When I run away, away
Through the midnight streets
Of a steel city, guarded by
Halogen eyes of Praxair towers
And dark silhouettes of giant
Mechanical sentinels,
Along boulevards of conspiring
Peltophorums in a wintry dawn,
Sighing lemon yellow flowers,
Along accidental highways
With coke-shops and temples
Haunted by the ghosts of melancholy
Evening bells and passing orgies,
Along derelict downtown markets
When all the cars have gone
Home, and three stray dogs
Bark around the ice-cream parlour
While bulls and bullshit litter the desolation,
And through jogging tracks
Of history and alacrity.
When I run away...
*
An invisible fish subsides,
Inscribing silver ripples
on the wasted waters of the Jayanti
March moon-lotus drifts along the Kharkai
A speckled lizard scampers from 1/4
to C8, leaving a trail of click-ticks
Confirming some unutterable misfortune
An inflamed Sakchi sky
Pitted olives ham and peach
Linger in neglect, on bygone
Tuesday evening shelves.
Life is a long due bike ride.
*
Cheap motel toilets
With white lights and
Green linoleum floors
Tea-stained blanket-sheets
Sighing ceiling fan
A notebook of Poems and
A pack of cigarettes. Each night
Death lights the Zippo
In return for fellatio.
*
Maybe I don't remember
Your touch, distinct from
The lovers and pimps,
But I do.
Maybe I should claim
It does not matter,
But it does.
My skin misses you as much
As this thumping pumping organ
Now diving down to
My navel and loins in an
Oppressing Dakshinayan.
Two years of love and
One year of penance.
Now you shall find me
With white hair,
White breath, and
A white pyre at Manikarnika.
Through the midnight streets
Of a steel city, guarded by
Halogen eyes of Praxair towers
And dark silhouettes of giant
Mechanical sentinels,
Along boulevards of conspiring
Peltophorums in a wintry dawn,
Sighing lemon yellow flowers,
Along accidental highways
With coke-shops and temples
Haunted by the ghosts of melancholy
Evening bells and passing orgies,
Along derelict downtown markets
When all the cars have gone
Home, and three stray dogs
Bark around the ice-cream parlour
While bulls and bullshit litter the desolation,
And through jogging tracks
Of history and alacrity.
When I run away...
*
An invisible fish subsides,
Inscribing silver ripples
on the wasted waters of the Jayanti
March moon-lotus drifts along the Kharkai
A speckled lizard scampers from 1/4
to C8, leaving a trail of click-ticks
Confirming some unutterable misfortune
An inflamed Sakchi sky
Pitted olives ham and peach
Linger in neglect, on bygone
Tuesday evening shelves.
Life is a long due bike ride.
*
Cheap motel toilets
With white lights and
Green linoleum floors
Tea-stained blanket-sheets
Sighing ceiling fan
A notebook of Poems and
A pack of cigarettes. Each night
Death lights the Zippo
In return for fellatio.
*
Maybe I don't remember
Your touch, distinct from
The lovers and pimps,
But I do.
Maybe I should claim
It does not matter,
But it does.
My skin misses you as much
As this thumping pumping organ
Now diving down to
My navel and loins in an
Oppressing Dakshinayan.
Two years of love and
One year of penance.
Now you shall find me
With white hair,
White breath, and
A white pyre at Manikarnika.
4 comments:
I like this poem very much. It's very real, very tangible, very sensuous. I'm glad I chanced upon your blog.
Somehow, this reminded me of Ginsberg.
Loved it!
Hello Arjun,
Thank you; I am glad you like it.
Rishab,
Incidentally, I was reading a lot of Ginsberg at that point of time, so discovering some influence there is not merely incidental I suppose.
:)
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