DON'T PANIC / LET GO

1 I ride in trains for whole nights trying to find myself

2. I call you from incognito pay-phones

Because I love to hear your silences

3. I look out at the ocean

But forget to notice how beautiful it is

Only that it is as inscrutably blue and silent and cold and tempestuous as your eyes

4. I feel the past clinging on to my fingers like gum

Yesterday stretches; yawns and is awake.
Here I am, again in the waiting room.
It’s not going to rain

5. I drink myself insensible every night

I wake up in sweats every morning

But you keep on going by

In my dreams

And I can't ever sleep

6. I behave stoically in the face of grief,

Knowing that the clouds above me,

The ground beneath my feet

And the air in my lungs

Are totally disinterested

In how I feel

7. I destroy as much evidence of your existence

As I could find

Until in the end,

All I am left with,

Are the red and white carnations of 2003

I’ll always have those

Dried up in dusty diaries

8. I suddenly remember your face and it flashes before me:

Your microscopic cut, just above your right eyebrow

Then, I realize that I never asked you about it

I looked into your eyes so many times

And yet I never asked you

Is it possible, that I just didn’t see you?

For I took your gaze for granted

But now, I miss it like hell

9. I plan to go to the Himalayas and become a recluse.

I wonder in Romanov nights-‘Whatever happened to you?’

I become constitutionally incapable of making eye contact

I fall in love with every woman I meet

I try to commit suicide by holding my breath

I lose 8 1/2 kilograms

I cry occasionally

I stop making movies

I believe everything will be all right

10. I write mechanically, without feeling

My poems; very scholarly, very droll

Page after page in silence

I wet my finger to turn the pages

Giving myself enough time between them,

To reach down to hold and stroke myself

While thinking of you,

Out of boredom, not titillation;

And if only, to delude myself into believing

That it was just wanton lust

CHILDREN OF MARX & COCA-COLA

I had met you for the first time in Zurich, Switzerland

It had been easy to want to fall in love back then

Amidst the postcard picturesque snow,

Elvis Presley in our heads

And of course,

We were eight

Our brownness seemed to connect us like some unarguable bond

You were the only girl in our detective agency

As we spent three of summers together

Today, they don't quite feel enough

Playing hide and seek, building card castles, imagining mysteries

Reveling in the chaos we left behind

I remember-

The day, we went swimming at the icy cold lake behind Mrs Henrik's house

Where I saw you naked

For the first time

You had seemed like an angel back then

The shared love for homemade bittersweet lime pickles and abridged Tolstoy

The tenderness of your arms which held me whenever I wept into your shoulder

After every cycle accident and every B minus

You could make everything all right

By blowing softly over scraped knees

Yes, for years, you were the only girl on the planet

I remain thankful for your unexpected friendship then, that seemed immortal

We met again, again unexpectedly, around twelve years later

In our old, ancestral house in London in 1967

I remember the year clearly

For our great grandmother had died that autumn, thus causing the family reunion

For I had taken you to Godard's “Week End” at the Ritz, the following weekend

I couldn't help noticing that you'd become incredibly sexy

The same limpid turquoise blue eyes

Now accompanied by unforeseen breasts

I wanted to be a novelist; you an actress

It was the Summer of love,

Free sex

Hallucinogenics

Nouvelle Vague

And a cultural phenomenon, called, “The Beatles”.

Anything seemed possible

Later, of course, Vietnam happened

JLG stopped making good films

The Fab Four retreated to the Maharishi

Our heroes became older men with ordinary problems

One of those days, outside the Ritz,

You'd confessed to falling in love with me

And I, in a moment of rebellious thoughtlessness,

Had turned you down

I should reveal that I was secretly looking forward to seeing you

In December winter cold war hit Tashkent, Russia

Six years later

India had won another war

One day cricket was a thing of the future

I was covering the covert activities of the CIA and the KGB

And you were shooting for Coke

But now, more than ever, you felt like a stranger

Perhaps out of revenge then

That after ruthlessly sleeping with me, twice,

You didn't leave me your number

Then, for eleven long years, we did not see each other

Until I ran into you, one very early morning in Shimla

That year

Fiat cars and silk scarves were in vogue

Michael Jackson burst onto the scene

Union Carbide killed twenty thousand

You had worn dark sunglasses to remain incognito

I had taken a sabbatical to become famous

According to the tabloid I'd worked for

The divorce had come through six months ago

You had seemed at once pleased and disturbed, seeing me

I didn't see you

As an aging model, whose moment of glory had long passed her by

But as the young girl I once knew

Now, Gigantic paychecks, cover features, masturbating fans, glowing reviews, ......

