tide that never returned, on a journey that never ends with a boat that never shores to a place that is unknown. It is in time but yet to be. But some day it shall well be. Until then the paper boats that I set to sea, Will carry the stories of you and me. I will grow old and light as a breeze And when these distances are too much to bear I too shall call in a wave And ride to the sea. Rest your mind my dear friend We shall meet again at the very end For I have heard that all the rivers in this world Find their way to the Sea.

Late into troubled nights I have often caught myself flaunting A flicker of a smile, unaware. It must be you thinking about me After your two shots of Vodka Or is it Rum  That you have these days?

I had a friend when I was growing up. I loved him and he loved me. There was this girl whom he fell in love with. And then I met her and unfortunately...fell terribly in love with her. You know how your first love is. It was magical. It is twenty years and I still remember her perfume and the taste of her lipstick. It is also twenty years since I lost a good friend. He may be dead, might be living a good life somewhere or maybe, like me, struggling with definitions of a good life. Wherever he is, I miss him and in some corners, so does she. He was a special friend. Before we parted, he was my friend for about 8 years. If he were around he would have known...that beautiful girl he lost to me twenty years ago never really went on to become mine. I failed miserably when it came to ownership of all things nice and wonderful. Like parallel railroads to eternity, I and her have stared at each other relentlessly across a small but unfathomable distance. The trains of time have rolled over us ...

Men's wallets are just as mysterious as those of women. Though smaller, they inturn have numerous pockets and pouches that are capable of safely tucking away many secrets. Mine is a leather wallet I go for a replacement every three or maybe four years. Every time I get myself a new wallet, the transfer of contents from the old one to the new is like a spiritual ceremony. First I empty all the contents of the existing wallet into a clean and empty table. Them comes the close scrutiny part. There are coins from Riyadh that my uncle gave when I was young, so they automatically gets into the new wallet. There are unclaimed bills from past expenses and hurriedly scribbled phone numbers, and then there are small notes or at times, a couple of lines from a poem that never had a name. All these go into the 'to be discarded' section. Photos of gods find space in the new wallet. So does all the plastic cards for credit debit insurance vehicle id voting reliance Spenser etc. All these...