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SEXLESS SOLITUDE & OTHER POEMS 12/12/2007 2:40:22 AM
A collection of some of my 30 recent poems. SEXLESS SOLITUDE AND OTHER POEMS
1
DON’T CONDEMN ME
It’s still linked but I don’t understand
or don’t want to understand because
I am too much with me and worry
about her dying libido and my
own shrinking sex amidst salsa chill
Bihu fever, Vishu rituals
ringing emptiness day and night shake
the age-wrapped youth for single-edge play
in forked flame carve image of heaven
to challenge the jealous God undo
sins of races flowing in my blood:
I love Him through the bodies He made
but they don’t understand redemption
in churning and parting of the sea
they don’t rejoice the flames of henna
on her palms nor let the lily bloom
in the valleys use the clefts and cliffs
to deface beauty and spike voices
don’t condemn me if I am not white
the water still flows in my river
2
BARBED WIRE FENCE
My window opens
to the back of a garage
where guards make water
at times show their dick
to the maid in my kitchen:
they care for none
how can I complain
if boys and girls make love
in the bush between
the children’s park and
my backyard? They are distanced
by a barbed wire fence
3
OVERLOAD
Goes awry
the electrical circuit
in the brain cells
in my drugged sleep
I utter expletives
unmindful of
the victims:
I can’t help my sensory
overload
4. HAZY SUN
Sweating desire
inhales new sketches
with mind’s pen
on the pillow
image by image
night passes
not knowing
how a hazy sun
rose from the sea
5. ALOOF
Unlinked to the trees
he doesn’t know his family
stands aloof, questions
ancestors don’t change
the mood of the weather:
the leaf reads his name
6. PEACE MISSION
He is amazed to see
so much corruption
in the system
of world peace:
his colleagues envious
of his foreign jaunt
with the UN
and earnings
in dollars, rise so soon
in career and
have the best of
life and style
while I worry about
freedom in Congo
untamed humans
safe sojourn
7. WINTER
The day is shorter
the night longer
and yet sleepless
suffer the dark
in the air in bed
I listen to roar
or whisper of
wingless worries
no high poetry
but nightmares trimming
the sun and the sky
that could never be
8. ABUSING IN SLEEP
The stinking waking hours
turn into solid abuses
in the abyss of head
after midnight the drugged
holes of the mind tear off
the veils I never wore
they are naturally disturbed:
turn sleepless to discover
the stupid sophistry
of a poet-professor
unable to redress
his inner balances
and yet posing stronger smashing
the academia that care
a tuppence for native
geniuses that unmake
the imported mates who
dovetail media to flourish
9. AGAIN AND AGAIN
Again and again
I find myself on bed
my sacred space
but can’t relax
meditate or dream
now fail to have
what I always had
her naked company
with tingling laugh
slurred with passion
can’t celebrate yoni
deep into silence
renewed released returning
without finality
again and again
10. HUMAN RIGHTS
Human Rights activists
discuss eradication
of manual scavenging
and construction of
wet latrines in villages
in the conference room
complain about poor flushing
in NHRC toilet
and routinely censure
the junior staff
before seeking provisions
for rehabilitating
liberated scavengers
11. EYELESS JAGANNATH
I can’t understand
their mystic heaven or thrills
housed in awareness
time’s intricacies
or sources of plastic mist
through mythical depths
the wings of my thought
are too short to climb God’s height
or blue deeps of peace
I stand on the edge
of earth’s physicality
waiting on the brink
with shadowy lines
and curves to image march of
eyeless Jagannath
if nobody sees
the collapse of procession
and the dark precinct
don’t blame the poets:
there is too much emptiness
and gloom to ignore
12. AWARENESS MATTERS
Each death has a passage
to surprise the dead
awareness matters
no solace the cow’s tail
in the river’s midst
heaven, far, too far
13. FROM THE WINDOW
Tall houses appear
to grow like trees from the plane
slowly rising high
people turn tiny
with cars water birds and beasts
in the summer flame
nervously worried
watch the moving mass of clouds
from the window
eternal patterns
nature’s wonder on the edge
a streak of orange
thousands of lights
twinkle in colours like stars--
seat belt fastened
14. ON HER BIRTHDAY
I want the best of life for you
but you too much understand
what I can’t do
you must be patient and do
what you can—
I can’t create the fruits
I may create space
for you to stand but I can’t
become the legs
you must run the race
on your own and be
what you dream
the redness of mars
and the whiteness of moon
merge in you
you have worlds to conquer
and miles to go, my dear
you must rear the goose
and have the gold each day
15. THE DEAD TOO ARE RESTLESS
Tracing the corridors
in my mind for the seeds
of misplaced dreams now turned
nightmares drugs can’t control
no use mocking meditation
Gods yoga or psychic
mumbo-jumbo to escape
the beasts within nurturned for years
now I fear each move
a suicide bid but dying
is more difficult when
the dead too are restless
16. IGNITE MINDS WITH FLICKERS
I read them but my prayers
couldn’t be news of tomorrow
nor could the images mean
surfing channels with coffee
at the day’s end can’t reflect
something positive to take
pride in myself justifying
the age or hours just prolong
the animal existence
prove worse than animals with
smallness of mid and concerns
forgotten like news flashed in
media without vision
glorify the shackles of
darkness bluff God and humans
yet ignite minds with flickers
17. SHRINKING INTO ITSELF
How to weigh the breath
the flame the soul or the ash
the body conceals:
I can’t turn my inside out
nor know life’s weight when lifeless
between earth and sky
it disappears one with
elements quiet
there’s no way to know the thread
or its mechanism that binds
secures life now or
beyond what if I can’t feel
the weight of the colour
on the leaves on tree maybe
shrinking into itself
18. I AM PROMISED A NEW SUN
Walking down a long corridor
a beam of light beckons
from a distant window
up ahead a figure
gently motions me to move
further along the passage
a large oak door appears
etched in the stone on the wall
beside the door odd-looking
symbols from unknown alphabets
I try to push the gold latch
on the handle but it doesn’t
open a golden key
in the hand shines brightly
in the dark I step out
from inside the window opens
to the sea an enormous yacht
slowly moving towards
a mansion kings occupied
with rare riches and power:
I am promised a new sun
19. I WANT TO SLEEP
Living among the sick
and the sickening what else
shall I carry except
germs and allergens that keep
me tossing and turning
from 10 p.m. to 4 a.m.
