EMPTY UTOPIA

Empty utopia never meant to be inhabited

Such dreamy hearts playing architects of a low ilk

They conjured an illusory order to those gossamer castles

Concealing the murderous reality, writing those wishful fables

Patent crevices on those flimsy structures ignored

Grim shards of skin spread where the dead ghosts roared

Dead with no face assume a deceptive appearance

Sharp claws betray the marks of the beasts in reference

Lofty dreams all gone by an unruly maelstrom

Cradling the monsters in those tattered clothes dancing feverishly in a prom

A world once ripe with warmth, now brims with shadows drowning consciousness in path

What fills the sight is a sad fate of discarded bones of absent lovers,

And a jaundiced bequest of want possessing the cadavers

Two specters trampled under the stomping feet of obvious choices

How the monopoly time once choked their cooing voices

They still live as a jumble of ghosts under the myth of salvation

Their stitches toying with their wounds, flaunting abject privation

ANOTHER EDEN LOST

( This poem reflects on the staggering male-female ratio in many parts of Asia due to a lingering cultural preference for boys. It is a take on female infanticide and crime against women.)

In the shadow of angry brutes and copious squeals she walks

Refracted and bent, starved inside the infinity of her skin,

stumbling through the rocks

There’s no healing for her for only pain makes history

She mocks the gods we assume watch over in their sublime glory

This time it’s not the fall of Eve but the doom of entire humanity

as the last woman on the earth approaches the threshold of death, humoring some patriarch’s vanity

No darkness weighs anything for her; she has seen her sisters getting raped

A hapless witness of deflowered women or girls teenaged

How the beddings of our fathers now reek of the virgin blood

She issues forth a deep sigh when memories of graceless mutiny flood back with a thud

Scantily clad young innocent girls with crumbling time line

Suffering ethical rape, unpaid rape, rape paid or rape with ‘harmless design’

Suffocated them in mogul harems, grabbed them from behind

Tamed them with improbable stories by preachers and religion blind

Ripping more than their skins, not even sparing their female fetus

With so called corrective violence within the four walls

They marred the contours of Venus

When honor killings or women burnt were reduced to mere statistic(s)

And indifferent male establishment dismissed such bloodshed as trivially criminalistic

Soon enough the hitherto heard sweet laughs were to be gone

Entailing the poor womankind, savagery is what you won.

GREAT EXPECTATIONS

Vitriol requited while love was not,

Curious are the ways of world, what eludes is 

is what you dearly sought.

The one who goes back on words

wishes meaningful faith from the one who still hurts.

Right when you wish to console the claimed victim,

I realize he moved on feeding me some excuse grim.

There's no denying that he still pains on certain weekdays.

He finds it more severe than my lasting heartache.

Or may be like anyone I just want to fix the blame.

You come an easy target as you don't look the same.

Let's say love consumed you and hurt consumed me.

What propriety demanded you to show up on that funeral so cheerful and carefree?

Don't bother. This Eid too, in the feast of a clan,

the slaughtered scapegoat still saves grace for a man.

If it helps! A butchered heart has no wounds to staunch,

but just countless dreams and a vague want.

Forget about dying, not every time you can have your way.

My prayers might have failed way back but today is my day.

When my words hurt, hold me silly ; when they don't, take me wise

I sniff it and write, I might just sniff it one day and die.

For dead are not subject to any angst and disgrace

especially ones who depart pining for a sweet embrace.

SILENT SCREAMS

There you lurk with those gingerly steps, all for a sadist laugh.

Ensnared by the bait, yet another Leda is charmed by the mighty Swan.

As if it was not enough already, once again you instill the same pain.

Having spurned her unceremoniously, you yearn to witness her spirits wane.

Why would you bring her to same masochistic self? Why would you have her feeble?

Haven't you preyed on her flesh enough? Couldn't we spare her of your design evil?

Why feign feelings? Why cast another sinister hex?

Why shed her blood once more? It's not been long since you ruffled her nest.

Curiously, when you tear her with gnawing claws, we see you thriving in your guilt.

