There is, I suppose, a gruesome fascination In watching blood spread across shaving foam: Crimson, then red, then pink And then a dull, gory grey Washed off in hot water and a scar to remember. There could be a different image, a wish even, Of blood oozing from a wrist slit with the razor, As it takes away the stasis of middle-classiyat Eyes glued to the sight, the heart beating excitedly, Till all sound stops and lights dim In that cockroached lodge room. No, it’s no romantic place to die. Much better to plunge into the raped Teesta – Virgin mountain stream now Pregnant with mud and moving zombie-like To her doom in the silt of the Brahmaputra. The train rings its corporate deadline. I have fifteen minutes to dress and pack: The Kanchan Kanya Express leaves at nine-thirty sharp. (Longlisted by the RaedLeafPoetry-India 2013 Awards )
The message is supreme;
Born in the heart,
and lilting itself
from tongue to tongue,
throwing its scent
over wind and wave;
travelling on dots
or fingers
when blindness
or silence bar its way.
It hews itself into stone
or burns itself onto magnetic discs;
it is the message that lives
and I exist
solely to pass it on.