Storming in tea-cups

“a cup of tea is not a cup of tea. . .

when you make it at twilight,

just for him.”

call it a love potion.

liquid dreams.

scented desire.

wishes boiled to a blend.

three cinnamon pods

the dried darjeeling leaves

milk and pearl-white cream

simmering to a syrup to be filtered.

as you sweat in its vapours

and imagine how the tea tastes

against his lips his teeth his tongue

and the pale pink insides of his throat

as you stir in the sugar

and test a spoonful to see

if it stings and soothes and

stimulates the way you intended

as you pour it into his cup

with eyes mirroring supernovas and

study the desirable brown of the tea

an entire shade

that fits exactly

between the desert sand of your skin

and the date palm of his.

almost the color

of your possible child.

Mulligatawny dreams

anaconda. candy. cash. catamaran.

cheroot. coolie. corundum. curry.

ginger. mango. mulligatawny.

patchouli. poppadom. rice.

tatty. teak. vetiver.

i dream of an english

full of the words of my language.

an english in small letters

an english that shall tire a white man’s tongue

an english where small children practice with smooth round

pebbles in their mouth to the spell the right zha

an english where a pregnant woman is simply stomach-child-lady

an english where the magic of black eyes and brown bodies

replaces the glamour of eyes in dishwater blue shades and

the airbrush romance of pink white cherry blossom skins

an english where love means only the strange frenzy between a

man and his beloved, not between him and his car

an english without the privacy of its many rooms

an english with suffixes for respect

an english with more than thirty six words to call the sea

an english that doesn’t belittle brown or black men and women

an english of tasting with five fingers

an english of talking love with eyes alone

and i dream of an english

where men

of that spiky, crunchy tongue

buy flower-garlands of jasmine

to take home to their coy wives

for the silent demand of a night of wordless whispered love . . .

Ekalaivan

This note comes as a consolation:

You can do a lot of things

With your left hand.

Besides, fascist Dronacharyas warrant

Left-handed treatment.

Also,

You don’t need your right thumb,

To pull a trigger or hurl a bomb.

Maariamma

We understand

why upper caste Gods

and their ‘good-girl’ much-married, father-fucked,

virgin, vegetarian oh-so-pure Goddesses

borne in their golden chariots

don’t come to our streets.

We know the reasons for their non-entry into slums.

Actually, our poverty would soil their hears

and our labor corrupt their souls.

But Maariamma,

when you are still getting

those roosters and goats,

why have you stopped coming to our doors?

Maari, our girl,

since when did you join their gang?

Deciphering a culture

INSTRUCTION #1 NAILED TO THE WALL: SWITCH OFF YOUR CELLPHONES

Keep Smiling! :-) This is what I got to read on ink-splattered desks one lonely day in the central Winners DON’T library of the IIT Madras. I was there waiting for someone to come and join me Frustrated and all the books surrounding me were such rigorous affairs in quantum mechanics One and ocean engineering and acoustics Sided and though I had studied science at school, I had opted out of academics Lovers for (shall we say) personal reasons.

And so there was literally nothing Association in there that I could read and understand, so I set about staring at the desks (Frustrated One Sided Lovers Association) and suddenly the graffiti made sense (Acronym FOSLA) and my reading picked up Join FOSLA da! in leaps and FOSLA: Exclusively for mother-fuckers like you bounds. Watching it was so funny I liked the picture. . . because I imagined Life begins at 40, Ice cream expires at 2 nothing in these mass of Bare! Scientific and Technical books with their !!SUPERB!! mumbo-jumbo jargons could attract me Lol! but these words I love rumour penned by different students was kind of distracting My kiss is bad and also a nice thing to My head is sad engage myself Its your love in.

So That’s made me glad I was busy straining to Help everyone! Love everyone! And yes, HATE ALL!! make out the CAT words and some of it was boring Guru is great! and Love my ass, don’t you? racy and Simran hip and Impossible breasts had self-explanatory illustrations Don’t marry be happy of naked, naked women that Asha, I love you was really Come out of the web of the world disgusting and horrific and If God has given you a rock it’s your choice to build a bridge or a wall I really don’t know what to say I have built a wall, what you want to do for that????? and Then I will curse Him and go search for some grub (only a rock, eh!) i looked up in exasperation.

INSTRUCTION #2 NAILED TO THE WALL: DON’T REPLACE BOOKS TO STACK. LEAVE THEM ON THE TABLE.

The other words Me too are silly Me too da idiot and I try my best to take How dare you everything Om Namah Shivaiah of this civilization Morals R for Morons by just To suck the marrow of life! (not me fuckers, but Henry DAVID Thoreau) deciphering Structure of Benzyne a Boobsy culture Keep Trying but Illustration (India map) its all Point out Lovegadh? Sexpura? in vain. Quates Desk ww.hornybanana.com So what I love vaginas sunflower gulmohar Oh god help me!! When I start talking to a girl, she starts loving me. Its disgraceful. Help me! Is it your bra? Nice work Illustration Can you draw the equation of the above ellipse Take your origin as Shravati and +ve axis along Sarayu u r time starts now No cunt if you take Shrav and Sarayu as lost what will be your origin Fat Fool Dribbler, read that AGAIN. Got me? Hum angrejon ke jamane ke fuckers hain Rock n Roll Stupid Once upon a time. . . there was Anushya. . . No smoking U taste good! Hippy sex? Wanna something hot?

And I was feeling blank and looking up and repeating Wanna something hot?

INSTRUCTION #3 NAILED TO THE WALL: SILENCE.

Cinquains

Morning Song

Wet pink

And dusty grey

The sky begins to blush.

Some sleepy careless charm welcomes

Daybreak.

Even Song

Azure

And pink gold hues

The smug sky at twilight

A final flush of fulfilment

Night falls.

My lover speaks of rape

Flaming green of a morning that awaits rain

And my lover speaks of rape through silences,

Swallowed words and the shadowed tones

Of voice. Quivering, I fill in his blanks.

Green turns to unsightly teal of hospital beds

And he is softer than feathers, but I fly away

To shield myself from the retch of the burns

Ward, the shrill sounds of dying declarations,

The floral pink-white sad skins of dowry deaths.

Open eyes, open hands, his open all-clear soul . . .

Colorless noon filters in through bluish glass

And coffee keeps him company. She chatters

Away telling her own, every woman’s story;

He listens, like for the first time. Tragedy in

Bridal red remains a fresh, flushing bruise across

Brown-yellow skinscapes, vibrant but made

Muted through years of silent, waiting skin.

I am absent. They talk of everyday assault that

Turns blue, violet and black in high-color symphony.

Open eyes, open hands, his open all-clear soul . . .

Blues blend to an unforgiving metropolitan black

And loneliness seems safer than a gentle night

In his arms. I return from the self-defence lessons:

Mistrust is the black-belted, loose white mechanism

Of survival against this groping world and I am

A convert too. Yet, in the way of all life, he could try

And take root, as I resist, and yield later, like the earth.

Open eyes, open hands, his open all-clear soul . . .

Has he learnt to live my life? Has he learnt never to harm?