Penumbra

You send me photos of irises enlarged
I see points of absences
And slipping light and
that is how I have learnt myself

The light has fallen in so many shapes
Father offering water to the sun

Practically naked

The light has split into fingers and lit
Up your skin marking all the
Off-limit places.

I wrote you little poems on postcards
In my head
I imagined little bullets
In your head
Either way I wanted
The same response anyway.

Practically naked

Reflections where our eyes meet, Recognising flecks of desperation
'Do you wear lenses
Your eyes reflect too much:

Practically naked'

Of course I broke glasses and pushed little cups off
China when no one else was looking
Of course I wanted light to shine
And break against my feet
Because no one was looking
Of course I made little ceremonies

Of Leaving blankets
Blanketed in mirror shards
Because that is how we will remain
Limb on limb,
Practically naked

And yes the light on the wall
Is the trophy I award myself
Because the only other time I ever see light splitting like that
Is in reverse,
Reflecting chain-link fences

And how do you unbecome?

I am trying to make
The last verse
The worst
Happen.

This is the moment
That we capture the sky
This is the moment
We will later eulogize:
sky
Fell into tatters put on a strip show maybe the sky isn't
All about light.

Mapping the Self: Three Points Around Which I Walked to Understand Myself Better

1. Graffiti, Zamrudpur (picture above)

Do you know what a quarter is? 

Currency, ek chauthai, part of a grapefruit 

-Mausumbi- 

Haan malum hai. 

Papa ke paan ke dokaan ke bagal mein raat mein bolte Hain 

'Quarter, quarter' 

Sniggers from four corners

This is a joke created out of the spaces 

Of why they would always sit opposite me, 

Not next to me. 

An eight year old learnt fractions with alcohol quantities

An eighteen year old spelled out

In the retreat of the evening

How he thought it was 

what he thought I was 

When I didn't know what they were talking about 

when they said knowingly,

Papa ke paan ke dokaan ke bagal mein raat mein bolte Hain 

'Quarter, quarter'. 

*

2. The Waxing Lady's Tale, GK1

She's seen her legs the way you wouldn't imagine them.

If you've crossed LSR in February there are flowers that fade 

Come April 

After the flower has been seen.

She is the gardener. 

Pull, tug, tear down, border off, landscape 

Limit wilderness to where you might find it beautiful enough to award it a token of appreciation:

A cup, for example. 

Drink her in slow, 

Because she spent three hours on achieving that glow 

That you're going to give a cursory glance to. 

She's doing it for a filter less selfie 

That she's going to drown in filter anyway 

(Even the golden honey instafair instaremoval nohairdontcare can says 

Valencia)

But just so you know 

She touched her there and there and went down south 

To strip down the Amazon basin

Before you even found your Brazil. 

The difference is, she stopped to question 

Why the basin had rivulets in red 

And knows enough about blades To say 

'Ma'am, aage se mat kariyega.

Yeh toh bada dark ho gaya.' 

*

3. Cosmetic Surgery, Amar Colony 

I bought Whisper 

She decided to stay free 

By choosing an alternative for (a) good foundation-

What you must skip on a menu card

But pause and consider in a cosmetics shop-

Soufflé. 

Each poster said natural, natural, natural 

I remember the ice cream company 

and vanilla and chocolate and 

Placing my arm on my friend's and 

Making chocolate and vanilla ice cream, naturally. 

Woman, subtle woman, smart woman, cool woman, 

saleswoman,

Considerate enough to stop and look from friend to me 

To consider skin colour before 

Choosing what was an appropriate foundation. 

Naturally. 

Vanilla soufflé on skin, 

mixing so perfectly that you

wouldn't even know it was there.

But it was. 

The foundation was always there. 

When asked what was better: 

a fair or a natural foundation, 

She said, 

'Natural, naturally. 

You have to make the foundation look natural.'

Two Days

(For 21/2/16)

Today was a really good day. I mean it. I went around the LSR Campus taking photos as an evidence of spring happening. Later, I explained spring happening to a friend of mine who can't see. Photographs aren't evidence enough, so I made her feel the flowers in the pictures- those whose names I knew. I also told her about my favourite flower, camellia. They break really easily.

Last year, after reading The Narrow Road To the Deep North before boards, a friend of mine and I had become obsessed with the flower. We had a camellia bush in school, which shed flowers everyday, as though to incentivize me to not leave. I gave a flower to everyone I loved then. They break really easily.

My friend promised me she'd tell me when the bush bloomed again.

I got this today.

So I wrote this:

Two Days.

30/3/15
When I offer you camellias,
Hold them like you would hold
yourself
When in the absolute fear of breaking.
Camellias break with touch,
And I give them to you as a metaphor for
Bigger Things
They will come apart, whorl by whorl
But on early mornings, in the middle of boards,
They are drops of blood scattered on
mirrors that ripple with a touch,
The ground rippling with the need
To hold something as delicate as a camellia,
Resorting to its oldest trick:
Gravity.

If impossible is an absolute
And it is impossible to preserve a camellia,
Tell me you'll love me absolutely.

21/2/16
How do you explain colours to someone who is blind?
You describe.
Draw shut your wrist, I'll colour it red with my fingers
Sketching circles with the pad of my thumbs
Can you feel it? My delicate camellia?
The sun looks like this, like my Palm opening into your Palm
The world may feel blue, but it is green,
Green as in you can walk uninhibited,
Green as in the earth opened its Palm into the Sun.
And that's a bougainvillea that I have put against your cheek
It feels like leaves, but I bet you haven't felt leaves
On your cheek at least.
Pinecones are prayer-shaped, like my prayer on top of yours
And the serrations of our fingers
Is what our prayers have to offer.

Think innocence for light,
Think fifteen and in love for the first time.
Think passion for deep,
Think fifteen and out of love for the first time.
Think light and dark heart-shaped drops
Which will come apart
Whorl by whorl.
Can you see it? My delicate camellia?