Vine 1, Vine 2, Vine 3, Vine 4
1. Silvery Groove
In obscure Patna of the eighties, bodies milled before a handkerchief TV mounted high and out of reach. Grainy soccer players dribbling and clashing for the World Cup – harder and oftener than the watchers – wove a carnival-ish scene. The antenna swayed, images knotted and straightened, boots and chappals overstepped, rivers of sweat flowed on both ends of the tube and the commentary morphed into a Samba beat. A college goer’s eyes zeroed in on a stocky, curly player dancing not the Samba but a Tango with the ball. Pressure outed the youngster from the crowd quick but he had seen Maradona. Later the young man would join the millions who samba’ed online with the sorcerer, undisturbed and alone!
– Bolbul
2. Blues Box
I sit in a box
With a solar top
And a shady blue, slippery bottom.
A flappy curtain woven
With a saxophonic pattern,
Won’t let the mind sneak left
While to right, I’m fenced
By strings.
I lean back on bricks of lyrics,
Exposed and red, staring out
Sliding glass doors with bayou views.
A voice that floats
Like a breezy boat
Bobs before, inviting in.
Sitting here, soaking beer,
I wish for little more.
– Bolbul
PS: Erika Lewis is the vocalist
3. Singing Riversides
A peculiar thing about the trace
Of a shared experience,
Is it’s obliteration of the variance
Of place and race.
I repeatedly saw villagers by the Ganges,
Voicing words of these sons of slaves.
Isn’t there a sameness
Here, born of an evening’s womb,
Life mated with earthy toughness?!
– Bolbul
4. Will Corporeal
Her act of overperfomance
In the patio-ed office
And in our mortgaged apartment…
Had a nuclear resonance
With the stock exchange.
I urged her to chill,
Pushed against a tunneled will
But one silent night
My love blew up like Chernobyl!
– Bolbul
5. South of the Truth
Her black face belonged
Less to her than to her race…
Roused mamba sway, reminded
Folks to never repeat the mistake
White feet made.
Not light but lightning
Reflected off her skin,
As she passed currents
Electric, in cycles pianistic,
And sang with a back blue
With pain… in a voice
Scattering quivering gems…
Less for her, more for us!
– Bolbul
6. Townmates
With inquisitive teens,
Across the concrete highway between
A city’s fame and sideswiped shame,
Keisha came –
To my computer crammed room.
She was an excitable fifteen,
Up to San Francisco never been,
But hoped to achieve that dream.
Over six months, her mates from school
Thought me a friend,
Teaching skipping rope tricks
I couldn’tn’t have imagined.
When my research ended,
She surreptitiously sent a note
To Stanford which the go between
Crushed into a bin.
She must be a computer pro
Now… all the way in East Palo Alto.
– Bolbul
7. Januaries Without Me
The sun-stubbled day hugged me with arms cold,
The night took me in a jamuni fold,
Their passing faces bared the truth
That had to be told –
About time’s engaging largesses
To which I may not much longer hold.
Press harder, the pen –
Think of January’s children…
Remember that brushmarks,
Walls to rise will ask for!
To stay relevant,
From apex to the last descent,
Son, pull the wondrous chain
Of quantum entanglements…
In others’ names.
Then the end shall be a friend!
Vanishing, did the two notice assent?!
– Bolbul
8. Christmas Clinks
Growing online,
A clear outline
Of the greenest pine,
Is a sign of our times…
With ribbons running
Between hooks of IP,
Each hanging
A box for the wish
Of someone distant who is
Not expecting… a gift!
There are notes candied
To keep cold from chimneys,
Tinsels of advice
For Snowwhites against vice,
A carol for Venezuelan undertrials…
The tree is loading…
Even as we think of it.
Every year, about the globe,
Ho… ho… ho’s
Shall be heard lots more !
– Bolbul
9. Parted Evening
Cars thumping feet
By buildings lit bourbon,
Horns throwing hair about,
Billboards braided in neons…
Darkeness from the valleys
Shooting hurt in melodic volleys –
That tipsy, smoke-hoarse LA evening,
Holding my neck for a mic
Breathed Janis Joplin.
– Bolbul
10. Avalokiteshvara’s Daughters
The sod even… yes,
Here recalls when the Buddha stepped!
How odd his daughters then,
Weep unblessed?!
Followers lend them ears… no?
Yet pretend not to know…
Of the duties the Lord –
For his folks left!
– Bolbul
11. Kill-a-man-jaro!
A woman comes in the way
Of a man, one movie-scene day…
Much as on a war ripped page
Of a tale by drunk Hemingway.
She stays by his side
Tortured by the twist inside
Her man as he careens
On snowy slopes that take away
Even past lives.
Hyenas cackle at her plight
And love’s messy blight.
– Bolbul
12. Always Goodbye, 1938
चाँद को ले गोद, रात पूर्णमासी
जब भी लोरी सुनाती,
दिमागी पगडंडियों पे, मार्गो भटक जाती,
अरमानों की साईकिल चलाती।
दूर कोई शिशु लेता न जब तक जुम्हाई,
उसकी घटती नहीं तनहाई।
– बोलबुल
13. Social Bee
In red powder puff tree,
A hiding bee,
A friend social apped to me…
Burrowing yet looking around,
Its gestures did confound.
Curiousity winning over,
I sucked it out to query for an answer.
Feigning to fret and on condition,
I shall offer it, my garden,
Said the newcomer, ‘I noticed
Your friend, the Whatsapper…
And risked meeting
A human who equally believed
That life is made rich
By us – the cross-pollinating!’
We hugged vigorously, then wings blurring,
My bosom buddy turned busy.
– Bolbul
14. Sugarcoated Change
It feels bitterly strange
When plots thicken and stories change.
A bar of Nestlé’s chocolate
He had in a breast-pocket kept,
Seemed to suddenly suggest…
A fruited tree, Mayan pride of centuries,
Before him revived,
Brownish memories of a frothed,
Bitter drink the locals had…
In rituals, trade and gaieties prized.
As he unwrapped and bit into the bar,
An unfamiliar, biting taste coated
His tongue between the molars,
He even heard Spanish cries of war
Then silence was…
When the familiar sugary taste returned,
He understood the tale had turned,
And a milky thick cover
Spread over the cacao flavor.
– Bolbul
15. Para-comical Tryst
Those laser eyes lit a childhood thrill,
Cast toward him a hypnotic will,
And when the hands waved…
With a shriek, he became a nine year kid,
Prancing on the streets of Paris…
Wherever he turned, there was magic –
Old arrondissements, walks by the Seine,
Reflections in spilled water and glass panes…!
What’s more, the feeling of being
A foreigner, never recurred that trip…
Mesmerized he remained, until turned
The last page of the illustrated French comic!
– Bolbul
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