ASK THE BELLY
Scratch your head
Bite your tongue
Grin
Bow low
Keep your hands tied
Your feet pressed firmly together.
'What's all this?'
You'd better
Ask the belly.
It'll tell you.
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Cheerful, Balachandran V, in English Clear filters
A Conference under the Sun
A weed, an insect and I
In a conference under the sun.
On the Lantana, flowers.
Pink, white and violet
They snuggle in bunches
Looking up at me like children
In awe of a giant.
Thorns prick my fingers
The stalk taut, lean like a whip
Refuses to oblige my hands
Trying to clear a path.
Then, glinting in the sun
This little Ladybird on a leaf.
Legs drawn up under the shell
She sits still, as if hoping
I wouldn’t see her.
Lessons in Love
It ain’t easy to write about love,
The blind can see better than I.
The deaf has ears sharper than mine,
The dumb has voice sweeter than mine.
What do I feel, what do I sense
I do not know what is love.
Is it sorrow, is it joy,
Is it the lust betwixt my legs?
I listen to songs, if I feel the same
I like the lines, nothing more.
I read the books, stare at the words,
Aay bee cee dee, eee eff gee.
Weary from travel, home am bound
Opens the gate- then hears the bark.
A blur of a dog leaps at me
I can’t see, for he licks my eyes.
Sun Shines Brightly
The evening was full of surprises.
Sunshine had a brighter, merrier tinge
Streets were full of decent men
And every woman looked beautiful.
Signals turned green at my very sight
Youngsters gave way, most obliging.
The fishmonger gave a couple free
The coffee tasted so good.
At the corner shop, I read out
A letter in English
To the unlettered worker
Who listened joyfully, as I told him
His daughter will be home for X’mas.
Passing, slowly, I saw me
In the glass panes -
A happy, smiling, me.
Beginnings of a New Day
There were two of them, silent, so unusual
Green Barbets, on the Papaya tree.
A flurry of green wings, heads cocked
They studied the ripe, yellow Papaya.
To lie on bed and watch birds in the morning!
One nibbling on one and the other on the other –
Pity me! The fruits I had hoped to pluck today!
Then hopped down a Woodpecker – what business
Does he dare here, I wonder, this nemesis
Of worms and termites? So do the Barbets –
Awed at his red crest and sharp beak
And how funnily he sat on the stem, so unlike birds!
One Barbet hurried away – the other sidestepped the ‘Pecker
And watched him, like me, head cocked
Jabbing away at the ripe yellow Papaya.
Filled, he left, the mighty Woodpecker
Smug about Signature
Some people admire my signature.
I too do.
The sweeping strokes
The V like the prow of a racing snake boat
The aerodynamic slant to the right –
It looks like a Roman galleon
About to ram into the midriff of an enemy ship.
I love to scribble my signature.
In bits of paper, in office vouchers
In letters to the editor and beg to submits.
Every signature reflects my mood –
Angry, tense, happy, sleepy, sad, content
Confident, shaky, casual, sharp -
The swirls and whorls, the strokes and strikes
Wax and wane in the tides of my mind.
Every signature screams - look at me, look at me
Guillotine
To bite into a chicken’s fried leg
And tear it with a twist of the head
Lick the morsel stuck on the cheek
With the gravy dribbling down the chin…
To light and draw deep on a cigarette
And watch the plume rising
Or the rings reluctantly vanishing
Gazing at the clouds rolling by…
To fondle a glass of whisk y
And listen to the ice clinking
The nip in the air fading
As the cool breeze waltzes by…
To stretch back on the park bench
And ruminate on nothing
Content, still, fulfilled
And admire a young girl passing by…
Spider in the Toilet
In the claustrophobic cubicle
(the reason none other dare use it)
That is my exclusive toilet,
At the stroke of midnight
We engage in a silent conversation.
I sit on the seat, hardly a foot away from her.
Twisting myself awkwardly, I strain to focus.
in the dim light, her eyes twinkle
As the light of the headlamp lights her up.
I have known her ( or her ancestors) for long.
Very polite, seemingly embarrassed
Having to witness my nocturnal
Passage of the bowels, she pretends
To be busy with cleaning herself up.
Observing her through the camera
I am reminded of the many lonely nights
Lord Toad
Why do you, Toad, look at me
So impassive, so self-assured?
You sit - no, squat on all your fours
your warty skin, wrinkled and ridged
Your glands swollen with poison -
Think I didn't know?
Go forth, be not afraid of me!
Go forth and procreate!
For you and your kind, here -
A blade of grass, a dried leaf
A twig to play with -
The shade of the great trees -
And over there, Kunthi, for your children!
Homo sapiens hirsutus
Happening to glance at my left forearm the other day,
Dark brown skinned and hairy
I notice that more hair have turned white.
Someday, if I live long enough,
My left forearm would turn all white
The darkness of my brown skin,
but not of my mind, hidden, hopefully.
Looking at the tuft, the bushy growth of hair
On my chest ( ah, not on my head!), again white ( why grey?)
I wistfully remember how, dark, how black it once were.
I hardly need a mirror these days, having not much
On the head to comb and pat them down.
I cling on (and at times nips at)
The vestige of my manhood, my moustache
Bristling, drooping bicycle handlebars,
The beard I dare not grow
Describe a feeling — we’ll find a poem
Or try: