She Who Cannot Write Three Decent Sestets

Winter is in the twin city
although you can only tell
by the slivers of white on your skin;
the embarrassing crackling of smile lines.
The sun still sizzles in the sky.
An old dog with an old habit.

Between Karkhana and Lingampalli,
sweaters sheepishly hang on roadsides
waiting to be bought,
while even old Hyderabadis laugh to see such ambition.

In the irrepressible smog of Diwali,
you realize the shortcomings with a start:
You are not a consumptive poet waiting to die by the sea.
You are a little bit of your parents,
a large question, round parentheses
surviving behind the refuse of Karkhana.

Surviving, in spite of yourself,
with a little October shiver, sparklers, someone else’s poetry
and asthma that is entirely your own.

Come As You Are

You appear in my dreams
as characters other than yourself.
Last night, moving furniture
then lying heavily on my divan,
perhaps you were a character
from what I can only imagine
was a movie of questionable virtue.

Never, then,
the coffee-sharing friend
with a mind of fine balance
and nonchalant wit
while driving on the streets of Colaba.

Never, either,
the tousled lover
seductive of hand
and meditating in autos
on by-lanes around Church Street.

Tonight in my dreams,
come as yourself.

I’d enjoy the warm fireplace
of your humor
and the prime real estate
of your shoulders,
in a third city.
Maybe we can joke about phone bills
in a smelly boat on Hussain Sagar Lake.

Coo-Coo-Ca-Choo

I want to wake up one day and find
the whisky and the words.
Before it’s too late.

Before punctuations are thrown in prison
for misdemeanor and rioting.

Before September steals August’s thunder
lightning, rain and the smell of wet mud.

Before the oceans eat us all up
as we brisk-walk away another Sunday morning.

Before you become preoccupied with
male pattern balding,
and I acquire a taste for young boys
and red lipstick.