The New Year dinner Of a consummate winner: The salad is stale But it has brussels sprouts and kale The wine is from a box and is almost dead But it is a great blend of red Frozen spanakopita, the main course, is now baked and ready In the New Year, I am off to a flying start, Now here on out, it will be slow and steady

Unmindful of the clouds, Gibbous and pale yellow, Incongruously cheery, Vulgar and happy moon, Squarely in my face now, As if the nimbus ring were a halo “How has it been?” he asks His diffuse wan smile spread on my weary skin “O moon, today is a milestone. …

अभिव्यक्ति मर गयी है अगर तो सत्य भी मर ही जाएगा चल तो रहा था संसार पहले भी आगे भी चल ही जाएगा अभिव्यक्ति-अधिकार को कब्र में छोड़ आये हैं कब्र को हम खुला ही छोड़ आये हैं अवहेलना अब उसमें मिट्टी उंडेल रही है काल भी सतत धुल डाल रहा है कुछ दिनों में कब्र भर ही जायेगी हम कभी उन्मुक्त थे भूल जायेंगे सत्य की परिभाषा भी भूल जायेंगे स्वर सत्य के भी लुप्त हो जायेंगे अंतरात्मा की कचोट कम हो जाएगी जो मर गए हैं ना उनकी याद आएगी ना ही अपराध भावना मन को सताएगी

The rain does not care It keeps falling A gentle, soothing murmur of many tiny drops And to keep the rhythm, Some larger drops Poems do not care Autonomous, they spill from the brim Flow on to the world On ears, on souls Some slip into receptacles Like fish into the water Dart around awhile Attempting a change of its shape Then quietly merge into the soft same

Midgets atop pedestals of jargon, as giants pose Swathed in vacuous verbosity, imposters! Mediocrity concealed in pretentious prose Their lexicon — the mask, the con, their shield Assured, the plebians with smaller vocabularies daren’t expose Perchance if some do come close Turning even more prolific, evermore verbose Midgets who sneer at us and everything Contempt, the only explanation Contempt explained with more contempt

Data The data I trust In rows and columns thrust Slips through my fingers Stories and Poems Vapid vapors of poems Stolid sediments of stories Their odor lingers Memory Bullet holes in memory For me to breathe in the world Listen to singers

The music I hear is heard by my plants But do they also listen to my rants? The impassioned argument That I made to the tub Was heard patiently, But did it get its nub? Is my chair aware That when I place my butt in it Sometimes it is bare?

वो शाम कुछ अजीब थी, ये शाम भी अजीब है उसके बड़े-बड़े कान थे, इसकी लम्बी सी जीभ है इन अजीब शामों के पीछे ज़रूर कोई तरतीब है हरजाई है कोई, या कोई हबीब है? deep state है शायद, hacker या कोई dweeb है? अनेकों मेरे वहम हैं, उतने ही जवाब हैं सब मंडरा रहे दूर दूर, नहीं एक भी करीब है डर के सकुंचाते घेरे ही हैं अब मेरे नसीब में सब के हैं सहारे, बस मेरा ना कोई रक़ीब है

Words are a trap that most minds cannot escape. The words are inextricably linked to concepts embedded in minds. Once a word manifests, either uttered or in written form, the mind is obliged to track it to the concept with which it is linked and then all the associations it…