Another April Ends

#1: GENTLE I find myself running again on the verge of our paddy field a bunch of wild cosmos in my hand I held it out to my mother In my dreams, I am nice to her.

We hurt ourselves from thorns and stones and branches picking red berries Little drops of sour sunset in our mouths.

While rubbing coconut oil on the scratches very gently she says smiling, regret in her eyes Darling, you will grow up too soon.

I wake up with a jolt, dial her number The person you are trying to reach does not exist.

In the past, I am nice to my mother.

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#2: PATTERNS i.

I met a wood carver in the floating market of lake Dal He told me of a young boy who pushed his lover into the water Just to watch the Ripples He said, everything left a mark in life Some we noticed, some we didn't Some, we would choose to be blind And for some, we stood and watched. ii.

I come home with a wooden boat clutched to my heart Everything leaves a markPineapple on the kitchen ceiling pizza sauce on my favourite rug breakfast tray on satin sheets wine dripping drunken lips Your teeth my nails mud stained feet on marble tiles Whiskey glass on the writing table wax drops of aroma candle.

iii.

You count the freckles on my arm it's a carnival ride on a windy night You draw a star, then a heart then circles inside circles Ripples you say watch the Ripples.

Everything leaves a markAngry howls on windy nights Crimson blood on carnival rides broken skulls empty homes miniature boats on lonely hearts.

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#3: DISTANCE I think this universe runs on a repeat mode telling us the same stories irrespective of countries, distance, colour or religion, irrespective of everything storiesof Adams and avalanches of Eves and embryos of cartwheels and caravans of saplings and sandstorms of plagues and fractals of birthing and burying of loving and losing same stories over and over and over again, that the only way to grow the only way to bloom the only way to surviveis Together.

But here we are, sitting on the edge of hospital benches bereft of affection but denying a little empathy, looking for sad death stories in corridors full of cadavers, wondering who would build our pyres.

Secretly waiting for the world to turn into one big funeral house.

Maybe this is the end and when all of these clouds cry us back to life we will know that we were in this- together.

I wish there was a way to gather all the kindness in this worldWhere would we put it?

Would we split it? Equally?

How many scoops would I get?

How many spoons would you share?

Maybe this is not the end and we are here to survive, together feeding each other spoonful sharing a few happy meals dancing until the tears are stopped singing the same songs, telling the same stories over and over and over again on a repeat mode.

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#4: UNSOLVED What do you think about, mother when you stand still watching the cobwebs while religiously doing the dishes?

About daisies in the garden, may be?

Or a past lover?

Or maybe you are trying to say "introspection" in your head.

What are you thinking, stranger when you stare at me in the lady’s coach fidgeting with your handbag?

About my earrings, may be?

Or your husband's affair? Or am I just a blank canvas you are filling with colours?

What is she thinking about, my grandmother chewing her tobacco, sitting on the wooden chair looking at the summer afternoon roads?

About grandpa? Or us, her favourites?

Or the God, may be? Or diabetes?

Father, when he stupidly stands at the foot of the stairs, Drunk and unstable with pity eyes What is he thinking?

The human brain never stops.

So what do you think about in the gaps, the empty spaces?

The one question I will never get overWhat are you thinking right now?

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#5: Home Oh! let me build a place where I can shred yesterday's dead skin, leave behind all the places and people, unhoming everything I called home in the past, on the doorstep before enteringA place I can call mine.

Where I can be naked feet and body and soulan unfiltered bundle of mayhem to unroll.

Where I can measure sunsets in my coffee mugs, Where my heart eats self-love for the meals.

A place like an old bookshelf that has a space for everythingthe neglected, the excited,

the repeated, the untouched.

A place that's a mess, a chaos but beautiful nevertheless.

Oh! let me build a place, I can call home.

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#6: SUDDEN And suddenly, art and art alone has become our survival tool.

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#7: ADVICE How wrinkled is my Aayi's skin like yesterday's hibiscus lying on the fresh grass and how toothless her smile.

She is as pure as a raindrop on a taro leaf and as soft as its tendril.

But when she talks, Oh! she drops truth bombs coating them with honey.

You should learn to listen better, dear.

When you do you'll hear

temple bells from the corner mosque and daily azaan from Krishna's sanctum they are all the same, she says.

Think of concentric circles they have different borders or colours or sizes. They appear unalike, but darling they share the same centre, they have tothat's the only way they can exist.

We are all the same, she says.

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#8: LINES Apparently, nothing in nature is linear I read somewhere.

So, in this changing continuum, far away in the future parallel lines are crossing each other.

That's it, that's all we will do keep moving, one little step ahead we are meant to meet again.

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#9: SILENCE On some nights, the quiet is so loud that you can hear the air moving, this room is now an abyss of nothingness. I walk into the void trough cobwebbed paths of my heart.

