Differential Failure

You thought it would be different.

It ought to be different.

Not just because it rhymes, but as well

because it should chime together too.

The start will be slow.

The acceleration well paced.

Gears would change swiftly, not once

outside of the pace. Race would be smooth.

Brakes would be so quite that

clutches will shy away from making a sound.

Soft, stringy and sweet. 

Subtle, mobile and slippery.

Steep, sound and solid.

Stoic, stern and sensational!!!

From the first season of the mango

to the first snow or rain; the marathon runners

will take their first bite out in the dust and 

the first tea will taste just like Darjeeling!

Because you will touch the sky. You need no ladder to.

Because otherwise you can not sleep.

So I will patiently wait, in my dark tuxedo;

when you'll have the red carpet rolled out for us!

All these smiles before sleep will not count

All the coffee will show their circles in the dark

For the change that you thought you will make,

fail you. What remains is a bloody red mark.

Wanton the kitten, Sober the cat.

It could.
Have been better in all ways.
It could have been
fuller, final and ferocious.

Not so much try, not so much dry.

How do you
Fit the expectations raining on
Good wishes pouring in that you don't need
Or do, only because they help a part of you..

But not you.
Couldn't have been a farther you.

May there be no conversations.
May there be schizophrenia.
May youth be an illusion we once lived.
May life take a course that you'd never pay for.

Double life.
Advisable, suggested and exemplified.

Being sold for cheap.
Being bold for neat.

Lead two lives.
Because they want you that way.
Morality maybe questionable, but it's frying in the fray.

The good heart, the good word, the good man wins.
He gets one less beer, and drives the party home.

Alternate ending

Blessed are those who fall in love
Blessed are those who find their love
Blessed are more when love finds them
Cursed if so one's already taken.

Maybe a beautiful day when the Sun rises
or it's raining and one's all stocked up
Snowing and the boots, Spring up the roots,
Smiling in the corner from corner to corner.

Champion is the one who restrained their vibe
and showered only when they're allowed to thrive
Cocooned in the self-contained glory of shyness
Wins she who's shun all education thereof.

How much can one sacrifice, and for what?
Can the valour go for glamour, or
where lies loyalty? Before or after thyself?
Would one let go what can possess for what they respect?

I have more questions that answers,
and more tears these days, and reasons.
They don't sound convincing when -
or maybe living on the edge was the mistake ever since.

S... talking!

It took me over 10 minutes to realise what I was doing.
.. and then 1 second to reprimand myself, and two more to log myself out.
It's often the time that you don't count is so enjoyably endearing.

To say this is the most widespread illness today is an understatement.
It's a protection, from the wretched eyes that follow you everywhere from bus depot to milk depot.
It's freedom not to look back when walking on an empty alley.
It's the safety at the end of the line-up at the movies.

Or is it, once you consider the carbon blueprint you just scattered your favorite ether channel?
Your chosen music channel, neatest social gossip corner or the virtual outlet which don't ask twice while you window surf for hours.
What is the cost you pay for all these made-to-order and deliver-at-home niceness?
Or is privacy a product sold by default.

I know most of us won't even blink trading fingerprints for a cool swipe.
Or a voice for a lady friend for all weather. That may give way to text analytics.
Or simple location for better graphics in the map... or choices in the market.
Because what better before you walk into the mall, and all sweaters are sized for you!

There's a cost of personalisation, and it's okay if some are okay to pay it.
But once everybody's defaulted to give in, to a larger lion, lone rabbits die alone.
So I enjoy my guilty pleasures till my last two seconds of reality hits me,
and we all loose in a game that shows to win, but makes sure you pay enough.

Hope Tense

Let the musical genius play foul.

Let the drumbeats run cacophonous.

Let the sunshine lighten the wrong room.

Let the missed call come from important someone.

Because hope is the only dope,
because ray is the only say
to lights bright at the end of the rainy day.

When the florist runs out of bouquets but it's her birthday
and the chocolate basket don't seem sweet enough
Maybe the days and minutes are clocked by the hour
But still, keep at it until the watch keeps ticking.

Because the ticktock at the night
is the only show of might
that you can show to the person on the mirror wall.

We will still shine bright
Forget diamonds, still be crazy
For the moments that are still our servants
and we will continue to enslave them to give us joy.

Let the joy be living in its own talent.

Let the spirit be alive tearing the brollies off.

Let the early morning jog run amok in the dew.

Let the fist be strong even when if the smiles are few.

Showstopper

You have been moving slow.
On an eternal afterglow.

Innocence couldn't define
what assurance couldn't refine
from hearsay or grapevine
the reality of the ravine.

The beauty of the fall colors
is proven by the barren browns of
the winter snow.
The purity of the soul may thus
be measured by the lives
one touched in the show.

The show must have gone on, but how
The glamour could have faded in time, not now
Now was too early, too early to be previous
too soft, too tender to be serious.

O, but we tried to be calm.
In the storm, we used the palm
to cover the forehead so it wouldn't warm up the body
Only, if only, could we sing some of the Bohemian Rhapsody.
   

Gory. Memory. Glory.

Let the tresses fall... fall apart today!

Let them not be tied to the tee, let them
not be knotted perfect. I like them free.
Like you, unlike me.