Yet, sadness embroidered your cashmere

Too afraid to go out

Except during your four a.m. strolls

When the salty-sweet fragrance of the wild valley flowers strolled with you

Chrysanthemums, I think

I called you up out of the blue, one day

From New York in 1991

When Russia was disintegrating

The Berlin wall had collapsed

Cold war was over

Gulf War had started

Back home,

Mandal Commission ended

Babri Masjid still stood

Cobain had arrived

I had just won the Booker

I had taken you hostage to the ceremony

Couldn't think of anyone else

The same evening, over chicken wings and Jack Daniels on the Fifth Avenue

You agreed to marry me

We returned to NY for our tenth anniversary

Temples touched by silver

We spent a night of Viagra- induced vigor

The next morning, just as I awoke

Aiming my revolver right at me and putting your finger on the trigger,

You said saucily,

“And now, baby,

Suppose I pull the trigger?”

And then-

Then my dear,

You pulled it!

.....SEX, THOUGHTS & HOTEL CONFESSIONS

Her blue denims
Around her ankles
His fervent tongue
All around her


It felt dangerous
They were constantly terrified
That someone would walk in
And discover them


Aniruddha and Reva had met again
In Marseille
Where she was getting married to Andrew
Eleven hours later
In front of five hundred people


Reva thought fleetingly, of the wedding,
At the chapel just six miles from the hotel
Of the unsuspecting Andrew, her in laws
She thought about their fledgling bond
That had changed irrevocably,
That had been ripped apart
Just like her denims
And her
That night
Scandalously
Unhappily
Inevitably


She knew in a few hours from now
It would all be over
Their secret would remain only between them
Punishing and protecting them at the same time
And that’s when she fell asleep

………
Aniruddha looked at her closed eyes
Her eyes had said to him that evening,
“Lend me just one night please?”


Her eyes which when open,
Were always; a sparkling, turquoise blue
He had felt that gaze that night,
And that left breast,
And felt those calves
Her sharp small breaths
Like a child’s


He thought of the November when she'd walked out
Of their eleventh floor condo
She'd left a storm in her wake
She'd left him staring at the empty walls for hours
She had left without a note
She had left nothing behind


His memories of Reva
Had begun falling apart in the days and weeks
After she’d left
The thousands of days he’d spent with her
Reduced to a handful of specific scenes
The images building, then fading
Like fireworks


He looked at Andrew’s photograph
In her watch-chain
And thought-
For this man, Reva had fought with her parents in India
For this man, Reva had colored her hair burgundy
For this man, Reva had learnt to cook
For this man, Reva had stopped having red wine and given up ballet
For this man, Reva wore an undersized ring that stung her finger in the winters
For this man, Reva had left Paris
For this man, Reva had left him


He wanted to wake her and ask her
“But does he make you smile?”
“But does he know that you’re allergic to silk and mangoes?”
“But does he manage to surprise you on your birthdays?”

…….
And then he fell asleep
No longer realizing
When Reva awoke at five- thirty
Ordered breakfast for him through room service
And delicately placed it on the bedside table
Then she had kissed him very lightly on his left cheek
So as not to awaken him
Drawn the curtains, dressed
And looked lovingly at him for twenty two minutes
She saw his half open mouth
And the red lipstick still around its edges
She smiled and thought-


“For months after we broke up
I’d looked for you
On the crowded streets,
In newspapers and magazines,
In every doorbell
I searched foolishly for your face


I'm so thankful
That you're here now
That you exist
You breathe
You are
And
Therefore
I am


Because
You, Aniruddha Kanti Sen, actually, genuinely, like me
You never judge me
You never seem to notice that I’ve put on weight
You look at my face
As I look at yours now
And I still see you as the young boy
On whom I'd had my first crush
Yes, you have not changed much
The same chiseled features,
The same brown, forlorn, eyes (now with faint wrinkles sprouting in them)


