Chastity of the world rose like dead fish and
The smell of un-cremated emotions stealthily polluted
The waters that flew patiently beneath the core.

Feeling the warmth of the decaying carcass, the poet
Laundered ceaselessly his stained outfit presented
By his mother at the revered hour when poetry was
Implanted in him with the surge of ‘bili’ lights.

He never slept again, waking up with a start,
Forgetting the jaundice which killed his better half,
Which continued to haunt him when he tried to move his limbs.

A stammer never escaped his speech, but his poems
Overflowed with the love that his mother lacked
When she left him alone with the blue lights, which
He revived unerringly, each time with a silent disgust!

On a day when apathy crept through his quiescent half,
He found a crushed chrysalis in his garden, he looked
At it and wrote the poem which you have just strode on!

Somewhere I have read a banner that said about Sachin Tendulkar, ‘Many compare Sachin with God. I mean he maybe great, but not as great as Sachin’.

Having left the field for one final time today, I try to pay a small tribute for everything this cricketing legend did for the country in the past 24 years of his career.

To my audience who may not know of him, I must say, he is more than just a cricketer, but truly the most loved person in India. And that indeed is the reason why he was awarded Bharat Ratna (the highest civilian honor in India) and also became the youngest person (at 40) and the first sportsperson to receive the award.

When Sachin showed up in the cover of the TIME magazine

Along the unfathomable walks through
Streets that overwhelmed my vehement
Desires to keep track of the moments
That a nation forgets to take a breath,
I found devotees of a God that proclaimed
Neither of the miracles he performed, nor
Of the souls he led onto salvation, but
About a prodigy who could inspire lives.

Fasts went on till the final images of him
Shown on their old yet priceless television sets
Brought (perhaps egoistically) to steal the sight
Of a person who became their lover, brother,
Son, and friend. Even the scurrying rats of the thankless
Slums spread faith today (rather than epidemics),
As he took the final lap of honor.

I felt blessed to find his face etched forever
In my memory, to hear the chants of his name
Reverberating louder than prayers of a ‘holy’
Nation, to feel the rhythm of the spell with
Which he envelopes the devotees with his
Wooden stick, to find my eyes disturbed
With an unguarded sprout of tears.

What happens from now? Where shall the
Countless worshipers go to seek peace?
Whom shall they consult during adversity?
Who shall guide them onto light?
Men may come and go, shouting hymns
And planting hysteria, creating God’s
That are reduced to the boundaries of a
Lifeless stone and charmless shrine, and
Dissecting lives ever more, but a legend
Shall rarely come by again, to heal the
Mind and ensure credence, very unlike
A shooting star, but rather like an assuring Sun.

Footnote
I remember this one time when the Indian state of Maharashtra was having a communal violence which was organised by a ‘political’ group called ‘Shiv Sena’. They hunted down a number of non-Maharshtrians and expelled many from the city of Mumbai. Anyone who stood against them was dispelled from the pleasure of living. Sachin Tendulkar made a brave statement then that, “Mumbai belongs to India. That is how I look at it. And I am a Maharashtrian and I am extremely proud of that but I am an Indian first”
And this is probably why the last stanza may sound a bit odd when talking about a sportsperson, which obviously is not the only thing Sachin have been.

I.
It is a clock, a clock as old as the antique hotel,
Which ascertained the abominable fact that
Two certain hours stood before me for sunrise,
I searched for Earthly motions, for a rustle of bats
Or the incessant chirp of a sleepless cricket, but
The blessed streets of Benares remained in a world
Filled with dreams, desperation and divinity.
In an hour where even Gods in the temples
Took a nod tired out of their daily chores of
Hearing swears and prayers, I stepped out of
The hotel that remained as dead as my thoughts.

Feathers you find on wings of pigeons were falling
From the skies, I shivered at the thought of dead
Pigeons flying around for salvation, a suspicious eye
Searched for answers of a meaningless sight,
My body ached with the rush of adrenaline, my
Legs found the pace that it forgot after the genuine
Rush of hormones during an unforgettable youth,
I ran where my feet led me to and dismantled all
Directions pumped by a frigid brain.