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#10: YESTERDAY City lights shimmer on a moonless night, Yesterday's poem suddenly dies.

In a half-built garden an old swing moves, Yesterday's poem suddenly dies.

Spring arrives, A lone bird sings Yesterday's poem suddenly dies.

A daisy blooms, a new song starts But yesterday's poem suddenly dies.

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#11: COMFORT Velutha, The only solace I knew was through words on paper, in songs in Rahel's ramblings and in Estha's silence.

But then you arrivelike a tranquil God amidst a storm surge You, my God of small things You, my God of losses You arrive and everything shifts Solace now has marble arms and ocean eyes, sudden smiles, a voice that reminds me of thunderbolts, it's sweaty nights on river banks.

Velutha, if love isn't enough bury me here in a fistful of sand you stepped onon this boat shaped land we lived on.

Or let me drown in this river you have called your home.

In the feeble moments of our end let me forget everything, but you and this water.

But if love is enough, enough for us to live enough for others to let us live, then let me count the sand you stepped on, and build a boat shaped castle.

Let me make this river my home.

In the moments of a new beginning let me put a rose on my hair and wait for you at the doorstep.

Velutha, if love is enough I wait for you, I wait for our Tomorrow.

Trembling on the banks of Meenachal, Yours always, -Ammukutti ----------------*****------------------

#12: POETRY I think I am the broken child of an unfinished poetry of abandoned words who met each other in the waste paper basket.

Someone, from all their heart thought of them bore them with mighty patience wrote and re-wrote and read them aloud birthed them with pain to find a half dead foetusI must be it.

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#13: IF If the singing bird starts to weep would you ever know? would you even care?

I don't want to write today maybe I shouldn'twho would know? Who would care?

It should be a happy poem with pancakes and warm hugs

or how my heart has found its wings.

But, if I write today It will be a list of artists who killed themselves, which by the way is way too long.

We are at war, me and my poetry disappearing from each other's views the way this city disappears with the setting sun deserting all of us in this darkness.

I don't want to write today, maybe I shouldn't.

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#14: SUMMER love notes on our(?) bedroom mirror slowly turns into dust your handwriting etched in black vanishing into thin air, outside my window a summer sun shines.

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15: MOTHER There won't be a road named after her she will not be mentioned in history doesn't care about world affairs nor worry about this country books never interest her she won't write poetry but there's one dish she alone makes, there is a song I can't sing, love I can't give, there is patience she alone contains, an abode of selflessness I am everything she won't be she is everything I can never be a punching bag I got gifted for free she, herself is a breath-taking poetry my Mother, is an unfathomable mystery.

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16: GREEN A jar of rosemary leaves, or a heap of raw mangoes Amma's wedding bangles or the fresco painting across the hall The Banyan standing tall or the unused garbage bag everything, all the time I travel a thousand miles across an ocean back to your green eyes.

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17: WINDOW Look at us, trying to hold onto something anythingfilling our feeds with diy and movies and music and recipes and poetry and memes work-out routines, audio books

and video courses an endless list of book recommendations, just anything.

Day after day staring at the world moving-on on its own through our windows, desperately clutching our hearts in our palms so they won't start growing fungi, How insignificant are we in this universe?

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#18: NORMAL What are we chasing here?

Ignoring everything we have everyday things, things that's ours.

Breezy evenings, good food, flowers in the garden, books on our shelf, healthy plants on our table, sunsets, a truckload of beautiful sunsets

and quite Saturday afternoons.

Isn't this how it's supposed to be?

All the happily ever after we have read about, isn't this that? to love, to be loved, to be happy.

When did this stop for us?

When did happiness stopped being enough?

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#19: BLIND They don't see, what you see.

What do you mean?

They don't see paint brushes in sun rays or swivelling stars in windmills or a magic wand in a fallen branch or a sleeping ghost on a half built wall they don't see the green in the blood or that hint of black in a moving cloud they don't see the singing bird's sadness or the poet's chaotic madness, they don't see what you see.

But they should.

Yes Darling, but they don't.

Ohh!!! Why not?

Because, They can't.

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#20: FRAGRANT i.

Grandmother always smelled of fresh sandalwood paste, grandfather, too much sweat Father came reeking cigarettes And mother, she smelled like Sambhar powder and Ginger. ii.

Men in this house tell us that they try their best, women pray a lot.

Me and this city, we are in a perpetual state of summer craving for childhood pieces, coral jasmines, and winter mornings. iii.

They say history repeats, I never agreed but I have started to smell like Sambhar powder and fresh Ginger.

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#21: SURPRISE To someone who is about to give up Don't!!

Believe me.

I was there, It will get better I promise you, it does.

All the days won't be same, Some will surprise you, some are nice.

You will learn to accept, to love yourself, When you do, you will be glad for staying For now, hold onto this poem. Don't give up.