With a strange air of martyrdom, she embraces all hurt at her peril.

A grin spreads on your face when she chokes soft sobs.

Possessed by a feral passion, you draw her pulling her locks.

With the time, the terrors grew and you gave a content sigh.

I swear on God, the morbid struggle didn't pain her but your lie.

Aye, you loved her just as any predator is fixated on his prey.

Gracing her with silent screams and a perpetual pain,
your might holds sway.

AN ABANDONED HOME

Walking through the memory aisle, I just traced a home long lost.

Conjuring the past, getting the ghosts of our remembrances tossed.

Once ensconced on the couch, their sweet laughter would fill the air.

My knees weaken with heartwarming somersaults as through the window I stare.

It is the same seaside we often fancied for our desultory promenade.

Here arrests my attention a solemn witness of their love, a warm furnace.

Another glimpse of our very own study where he reads some beautiful classics to her.

Luxuriating in those dreams and admiration, his beloved would purr.

As the door swung open, it exposes a graffiti heart cropped against the wall.

Her heart is now a whirlwind of emotions hearing his promises tall.

A small squeal escape my lips as I see him now setting our home ablaze.

Fear creeps into my bones to find his affection faze.

His general summation of this predicament is a play of fate.

I curl my lips into a wry smile hearing this blame game.

Kismet never occasioned those feelings and assurances in me.

Why malign the mighty God when it was your own decree?

Faithless as I am, perhaps basking in my own humiliation.

Loss of my haven and your beguiling words worsen my angst and dejection.

The irony is that neither I can blame the heavens nor call for a nemesis.

One of the two is immoral and another eviscerates my once beloved bliss.

All I'm left with is this forlorn abandoned home,

Vestiges of forgotten vows and shards of memories of my own.

A FINAL PORTRAIT

Here we are, yet again in proximity

all braced up for a grand enterprise

A word picture awaits a final portrait of yours,

to capture the one who I insanely prized.

An only plea, just be yourself

this image has to mirror the real you.

No put-on, no facade, no assumed countenance

'a mere smile', begs this amateur artist and nothing new.

A fantastic and collegial setting

despite the past clash.

Don't we still strike the right chord

holding an appropriate measure of dash.

You look nice with that frown

with your raised eyebrow.

Should I repeat this portrait goes to me

and no other woman gets to say a 'wow'.

I mean, why let a look go futile

when everything you do has an angle.

After all we all adore your artful maneuvers

and know it when your eyes spangle.

It seems so facile to paint you now

when time left you no whit of shame.

It's just you, a stark lie

my hands yet sense the old flame.

My painting brush looks grief-stricken

unable to hide your ersatz virility.

Wish my loving words redeem the lost honor

and remind you of my affection infinity.

And so it ends, with you beaming so large

with three long years culminating into an unbecoming image.

Your love never soared high like Invictus,

it just got lost in the maze. 

Now whenever I'll behold this portrait

I shall always be reminded 

of lost humanity, divestment of a sham,

dearth of emotions and an affair sordid. 

BEWILDERED (2009)

I laugh insane something is wrong with my mien,

I think of something and then I'm beginning to wail.

I step out of my home all jumpy and gussied up,

on the way something clicks and I wipe off my make up.

I sing out and loud right there in the crowd,

before they could say 'encore' I begin to howl and growl.

I head westwards called by a familiar fragrance,

with a mellow voice and an arresting cadence.

Onus pulls me back rending me its minion,

I'm reduced to a bird with a truncated pinion.

Why don't you execute the same miracle?

Why don't you unwind this vexing manacle?

Disentangling myself, I forgot my destination,

all I know is this pain is redolent of my ambition.

So I try to inflict on me this enormous pain,

I'm bleeding and sobbing with diminutive gain.

Why don't you sing now, why don't you now call

give me a direction so I could proceed to crawl.

I bow to you in love and supplication,

wherever you are come to me for I'm your creation.

As God fashioned me from one of your beloved ribs

with you comes my respite, my Nirvana and my bliss.