II.
The clock in the alley still show five hours to sunrise,
I woke up, leaving my memories to sleep peacefully
On a delicate bed. Passing through the streets of
Benares which chanted their final prayers of the day,
I felt urged to sing a swansong before the destined hour,
Deep Gharanas and un-cremated bodies blended into
A classical Hindustani tale, salvation begins here.

My thoughts, immune to seeds of rage now boiled
With a fervor unmatched, untamed, it inflamed my
Body and senses. It burned the veins, and boiled
The blood. With a spew of hatred I launched all of
My physical existence at all life nearby who mocked
At my tranquility, who laughed at my innate nature
Of transforming into a man-eating, blood sucking
Aghori. I walked home with a group of paralysed
Humans, and caged them along with my pigeons.

I went back to my bed and threw my head straight
To the wood of the cot. A pain rushed through,
Which reached my brain faster than the noise.

Notes
In the context of the poem, Gharana is a Hindustani style of music which originated in Benares and  Aghori is a fanatical devotee of the Hindu god Shiva.

Each passing second of a prosaic life
Showered me with scorns for not stopping by
At abodes where dreams flew like feathers.

I’m an eternal traveler now, through orbits of
Dreams, on top of balloons made out of canvas
Stitched tight with threads of noxious hope.

An artist was born amidst, he pricked the balloons
With a pin, taking out the strands of hope,
And sinking my life on seas of random celebrations.

Notes
Prompted by Kim Nelson on Verse First at Poets United . The noun artist ended up with celebrations.

This is an old one, written probably a year back. Sharing it now. I always believed that the problem with an average Indian is his addiction to alcohol and exhibition of religion.

A hungry stomach burned,
The drop that sustains life
Remained mutilated,
Smog hid the Sun
From a weeping slum.

To feed her child,
A mother unbuttoned her gown,
A covetous mosquito flew about,
Sucked the mother’s last drops
Of blood with pride.

The child stood alone in the hash,
He gazed at a world up high,
Amazed at the sight of flight,
An eagle soured to greater heights,
The world of clouds he caressed.

His father wriggled in at night,
One of his hands held the drink
That ceased all earthly strife,
The other grasped faithfully
On a jade Buddha,
Covered in pure gold and fat,
With lips that forever sneered.!

Rahul Dravid a.k.a The Wall : Indian Cricketer He retired from cricket recently

Since the time when I developed the intelligence to count, I remember counting the balls this man has guarded off during his selfless workmanship that many adorn by the meager word ‘batting’ in cricket. And to think that I would no longer see him play again shatters my heart. I know the heart is no longer guarded by the Wall, but, I am sure the memories shall live on.

This picture is drawn and painted by my friend Aishidha Rajeev. Thanks to her sincere efforts I could pen the poem which almost came as an inspiration from the painting. Kudos to her and her subliminal effort.

Artwork : ‘Metamorphosis’ by Cris Vector on Deviant Art

People pass beside me with an imagination
Drowned into a shallow pool of vestigial thoughts,
Induced emotions relentlessly fluctuate in their
Illustrative faces which when colored by lies
Gives you a mightier weapon than camouflage.

I see proclamations of fake monsters beside me,
I stop, look and fall apart as a worshiper of evil,
I utter profanity that the hero was always a coward
Who grew devoted to the laws of an insane world,
And destroys the monsters before they break away
Both from within and outside the unbearable inertia.

Keep moving along and the scent of flowers, grown
By a thankless woman who puts her uterus for sale
Every once in a year, greets me back to Earth,
Where stories mix evenly onto the air like the
Unmistakable melancholy of the forgetful scent.

People complain when the innate depression
In their shallow pools are brought onto the surface
Buoyed by my nonchalant allowance of truths,
Maybe it is hard to die away from your pools,
Or maybe the skepticism of my theory is what you
Regret now, whatever be it, the change is yours.

The Mag 188 Photo by Mark Haley