Your laughter

Take bread away from me, if you wish,
take air away, but
do not take from me your laughter.

Do not take away the rose,
the lance flower that you pluck,
the water that suddenly
bursts forth in joy,
the sudden wave
of silver born in you.

My struggle is harsh and I come back
with eyes tired
at times from having seen
the unchanging earth,
but when your laughter enters
it rises to the sky seeking me
and it opens for me all
the doors of life.

My love, in the darkest
hour your laughter
opens, and if suddenly
you see my blood staining
the stones of the street,
laugh, because your laughter
will be for my hands
like a fresh sword.

Next to the sea in the autumn,
your laughter must raise
its foamy cascade,
and in the spring, love,
I want your laughter like
the flower I was waiting for,
the blue flower, the rose
of my echoing country.

Laugh at the night,
at the day, at the moon,
laugh at the twisted
streets of the island,
laugh at this clumsy
boy who loves you,
but when I open
my eyes and close them,
when my steps go,
when my steps return,
deny me bread, air,
light, spring,
but never your laughter
for I would die.

---- Pablo Neruda

I do not love you except because I love you

I do not love you except because I love you;
I go from loving to not loving you,
From waiting to not waiting for you
My heart moves from cold to fire.

I love you only because it's you the one I love;
I hate you deeply, and hating you
Bend to you, and the measure of my changing love for you
Is that I do not see you but love you blindly.

Maybe January light will consume
My heart with its cruel
Ray, stealing my key to true calm.

In this part of the story I am the one who
Dies, the only one, and I will die of love because I love you,
Because I love you, Love, in fire and blood.

Sonnet LXVI
---- Pablo Neruda (Nobel laureate, 1971)

Metamorphosis

Painful, it is
when life whips at you,
with lacerating blows !
And you wail, anyone will !

Unless you're blessed,
that continues.......
Perhaps, it is a test
or a lesson of forbearance !

A stage comes when,
skin metamorphoses into hide...
when you no longer feel the pangs
& tears dry before they betide !

And, all of a sudden,
they stop...the whips!
And you start missing them,
the void of pain pains!

Duels with God

God and I
have been the best of friends
and the worst of foes
We play games & have duels,
and he always wins !

In hide n seek, his favorite,
he could see me
no matter where I hid,
but I could never,
in any nook and corner.
I would then call, as
was sure he could hear,
and I felt he was near..
but he didn't answer!
Instead, he would come and
hit me from behind..
as a sign of victory, and
I would fall,
my nose bleeding !

When I desired a milieu
in which I could nurture..
he led me into one
that was good enough
only to rust !
When I'd forgiven him,
like a friend does,
years later he inveigled me
to the place I'd always
wanted to be !
Funny, is it?
To put a putrefying seed
into a fertile land,
and laugh at its incapacity?

When I craved for a company,
he allowed me none,
not even his.
I excused him, and
thought it to be
another lesson
in the 'ways of life'.
Slowly, I fell in love
with solitude, and got
intimate with inanimates !
but then he plotted to
put people around &
one fine day, stole
my best mate
among inanimates!

He has prevailed in
all duels we've had !
But there will be,
yes, a final one;
wherein I'll have all
my barriers overcome;
I'll transcend
the binding dimension;
he'll have no choice
but grant freedom;
and it'll be ME
who would've won.

(The premise for this poem is that all that happens is controlled by God!)

The Rainy Day

The day is cold, and dark, and dreary;
It rains, and the wind is never weary;
The vine still clings to the moldering wall,
But at every gust the dead leaves fall,
And the day is dark and dreary.

My life is cold, and dark, and dreary;
It rains, and the wind is never weary;
My thoughts still cling to the moldering Past,
But the hopes of youth fall thick in the blast

And the days are dark and dreary.

Be still, sad heart! and cease repining;
Behind the clouds is the sun still shining;
Thy fate is the common fate of all,
Into each life some rain must fall,
Some days must be dark and dreary.

--- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

If thou must love me, let it be for nought

If thou must love me, let it be for nought
Except for love's sake only. Do not say
'I love her for her smile—her look—her way
Of speaking gently,—for a trick of thought
That falls in well with mine, and certes brought
A sense of pleasant ease on such a day'—
For these things in themselves, Beloved, may
Be changed, or change for thee,—and love, so wrought,
May be unwrought so. Neither love me for
Thine own dear pity's wiping my cheeks dry,—
A creature might forget to weep, who bore
Thy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby!
But love me for love's sake, that evermore
Thou mayst love on, through love's eternity.

Sonnet XIV

-- Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Figments of imagination

The figments of my imagination are like wrecks sublime,
Waiting to be unearthed until I plunge into the seas of passion.
I climb a bewitched ladder into the world of ecstasy;
Where strangeness rules and reason fades into oblivion.
I become a zombie, a slave to the musings of my psyche.
The sudden unbearable urge to give vent to my imagination.
The passion of creativity seizes me by the throat.
The lines that you peruse are the only culmination.


The figments of my imagination are like wrecks sublime,
Waiting to be unearthed until I plunge into the seas of passion.
I try to mould words like clay being shaped into a pot,
The effort leaves me sweating; defeated in exhaustion.
But the elation at giving life to my humble musings;
Is more than I could ever ask for in compensation.
I ogle at these etchings like an indulgent mother,
Attaining divine content with every single adulation.