Infinity
Hanging between two towers –
a swimming pool clasped
within the Infinity Loop –
floating web – a wire mesh
called the cloud – Deya –
causes architectural shivers
down the spine of an
awestruck spineless city that
has forgotten to protest.
Far below, on a flyover,
travels a red car serenely,
out on a joy-ride,
a tin can stuffed with
two big, two small heads,
imagining mermaids diving –
a walk down swish corridors –
turning the handle into a plush room.
Stacked below everything,
as in a series of tin cans –
the bustees where
all ambitions begin and end
with a pot of boiling rice,
strips of fish, and the
occasional andaa biryani, in
the flicker of a mobile screen.
Deya — a Bangla word meaning ‘cloud’
bustees — slums
andaa biryani — an Indian rice dish featuring the andaa or egg
Domestic Terminal
Words calibrate
the falsities of my soul;
turn them into
pit bulls of terror and anger.
Words celebrate
the hooded sleepiness of my guile
that coils and morphs
pitilessly into a marauder.
Words masticate
dangerous emotions, then
make them harmless, like the
soft plump walk of a
duckbilled platypus
over a deserted flyover.
Words dictate
the recipe to churn
thoughts – illogical, liberal, wanton –
into homemade buns
and teacakes of contentment
on a green striped armchair.
Hand in Glove
I wondered which two worlds
I would swing between, –
On us two supine on the bed,
or the ogre hiding below the bed-beam?
I wondered how wonderful
we dared feel; should we
ride high on waves of shared
footfalls, or be the lazy busy bee?
I wondered how deep we should
dig, to feel the subtlest pain;
should we part to meet again
and again, and joke at a teary stain?
I wondered how crooked we could
be, like a gypsy’s broken teeth;
we could lie or cheat, flick a match
or a knife, to dwell forever in league.
