The kerchief mouse

                                            A typical Chettinad family house, Year 2014.

Joy flashes

As the kerchief mouse jumps, suddenly

Looking for who could now fold it

Into a living being

When all go about so dead;

Addicted visibly

To discounted wealth

Worn out shows

Made up smiles

And dressed to shed like the mannequins;

I may be hurt in my attempt

To chastise or tire, to pronounce myself

Not guilty

Of rolling the kerchief

Of making the desires to come alive;

Come and sit then

To let sorrows pass farther

Than you and I can image

The greater part must join

Us from our origins-

Let us wait, together

Preparing food for the dead

If possible

For the dawn to break,

Something to remember the visit with.
 

(The above is the side view of a Chidambaran's kin's family house- note about 9 garage doors, one house apparently has a thousand windows and most houses have a separate suite for deliveries)

Answers that just do not come

                                                        Sunset at Dhanushkodi, September 2014.

Today when the hours hung heavy bind us

As much

And the moments not lived be as precious

As others

What we did not or will ever know

What this hour be remembered for;

If this be the hour that will hang light

Will I stop crying, and how long will it survive?

Will now be remembered for, what we would not have believed

Had we known our tomorrow?

I look at myself and I want to be beautiful

I look at the world and it has been so

The heart beckons to go, stealthily forever

Like the monkeys that watch from the corner

And steal the papayas not yet grown

Repeatedly, and are not afraid to do;

Not for the best of gifts you gave

Not for the best of times I had

No, I cannot stop crying for that, not until I can find why

For the answers that just do not come.

Does it really matter

                                                                            New England, USA, August 2014.

Sisters in shiny green and pink

Sat behind happily, seeing nothing

Nothing, of the long road

Stretching beyond all expectations;

I could drive miles with them in sight

Peace overcoming all myths

Of fashions and modernism

Passing on the values, that mattered little;

If a good journey ended well

If a dot went around as a circle

Or was dragged, leaving no trace

And straight with no retract;

It is not fair, to be ill, and think ill

I may work hard, abound in good

Does it really matter?

When you have hungry people?

  

All make beliefs

                                                                   An antique church in Vienna, June 2014.

I release you of the sins, yours and mine

It has been raining so incessant

The certainty of past seems as dim

As the perspective of what could become,

Have we not all

And have we not had it, all fall

To keep what is left of

Have we none, mere sins?

The music, the meetings, the letters

Held close and cried with, rewritten at times

May be you will, in return bring

Some scattered bits, to keep

A picture, scarlet and clear

Away from all make beliefs.