You will realise you have come a long way Know this, to become is a tough process you break your back, hurt your knees but you will fight, you'll heal I promise you, you will.

Life will surprise you.

Don't give up Not yet, Don't!!

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#22: RESTLESS These restless days wrapped around me like a bored python on a fallen bark.

When will this end?

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#23: APRIL It was an April afternoon; sky had turned violent black as if to tell us that the universe wasn't happy with us. You had laughed at the idea when I suggested it"this is meant to be, silly". And it rained, rained so heavy that I thought all the Gods of this world must be weeping with joy(?).

I have seen 4 and a half Aprils since then. It has never rained.

The daisy we had planted has stopped blooming, it just exists purposelessly in the pot.

I started using your toothbrush to wash my shoes, it's a little broken now.

I still wear your old T-shirt - it doesn't smell like you, not anymore.

No one asks about you, they got tired.

I think that I don't write about you, but there is a poem about brown eyes and dark chocolatesMy words are caged inside.

April has never been easy.

I survive my afternoons through iced teas while you wake upto a chilly spring morning "You and I. We weren't meant to be, silly" We are now two cities who will never share a rain again, not in this life.

But then evening arrives, A beautiful April evening in my backyard and sky turns into violent red as if to tell me that the universe was angry with me, it burns me whole taking over everything that I ever belied in.

And sky sky looks like freedom I didn't know existed.

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#24: PAUSE There's a village, somewhere in the hidden corner of this world where they don't have internet or television. No radio, no satellites, not even electricity. Every person in that village is happy it seems. Nobody's heart is broken, no one is starving to death, they don't kill in the name

of religion and they never fight over a piece of land. They called it "The village of Joy", I heard.

Every night after dinner, the entire village takes a pause, people stop whatever they were doing and gather around; to share stories and songs and poetry.

That's all we need to do isn't it? Take a small break from our day and fill it with a little art. All we need is a pause button.

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#25: DREAM i.

I am six I chase butterflies and pick wildflowers my dreams are filled with honey spread hot dosas.

"I will be a teacher when I grow up" ii.

I am twelve I fight for a best friend and worry over unit tests

dreams are filled with Amma's helpless sobs.

"I will be a doctor when I grow up" iii.

I am sixteen and sad.

I weep when I bleed and silently wish I were dead my dreams are filled with teenage boys abusing me, they are now nightmares "I don't want to grow up" iv.

I turn eighteen I fall in love and blush a lot my dreams are mixed up and I can't tell what’s what.

"I don't know what I want to become when I grow up" v.

I am twenty-five I read a lot

I have loved and lost I stop dreaming because I stop sleeping.

"I am a grown up and I don't know what I have become" vi.

I am thirty I am chasing butterflies and picking wildflowers.

I wipe Amma's tears and give my shoulders.

I write, I cook, I clean, I read, I work.

I am in love. I am loved.

I watch sunsets and grow plants.

"I will be kinder, braver, happier and healthier.

I will become better when I grow up" ----------------*****------------------

#26: EMERGENCY Be tray al falls on my heart syllable by syllable like shreds of glass stabbed into baby lamb.

Poor heart breaks into pieces, pieces scatter like rain drops on a rock, my floor is a fresh Ruby red.

This is an emergency, I need a new heart for too long i have glued it up band aids won't work this time stiches will fail as well.

Bring me another and I promise it won't beat for you.

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#27: RECIPE They will taste a little bland even the perfect recipes even our favourite desserts without a tiny pinch of it.

Think of self-love as salt in relationships in careers, in life as a whole, even when you think it's you don't need it a tad bit will make a huge difference.

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#28: LANGUAGE Of all the things I have left behind, what haunts me the most is my mother tongue abandoned on the banks of Aghanashini, she waits for me under the shade of sour mango trees her palms full of orange Magnolias. my own version of Shabari but who blesses whom?

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#29: MAP Look closely, trace your fingers on the thin lines those which separate "us" from "them" that tell us who can live where what colour belongs on what land who can love whom where you can build a temple where a mosque, move past, cross the waters think of maples and cherry blossoms or go a little left to cities filled with lights or snow, now all the way to the North pole What do you see?

Battles have been fought blood was shed corpses laid down over and over and over again to draw these lines.

Tell me, what do you see?

Just people as vulnerable, as desperate, as sad as us.

Just people like us.

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#30: GOODBYE To all the unfinished sentences, To half written poems and the other halves curled up in our beds.

To word prompts running around from kitchen to bedroom, sunrise to sunset, conversation to silence all day, every day.

To the lemongrass that became a metaphor and to the silver anklet that tried to, to the ink stains on the thumb to the dark bags under the eye to the unsatisfied sigh or to the content smile.

To all the poems, To all the poets Thank you You have been wonderful How unfortunate that April ends.

Maybe we won't stop or maybe we will but I am glad for this.

Good bye, I will see you again and soon.