In these wrinkles of your face only
Lies the entire meaning of my being
I wish time would stop here like a train at its last station
But I've reached an end here”


……….
She locked the door on her way out
He never saw all that
He never saw
Her tears that morning
Crossing the threshold
She returned to her existence
The existence she had chosen,
Without Aniruddha in it


Last night
She had asked him,
“Where’re you going after you leave Paris?’
“Maybe Florence”
His silence had said,
“Don’t marry him, Reva. Come with me”
And her silence had said,
“It’s too late baby”


She thought
In a few weeks,
It really will be,
Too late
But
Maybe not yet,
Baby
Not yet

EVA BRAUN’S PHOBIA OF CLOSENESS IN 1945 LENINGRAD

I thought you’d forgotten all about me
Until yesterday afternoon
When I received the small vial you sent here
Full of cyanide capsules
And with a note in your familiar, childlike scrawl,
“Monsieur, I send you my temptation”


You gave me my best years
During the Second World War
Now, you’re unwell
I didn’t expect
And in hell
But you won’t accept


You live in a delusional world
Abnormal
Aryan
Mad
Fantastic
Luftwaffe


Agoraphobia means a fear of going out
You’re afraid of falling, not from heights
But falling while walking
You live in unwavering fright


Why did you become a recluse?
And I just didn’t see you
I thought I dreamt that you were crying
While dreaming that you were dying


When you asked with your large black eyes
“Carry me in your arms
I can’t walk anymore”
We carried each other
And I laughed and never suspected
Anything was wrong


We all contemplated suicide
We hoped for euthanasia
We were lulled into believing
Every conceivable nightmare
What a time that was.


Those simple memories now look irreplaceable
Walking with you
Talking to you
In gardens
And laughing
Around crowds
Over tea
At sunsets


I wish I’d recorded your laughter
Each word a sunbeam
Glancing in the light
The year slips on the calendar
So much has changed


Hollow eyes
Broken bones
Dreams on wheelchairs
What triggered it?


I already forget how you used to look like
I don’t care that you’ve become obese
But you’re eating me inside


You don’t let anyone reach you now
Won’t you set aside your pain?
It’s beautiful here
Won’t you come out again?


No, the sun won’t burn
No one would mock
No one cares
No one but me


Come on, let’s go and see
How it will be like to drown.


Let me see you smile
Your smile like a vintage currency note-
Parched
Faded
Moth eaten
Yellowing
A veritable antique
Locked in museums


Slowly but surely, I know,
That smile will fade
Then you’ll be miles away from me
Enjoying going insane


You say me:
‘Vivre sa vie’
-My life to live
You tell me,
Not to be
Like a detective asking all those questions
My sympathy embarrasses you
Even on the telephone


But I can picture you
A woman frail and sad as Hiroshima mutations
Walking slowly down the corridor
It's very quiet
Exploding into timelessness
Ran from home but panicked on the train to Normandy,
Brought back exhausted and unconscious by Fuehrer’s men
To die that night
She who mumbled incoherently into her incontinent tears
Unaware of me
Standing in the corner


You are home with the blinds drawn
You made a patient of everyone
Cold as death
Push at the bed-sheets
Good blood and bad blood
Our blood and your blood
I sit here - you sit there


When you cut your hair
And the skull was visible from the top
I felt my heart would burst and stop
I laughed at my own naivety
I felt naked then


Then you became invisible
Always seen less
In places never heard of
With feelings suppressed


But now I think I understand you
You didn’t want to let me see you like that
You wanted me to only be in love with your image
The way you were
The way you’d want me to remember you

ACID RAIN

Our windows look out at other windows looking in at us
Mynahs no longer come by in our balconies
Branches, not of a mango tree
But of a conglomerate,
Surround them


The silhouettes of concrete buildings shine
In the rain's aftermath
Like surreal cardboard cutouts
It's a conundrum to decide
Whether the world we live in
Is an illusion or a reality


Silver skies
The world goes by
My window
Too many people walking on
Everybody's talking
No one makes a sound


Urban loneliness
Nihilistic pain
Junkyard wars
Acid rain

THE 13 CLUES

I lie awake on the naked rooftops
Of cloud lapped skyscrapers
And I feel cold....
Until I feel your starry gaze upon me
From a million feet tall
Synthetic billboard.....


Before you embraced the silver screens
You played only for me
But you were only playing your part well
That I could never see


And now you would
Only look at me from afar
You are nothing
But a busy shooting star


………..
As the release date of ‘13 Clues’ draws closer
My mind goes back to how it started.


I cast myself and Winnie in the roles of-
Myself and Winnie


Even though we hadn’t spoken in over a year
And even though I was sure she’ll refuse
She had accepted the role
No one else could’ve played her
No one but her


So, with Cannes in our eyes
We started work on ‘13 Clues’
It was a whodunit
About a woman’s murder
Parts of it were autobiographical too
My whole life captured in a movie,
My whole world recreated in a studio
This was going to be art, baby!


(And after this point,
I’ve disguised myself so cunningly
That, even the cleverest reader
Will fail to recognize me
All my notes are muddled)


The lights flashed
The camera came on
Atomic bright
The flash leaves
Scarlet after image after image
Images
Prisons of the soul
My Sony retina
A distant planet


French kissing
Dancing around trees
Campus romance
Gyrating Pelvis
Mexican standoffs
Shot my first chase sequence on the fifth
An expensive car rolling down the cliff
Kidding


On the sets
It's like Prague in there
Two light bulbs
The actors don't see
There are no resources
To brighten the place up


Here I am again in the waiting room
You in the van
Waiting for the scene to be called
Greasing your hair
Forgetting for a brief instant
That it’s a film


You avoided me on the sets
Like a contraceptive
You were so
Professional
Polite
Well meaning
And cold


I didn’t tell you then
But watching you make out with Anuj
On or off the sets
Gave me insomniac nights
I used to wake up in sweats
With you in my head
And you’d flow out
Like a dream upon awakening
Did he solve you in a way I didn’t?
That’s when I first decided to kill you


And on the morning of 24th February
We packed up


In the cutting room
I dwelled through the negatives
I delved into your memories
The frozen frames
In the screening room
Your blow ups
You looked so different
The camera never lied


The test audience told me the ending was bad
“Too tragic”
They said
I said-
“We’ve given them too many dreams to take home
Too many happy endings to believe in
Not anymore
Show’s over, my friends
Go home fellas
The End”


All characters and events in this film
Are fictional
Any resemblance to anyone or anything
Is coincidental


And then I remember you walked in
You seemed like a tempestuous
Gulzar heroine
Wearing mufflers of clouds
And raincoats
The whole of Gravity’s rainbow
In your eyes
Bearing evidence of mysterious allegories
In Rembrandt’s masterpieces


Your kiss flared
My slumber broken
Kiss me again
Kiss me
Kiss me again
And again
Never enough
Greedy lips
Speedwell eyes
Blue skies
Blue and Jet black
Your familiar
Yardley Lavender
In Dreams


You’re falling in love with me
Again
I dreamt


Don’t your dreams mix with reality?
Is it all an illusion?
Isn’t life too?
Is life a film?


That last day
I stood alone, watching the sets getting dismantled
Like little pieces of my soul being taken away
I had reveled in them for so long
I could never finish the film
The way I wanted to
But may I live in that world for a bit longer?


I realized then that
Shooting you was the most difficult part
But I did it
Anything for art
However the red, squalid liquid on my hands
Just doesn’t go off


What had started out as a mystery
Had somehow become a tragic love story
In fact, so many things had changed
There were so many things we wanted to do
Wanted to be
We became something else
Someone else
Somewhere down the line
We let it happen to us


They say life imitates art
Or is it the other way around?
Because I realized
That even then,
When we had fallen in love,
We were someone else

ERASERHEAD

Would that be lost?

Like

Love in the times of cholera
Voices in an autocracy
The glorious Roman era

Iraq's WMDs
The twin brother in the village fair
My childhood memories

Polar Bears with global warming
Ships in the Bermuda triangle
JD Salinger's Writings

White ink
The first talkies
Erased paintings

Palestinian homeland
A Dream upon awakening
Footprints in the sand

What about our time together?
Would that be lost too?