There were days when we admired the Sun... in all it's glory,
and gory, occasionally. But then came the waters, taking
the mothers apart from the daughters. The daughters had a failed existence anyway.
We are tagged regressive after all.

Somewhere it doesn't add up.
The numbers, the emotions, the history, the culture -
the tradition of procrastination and failing when and where it matters.
It's just too perfect to be true, or so it seems.

Let the winds blow us off tonight.
Let the tresses, again, fall off.
Imperfection, is sometimes, beautiful.
For without chaos, order is just not monotonous.
Predictability is death.

Come. Let's live and jive.
Again. Once again. And Again.

Colorless rainbow

That feeling is kicking in, again.

Somewhere in a crowded fair back in the days, always scared to loose the hand
of the one who brought me there. Who could feed me, and get me a toy.

Somewhere in a public vehicle where I could not the stations passing by,
just relying on the stranger by the window to get off at my destination.
Who hopefully is alert!

Somewhere in a party with high-flying elites, among the flashlights and boom speakers, finding the host.
He invites. He tells. He makes you someone from a no-one.

Rather more of the chap by your side in sprint competition in the local sports club.
However you may like to beat him, he needs to run the full mile for you to be declared a Champion.
Nobody scores at an empty goalpost, So.

That feeling when nobody cares if runs are enough, if the shirt is properly tucked,
if the lawn is mowed or if the lipstick mark's been erased.
Where no vigil, there no escape. Where no escape, there no freedom.
And that ends everything!

So what you run for, or against? Who creates the empire, the king or the peasant?
Both. But they probably don't even know each other's names.
We play I-spy all day but when the dusk sets in, and they blabber how
tomorrow should exactly be like today, better if yesterday,I feel like
my time-machine formula has been robbed, torn and dusted to atomic proportions.

Which universe do we go to, where resources are aplenty but not everyone's rich?
Where nobody's a king but all are treated like one?
Where there's fields to farm, letters to write and whips to be whacked?
and if the galaxy is a stupid copy-paste, then why waste time hoping at all?

I am not spoilt for choices. I just can't choose between
that wok full of boiling oil or chainsaw massacre... to name a few.

One that flew over the scribbler's nest!

So it happened.

Matter-of-factly, without an announcement of the denouement,
it just climaxed, and I was, as always, hands-in-pocket -
too comfortable even to take my hands out to clap and congratulate.

Now you'd ask why, when and why not.
But to me, it was more of loosing a dream, than love lost!
 I have heard that people love their dreams, but the moment you start dreaming your love,
that's a recipe for disaster!

Anyways, it's all happy and sundry - and I still sit pretty enjoying the winter Sun.
Won't say I bought them, but stuff that I planned to get will not be bought anymore.
For I could be a poet and say, the mirror is just glass if it's not reflecting your other side -
or I'd never comb because now I can never smell you tresses! Oh No!

To hell with artificial romanticism that finds itself on paper and print.
Or over coffee, cigarettes and costly cappuccinos.
Because it's not fruitful, it's redundant.
Because it's not resulting, the resultant is boring.

Not the same for you maybe, or the poets who endured the Fall.
We were busing shooting the colors of the leaves but missed they'll all soon be brown.
No leaves, just brown. Branches, alone in the snow.

Make do with what you got then, coz you really do not have so many
options - or colors - in the Spring. Simple is easy, easy is alright, alright is.. Simple!

Arts: 'Your Lifelong Prisoner' Liu Xiaobo's poem from p...

Arts: 'Your Lifelong Prisoner' Liu Xiaobo's poem from p...: New book by the jailed dissident and Nobel peace prizewinner contains a moving tribute to his wife, the poet Liu Xia To Xia My dear, I'll ne...


'Your Lifelong Prisoner' Liu Xiaobo's poem from prison

New book by the jailed dissident and Nobel peace prizewinner contains a moving tribute to his wife, the poet Liu Xia

To Xia

My dear,
I'll never give up the struggle for freedom from the oppressors'
jail, but I'll be your willing prisoner for life.

I'm your lifelong prisoner, my love
I want to live in your dark insides
surviving on the dregs in your blood

inspired by the flow of your estrogen

I hear your constant heartbeat
drop by drop, like melted snow from a mountain stream
if I were a stubborn, million-year rock
you'd bore right through me
drop by drop

day and night

Inside you
I grope in the dark
and use the wine you've drunk
to write poems looking for you
I plead like a deaf man begging for sound
Let the dance of love intoxicate your body

I always feel
your lungs rise and fall when you smoke
in an amazing rhythm
you exhale my toxins
I inhale fresh air to nourish my soul

I'm your lifelong prisoner, my love
like a baby loath to be born
clinging to your warm uterus
you provide all my oxygen
all my serenity

A baby prisoner
in the depths of your being
unafraid of alcohol and nicotine
the poisons of your loneliness
I need your poisons
need them too much

Maybe as your prisoner
I'll never see the light of day
but I believe
darkness is my destiny
inside you
all is well

The glitter of the outside world
scares me
exhausts me
I focus on
your darkness
simple and impenetr! able

Reprinted by permission of Harvard University Press from No Enemies, No Hatred: Selected Essays and Poems by Xiaobo Liu. Copyright 2012 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College.