Friday, January 29, 2021

Growing Up

You join dots that glint like the tips of a tantrum

to form alphabets that are onesies dangling

from pink plastic clips of lisped words   

fluttering into sentences like shape shifting wind

settling into a sepia memory like winged butterflies

on a flower.

 

Can we spend some more time, here, together?


~ In response to the Peter's Prompt at dVerse

Thursday, January 28, 2021

Turning within

watch the mind for five seconds,

watch it watching itself

like an alert sentinel

realisation pierces through

the parallax of demands like a diamond cutter

shredding   shearing the flab   flak

of the unwanted  the unneeded  

convoluted ingrained patterns of

thinking    thoughts

the residue of purity   unadulterated consciousness

decants into a moment of

meaning that spotlights existence

and everything becomes clear

sharp like the crackle of fire


~Written in response to the Brendan's Earthweal Weekly Challenge : Deep Time

Wednesday, January 27, 2021

A Rainbow-bridge

"Call me to lie down in fragrance" ~ D Margoshes ~ Season of Lilac


Sunny afternoons

when I sat in your warmth

tracing the picture of a red apple

its nascent curves, remnants

of baked memories  


Fresh earth washed by raindrops  

Each the size of a teaspoon

Full of your wise words

That I missed in my hurry to find a place

Under a grey sky raining needles

 

Green possibilities

When I can cup the glow of fireflies

And listen to the ditties of the cuckoo

Taste the tartness of the grapefruit you once peeled

And walk, with you, along the colours of the rainbow-bridge    

    

~ Written in response to the dVerse Prompt: Poetics: Beginning at the End by Laura Bloomsbury

 

 

Tuesday, January 26, 2021

Transience

The glitter of gold is questioned

Groupthink has had its say      

 

One invisible living atom quietens

The uproar of invincible economies   

 

Honesty is looked upon as a hydra-headed handicap

And values morph into gibberish fit for the sidelines

                                            

Although nothing is a surprise anymore

Nothing is a mystery

 

Hope remains 

That kindness will prevail

That gentleness will proceed to work out a way

That rules will be followed and roles will be respected

While acknowledging the transience of

Perishable life in a scarfed paradise


~Written in response to the prompt Writers' Pantry #54: New Dawn at Poets and Storytellers United

 

 

Monday, January 25, 2021

Green

Gentle rustling leaves    echo

A strewn pebble   white round smooth

The blue river     gurgles below

The tall sky sparkles    evening glow

 

I will walk this way   later    again

In the quietness    of an interlude

To touch     the scent green     see

To belong    to be      


~Written in response to the dVerse Prompt by Lisa  

Sunday, January 24, 2021

Visual Verse

 A piece of short fiction that I submitted to Visual Verse is up at https://visualverse.org/submissions/the-ship/ 

Thanks for reading!

Saturday, January 23, 2021

Moonshine


The captain knelt in front of the altar and raised his palms in surrender, for after two hundred fifty days of voyage, exhausting their store of canned food and no respite in sight, sea sickness consumed him and his men like conflagrating wild fire.  

‘Sire, land ahoy!,’ cried the men, banging their fists against the teak door of his room.

The captain opened his eyes to see the top of a light house glowing incandescent against the dark sky, its light as soothing as liquid moonshine.

~Written in response to Sonya's Three Line Tales Prompt at https://only100words.xyz/2021/01/21/three-line-tales-260/ - Three Line Tales 260

Friday, January 22, 2021

Resilience

Manya sat in the midst of papers, swirling in a sea of indigo files. She couldn’t hear the clock ticking but knew that each moment gave way to the next with speed of lightening. The Deadline would creep in, deadly quiet, and stand there, thin-lipped, hands on her hips, demanding her pound of flesh.

Manya stood up and stared out of the window. The red-tiled portico was unpeopled except for the aged gardener who was hunched over, picking tufts of dried grass lining the edge of the green lawn.

How she wished she could join him. Did he want a potted petunia for his garden? Or a gladiolus, may be? She would choose the best ones from her own select array and gift it to the man. Tomorrow. When it would all be over. She would gladly trade the coldness of the ivory tower, where she stood, to the greenness of the grassroots with which the gardener worked. Carefree. Shorn of inane responsibilities. Happy.

But then again, wasn’t happiness a bi-product of the mind, just as suffering was. It was all in the mind. What stood between her and happiness at that moment? It was her mind. Her imagined fear of a missed deadline.

The gardener stood up, stretched his back and made as if to wipe the sweat off his brow. He sat down in a huff, muttering under his breath for a couple of moments, and slowly proceeded to pick up where he had left.  

Manya looked at the clear sky. It was dotted with wispy white clouds. Clouds that predicted good fortune, she knew. The Deadline was inching, slowly and surely. Battling it, tackling it and nailing it, was the Hobson’s choice she would choose.

She turned around and found the indigo blue files staring at her. They were the same colour as the colour of the sky. She picked one and ran her fingers over its smooth surface. She was now holding a piece of the sky, her very own sky.


~Written in response to Rommy's Prompt - Weekly Scribblings #53 : Beautiful Words at Poets and Storytellers United. I chose the word Zuiun: clouds that predict good fortune. Word Count:341

https://poetsandstorytellersunited.blogspot.com/2021/01/weekly-scribblings-53-beautiful-words.html#comment-form

Thursday, January 21, 2021

A ball of ideas

Life is all about engagements,

entanglements of

thoughts of action,

actionable thoughts

action and thoughts,

and sometimes thoughtless actions

meaningless thoughts

until the colourful skeins transform into  

one giant, jumble, colourful ball of ideas.

 

It takes a calm mind,

cool and clear

to separate and put them to use

or to see meaning morph from

what is far from a mess.    


~In response to Earthweal Weekly Challenge : Entangled Up in You from Brendan

https://earthweal.com/2021/01/18/earthweal-weekly-challenge-entangled-up-in-you/

Wednesday, January 20, 2021

Making Sense

It is always easy to unentangle

the Past into clarity,

fork and ingest, decipher

her epiphanous meaning

under cones of the clear white light,

shone by fleeting Present. But sometimes, when

she lingers long enough,

her diaphanous flecks

spill purpose onto the swell of Future,

transmogrifying into a slip-fit link

so life becomes one long roller chain

of purpose.


~In response to Prompt at dVerse by Merril D Smith : Connections

https://dversepoets.com/2021/01/19/poetics-connections/   

Saturday, January 2, 2021

The new year

Here we are, at the cusp of a new year. 

Last year was a painful year as a gigantic wave of loss swelled and spilled onto the banks of the normal idea of normalcy, engulfing many in its folds. It was like as if God had tightly closed the lid on our world and was rattling it like a salt and pepper shaker.

If there is anything the pandemic has taught us, it is, according to me, the need to be kind, the significance of being understanding. It has reminded us the ephemerality of our thoughts, our desires and our existence. As long as we are destined to be here, let us be kind to one another. For, long after a person is gone, what remains alive in the hearts of the living, are the wispy petals of kindness that she has dispersed.    

Let us begin the new year, gripping the torch of hope firmly in our callused hands. Let us stand united and lend each other support till we can together surmount the challenges posed by these trying times and make it to the shore of safety.

Happy new year!