perhaps from the day one
I’ve never slept well and now
I want to sleep without pills
drinks ‘zines or sex
thoughtless prayerless in peace
20. MET BULLETIN
Snows all around
for the last seven days
no supplies no planes
the runway all white
surviving on their little store
for the winter in fibre huts
bored they drink more often
and wait for the met bulletin
21. BROKEN WISHES
Thrice a day standing
at the kitchen sink she
washes utensils
to save tears and memories
of broken wishes smelling
from the pillow on cracked
linoleum in cubbyhole
22. REMIX
Feeling safe with shadows
live the flickering images
channels deceptively sell:
remote control in the hand
change tunes for songs my mother
hummed and they choreograph
with girls and guys who play sex
sans taste in cheeky zipouch
23. IS THIS ALL?
With prayer’s cocktail
live animal existence
and boast, is this all?
in self-same cocoon
fungus of illusions grow
toadstools of damned tract
24. JOURNEY
Journeying
with no sense of direction
no control over
destiny or destination
I can’t take pride in flickers
or flashes on their faces
in the train they come and go
with the same indifference
shadows of distant houses
hills and trees keep passing
25. PSALM
Where shall I find my rest?
at the doors of Sheol?
in dust? or in the light
of living? standing still
among the ungodly?
to break the bonds and cast
their cords that divide faith
with flattering tongue
turn a well into the sea
or preach hypocrisy
untouched by fire or air:
o God save me from sin
of calling them sinners
and bless the spirit in
time and me that I feel
your healing touch in thought
and bear without regret
the burdens of the world
loss of love, or even hope
to live like a lotus leaf
26. CONCLUSION
I wish I could clean the cobwebs of legends
that veil the vision, moralizing future
with doubtful glories urge us to move backward:
echoes of the dead reverberate; no use
setting the alarm to go off 2010
stashed away in empty slogans life’s seconds
periodically exhumed is a travesty
of obsolescence of the sun ever clouded
Gateway of India or Delhi’s Circus
suffer midnight lust with rites of consummation
like the conclusion of a tragic poem
27. SEXLESS SOLITUDE
I don’t seek the stone bowl
Buddha used while here:
she dwells on moon beams
I can see her smiling
with wind-chiselled breast
in sexless solitude
her light is not priced
but gifted to enlighten
the silver-linings
28. I HANG NOBODY’S PICTURE
It is merely the colour they replace
not the content and make distance
with rickety slogans engulf the waves
that trap tears before dreams revolt
what use lamenting the shipwreck in a void
or braving the moral remains
or the day’s frail fabric in a dead world:
no good as a gauze for the sick
or shroud for the dying: their flags deceive all
in the name of independence
they mock the millions with substanceless noise
while funeral dreams haunt my sleep
I hang nobody’s picture in my chamber
but see their shadows masturbate
in damp corners or seduce in poppy light
the crooks and righteous alike
29. PORTRAITS WE FEAR TO SEE
Culture is not repression
but sublimation through expression
why do they police
art for lesbianism
homosexuality
naked sex or blasphemy?
politics of vandalism
throttles tradition
aggravates baser instincts
do they know their metaphors
defy the divine that creates?
destroys the soul, the vision?
the future is not their high wind
but the artists’ honesty to peep
into the potential hell and
come back with portraits we fear to see
30. VALLEY OF SELF
I don’t know which psalms to sing
or which church to go to feel
the flame within for a while
sit or lie still with
faith weather the restlessness
brewing breath by bresath
I don’t know the god
or goddess or the mantra
to chant when fear overtakes
my being and makes me suffer
plateaus of nightmares
paralyzing spirit to live
and by the promised fulfillment
I see no saviour come
to rescue me when mired
I seek freedom from myself:
my ordeals are mine alone
in the valley of self
I must learn to clear the clouds
soaring high or low
Copyright: R.K.SINGH
Indian School of Mines
Dhanbad 826004 India
